Cryptonomicon

Rating:
Summary: a fine work of serious literature for the digital age
Review: well, not exactly serious literature, but one of those books you might come across by accident and discover with surprise that someone has written a nearly perfect story *just for you*.

Rating:
Summary: Mr. Stephenson's Best Work to Date
Review: This book grabbed my attention from almost the first page. Even though it's huge I read it in just under a week. The amazing story weaves through different times while still connecting within itself. I got a lot to think about from reading this book and it's full impact has probably not set in yet. Highly recommended, especially if you like his earlier work. (Snow Crash, for example.)

Rating:
Summary: Cannibals, Nazi gold, and computer geeks - pure heaven!
Review:

What more could you want from a book? It tackles a great plot by developing it smoothly and embracing it with the true dorkiness of a computer scientist. Stephenson thinks that hackers are cool, which we can overlook in favor of other great things about the novel. A great read if you have lots of time on your hands.

Whether you like computers or not, you will like this book. I learned most of my Unix commands from it. Also, Stephenson explains in detail the optimal eating pattern for cereal.

Enjoyable, challenging, and imaginative. If you haven't read it yet, do it now and write an online review for it - .........

Rating:
Summary: Ouch, my head hurts!
Review: In essence this book is predictive historical fiction. In exploring the 20th century history of cryptography, Stephenson weaves a tale of how the modern computerized world has found itself on the brink of a global economy.

There are two plots here. The children of the World War II cryptography plot are involved in the modern cyber-business plot. Stephensen ties the two plots together very well. Secrets revealed in the World War II plot become plot elements in the modern day plot.

The modern day plot involves the establishment of a data haven. Since the book was published, data havens seem to be emerging in reality.

The characters are quirky and interesting. They are not all techno-geeks. Indeed one of the most interesting is a hoo-rah marine.

One word of caution. This book belongs, in part, to the 20th century magical realism school. There are mystical plot elements and a magically wise character that spans the plots. Perhaps a better phrase, considering the technological focus, would be mechanical realism. (If you did not like the "drummer" part of The Diamond Age, you will be bothered by these elements.)

In all, I heartilly recommend this book for the strength of its writing and for the freehand manner in which ideas are splashed acros the pages.

Rating:
Summary: Literary Equivalent of a Cyber-Geek Wet Dream (Sorry)
Review: Got 600 pages into this book and finally threw it out the window. Extremely thin plot, zero character development, and it doesn't go anywhere. Everybody's been saying this is the cybertech Gravity's Rainbow. Here's a suggestion: go read Gravity's Rainbow instead, a real book.

Rating:
Summary: Chock full o' everything
Review: The point of most books is the plot. The plot is a sequence of events that carries you from A to B, where A is the opening of the story and B is the conclusion. The only elaboration may be in the inclusion of a prologue and/or and epilogue. Most books are, to use a convinient metaphore, a book like a one way ocean voyage where you start at one beach and end up at another.

This book is not like that. Oh, sure, there IS a beginning and there IS an end, and there is a plot that takes you between them. But the fun of the book *isn't* in the plot. It's in all the wild and unexpected detours that you in strange and interesting directions.

To return to our metaphor, if most books are an ocean cruise, this book is a surf board: you do end up at the beach, but it isn't a straight and sedate path; sometimes you'll be heading straight for shore, sometimes you'll be swingly wildly to the left or right, and sometimes you'll be under the water without any clear sense of where you are or what direction you're facing.

It's like that.

Is it a book for everyone? No. In fact, the author has a FAQ that does a good job of answering the question of whether or not you would enjoy the novel at http://www.well.com/user/neal/cypherFAQ.html#10

In short, if you don't like long novels, novels with lots of exposition, novels that deal with technical materials, novels with sex, violence, and obscenity, etc, then you probably should give this one a miss.

If, on the other hand, you want to take an interesting journey with lots and lots of (apparently) random detours into a whole variety of sub-topics, then I think that this might be a book that you would enjoy.

Rating:
Summary: Good read!
Review: Not what I expected but I was pleasently surprised. This is a well written story that had me totally enthralled. I was a little worried that a storyline involving encrypted codes and such would be a bit too technical for me, but by 1/2 way through the story I wasa eating this stuff up! I liked the way the storyline went back and forth between WWII and the present day. This is an excellent thriller!

Also recommended: A Tourist in the Yucatan

Rating:
Summary: One book too many
Review: This is the title that closes the chapter on Stephenson for me. I'd enjoyed Snow Crash enough to overlook the accumulating cuteness that gooed up the end, and I found sufficient merit in Diamond Age to offset the even larger splashes of the same defect marring that volume. However, despite its ambitious conception, Cryptonomicon is a showcase of sloppy writing and errors of fact. Even more damning, though, is the tone throughout of cleverness so precious it made me gag. I read to the end out of a sense of responsibility to the friend who placed the book in my hands, but do yourself a favor and spend your book dollars on something worth the effort.

Rating:
Summary: great book disappointing ending
Review: i loved this book, found almost every page to be a pleasure. I loved the length and the complexity. I was, however, disappointed with the ending. In fact, it didn't really make sense. why write this fantastic 900 page tome, and then pay so little attention to the ending? Suffice it to say that the closing scenes and the ultimate villain just weren't believable. it seemed like stephenson was just tired of the book and wanted it to be over. i also agree with the reviewer who was irritated by the loose ends. Who WAS responsible for putting randy in prison? If it is the person who seems like the only possibility, it is hard to understand how he had that kind of power. Next time, stephenson should take a break if he gets tired, but come through with a better finish. p.s. i love lawrence pritchard waterhouse.

Rating:
Summary: Disappointing for Stephenson
Review: I had lukewarm expectations for this book and wasn't let down. Unlike his earlier books, which I think will remain timeless, imaginative, inspiring, and thoughtful (the Mouse Army in Diamond Age is one of the most inspiring and meaningful concepts I've read and made me believe again that computers may do something good and revolutionary for this world), this one reeks of second hand knowledge, macho robotic characters, and cliches. The writing is also not great, reading more or less like some casual email (too many paragraphs starting with "Anyways," among other things.)

Stephenson was trying too hard and some of his examples sound clever but are very one dimensional in that especially irritating geeky way; the self-righteous geek arguments in this book (IE the "information highway" vs TCP/IP [a transport protocol that is irrelevant when considering the effects of the net]) contrast poorly with Stephenson's earlier wide vision views and is along the lines of pointless techno name-dropping. And while I'm hardly an expert on history or cryptography, some of the information presented in the book is wrong (Turing did not invent the Bombes) or even laughable (excuse me, I have to boot up BeOS now so I can view some JPEGS.. yeah right).

If you glorify geeks and don't have that much technical knowledge then perhaps you will really enjoy this book but otherwise I think it is simply a sign that Stephenson is no longer a inspired writer and must now move on to the "career" stage where he is compelled by publishers to write the equivilant of current events mini series/travelogues full of content dictated by his fans. Not the end of the world because I'm sure he still has lots to say but I hope he finds a way to move in a different direction or at least drops the geek romanticism because he can be truly an inspiring writer.