Neuromancer

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Summary: The hight of future noir
Review: Definitley one of the best Sci Fi books I've read in a long time. The action is intense, the characters are honed to perfection, and the premise is great. Remember, this is a book that pioneers cyberspace, and does it very well. The environments, both in the martix and out, are awe inspiring, ensconed in shadow and mystery. The gritty underworld criminal roads that you travel along in this book leave you wanting more and more. The best future noir novel to date. Only problem I found was some confusion in the descriptions of the matrix and the spindal, but you can get by.

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Summary: Technocratic Family Values
Review: Forget the noirish qualities of the book, strip away the wonderful descriptions of the undertow of a future populated by hi-tech drug addicts, and what the reader is left with is a teary-eyed rewriting of Poe's FALL OF THE HOUSE OF USHER. A large corporate "family" has fallen into decay and it falls to our rag tag group of heroes (including a poorly scripted duo of Zionist Rastafarians!) to redeem the family. The computer intellects (functioning here as the hidden soul of the novel) represent all that family corporate unit might attain (need it be stated that the dead mother, murdered by the insane father, programed these beasts?), and they are driven seek this self-fulfilment? Boring. The sex is victorian, the sadism mundane, the dialouge faltering, and the action confused. Overall, completely unworthy of all the awards, especially the Philip K Dick, b/c his novels sought to find god in paranoia and self-destructed among the technological ruins in the process. Never would he have penned such a glee-ridden tome celebrating the potential of technology.

Rating:
Summary: Absolutely amazing
Review: This book was so vivid and the visuals were so clear. You have to remember that this was written in '83 to fully respect it. I did get a little lost in his descriptions of the matrix, but it only made me want to read it over again. After finishing the last sentence, I actually missed Molly and wanted more. I have a feeling it'll be more fun the second time around.

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Summary: Great book, great way of putting words on paper.
Review: The first book of William Gibson that I read, It made me order more of his books. Try it for yourself!

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Summary: It's just too bad they don't get it...
Review: Odd, isn't it, that some consider this book full of clicheswhen the book was written long before the cliches became cliches.It's too bad that they didn't read it when it came out, like I did. It would have definately been a bit more interesting to them, then, I'm sure. I'll readily agree that it's a bit hard to read, at first (I personally read it five times in a year, each time picking up more than I did in the last read), and indeed Gibson's style may seem a bit drawn out at times. But then again, so were some of Herbert's novels. It captured my imagination, all those years ago, and did throughout _Count Zero_ and _Mona Lisa Overdrive_. Always one of the first on my list of recommended reading to anyone.

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Summary: For those of you who say it's cliched...
Review: I agree with the reader from NYC who posted on July 8th. This book may seem cliched, but that's only because it created the universe of cyberpunk, parts of which have become cliche for so many second rate hack writers. When this book was first published in the mid-1980s, it way ahead of its time. Gibson is credited with having coined the term "CYBERSPACE," and with having envisioned both The Internet and Virtual Reality before either existed.

I preferred Idoru to this novel, but as a student of literature and someone interested in the development of this genre, I recognize the importance of Neuromancer.

Rating:
Summary: Second to None!!!
Review: To summarize this novel -- fanstastic! A must-read for anyone who enjoys science fiction. WG has a wonderful imagination...this was the second book of its genre i'd read. few contemporary novels shore up to its magnificence.

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Summary: The seminal cyberpunk novel
Review: This is the book that started it all. Read it

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Summary: This is a true masterpice!
Review: This is a true masterpice! Its like he twisted the pure science fiction of Philp k. Dick and added Hunter S. Thomsons adrenilin and drug abuse. WOW!!! The BEST! BRAVO!

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Summary: My all-time favorite novel, period.
Review: This is it, folks. The cyberpunk genre starts, and in a way, ends here. This book has been ripped off so much that some it may seem cliched, but it was all done better here. What has been most overlooked, however, is Gibson's incredible, and at times, frightening writing style that completely places the reader in the setting, whether it be old Turkey, neo-San Francisco, or the original concept of cyberspace. Also, Neuromancer has a wonderful re-read value, unequaled by any other sci-fi book except maybe Dune. You won't get it all in one reading. Guarenteed. The sad part, though, is that this book is so good that everything Gibson's done since has been kind of anticlimactic. Sure, it's better than most fiction out there, but it can't equal this. A dream of brilliance, terror, and power.