Rating: 
Summary: Playing 'The Jazz' has its delights
Review: Anyone who follows Melissa Scott's work will know that she seems to write in several 'veins'. This book is very much in the style of 'Trouble and Her Friends', but improves in several key areas. Set in a near-future world with cyberpunk atmosphere but without the usual 'cyber' accoutrements, this book is about people living on the grey side of the law. Keyz is a teenage hacker who has stolen a program from a major studio without realising how important it is. Pursued by the studio, he turns to Tin Lizzy, the women who put up a piece of his satirical writing ('The Jazz' of the title). Unfortunately, Tin Lizzy has her own problems, not least a colourful history that comes back to haunt her. As always, Scott's conviction in the worlds she builds and her skill at conveying it mean the book immerses you effortlessly. Tin Lizzy is a well-realised character, someone you think you would like to meet, but that you would probably hate if you did. Her motivations are clear and understandable, but she is by no means a saint. Keyz never really develops as a character, but as he is the initiation of the story rather than its impetus it doesn't really matter. (In addition, it works quite well to convey an 'innocent' caught up in events that he doesn't really understand). The negative on this book surrounds the plot. It's not a bad plot, and it is sustained the length of the book quite nicely. The problem is that the plot does not require the milieu. It fails the SF test of being unable to be told outside of the world in which it has been set. In fact, it faintly reminded me of the film 'The Parallax View', though I haven't entirely figured out why. Scott is capable of writing top-notch SF ('Dreamships', 'The Kindly Ones', 'Burning Bright', 'Shadow Man'), but this is not quite up to that caliber. What it is, however, is an undeniably enjoyable read and a decent way to spend a few quid. It doesn't, to me, reveal or question any fundamentals, the way the other books listed do.
Rating: 
Summary: Trouble and Her Friends, draft 2
Review: Basically, this book takes the plot of Scott's earlier novel Trouble and Her Friends, and changes the technology a little. Instead of netwalking and criminal hacking, it's about people who spread misinformation over the internet as their profession. This is an interesting idea, and could have made a very good short story or novella. But Scott takes it and makes a thriller around it, complete with a villain. It reminded me of The Fugitive. I have to admit I never finished reading this book. After half of it, I decided that the plot wasn't nearly strong enough, the characters weren't alive, and the setting was too mundane to keep my interest. Compared to Trouble, the tech in this book is peanuts - the computers aren't too much further along than those we have today - and not much else has changed. Such near-future settings can work, obviously, but there wasn't enough substance here. I would love to see this idea - the jazz - rewritten in a shorter format. As the basis for a novel, I don't think it's strong enough; especially not as the basis for a thriller like this book wants to be.
Rating: 
Summary: Best yet from Melissa Scott
Review: I first started reading Melissa Scott when a friend gave me Burning Bright and from then on i was hooked. The Jazz is her best yet. Lots of inventive virtual reality and some really nice bits for gamers like the boy that everyone is chasing is a gamer who just happened to stumble on something he shouldnt have. This book would make a great game!!
Rating:
Summary: Melissa Scott Has Another Hit with "Jazz"
Review: Melissa Scott consistently turns out the best visualizations of our cyber future, and has done so again with "The Jazz." From the effects of Internet postings to the future of gated communities, Ms. Scott has them all in "The Jazz." I always look forward to Ms. Scott's latest books, which fluently integrate believable techno worlds into plots that keep you reading.
Rating:
Summary: Melissa Scott Has Another Hit with "Jazz"
Review: Melissa Scott consistently turns out the best visualizations of our cyber future, and has done so again with "The Jazz." From the effects of Internet postings to the future of gated communities, Ms. Scott has them all in "The Jazz." I always look forward to Ms. Scott's latest books, which fluently integrate believable techno worlds into plots that keep you reading.
Rating:
Summary: Melissa Scott Has Another Hit with "Jazz"
Review: Melissa Scott consistently turns out the best visualizations of our cyber future, and has done so again with "The Jazz." From the effects of Internet postings to the future of gated communities, Ms. Scott has them all in "The Jazz." I always look forward to Ms. Scott's latest books, which fluently integrate believable techno worlds into plots that keep you reading.
Rating:
Summary: Fascinating view of the future of the Internet
Review: Melissa Scott's "The Jazz" is a smart, hip look at the future of the Internet and the future of entertainment media in our culture, and where the two shall meet. The term "jazz" refers to the placement of false or hoax information on the net, which among the elite is considered to be an artform. Keyz, a 16 year old hoping to become a jazz "player", hacks something he shouldn't and ends up on the run. Lucky for him, he's helped by Tin Lizzy, an experienced player who knows the streets, both cyber and real. My only minor quibbles are that Keyz is underdevloped as a character, and the ending is a little too quick to be satisfying. Tin Lizzy is well-rendered, however, and the descriptions of surfing the net are truly interesting. It's not hard to believe that the future Scott describes may be the way we're headed. For another, different version of the future Internet, I also recommend Shariann Lewitt's "Interface Masque".
Rating:
Summary: Fascinating view of the future of the Internet
Review: Melissa Scott's "The Jazz" is a smart, hip look at the future of the Internet and the future of entertainment media in our culture, and where the two shall meet. The term "jazz" refers to the placement of false or hoax information on the net, which among the elite is considered to be an artform. Keyz, a 16 year old hoping to become a jazz "player", hacks something he shouldn't and ends up on the run. Lucky for him, he's helped by Tin Lizzy, an experienced player who knows the streets, both cyber and real. My only minor quibbles are that Keyz is underdevloped as a character, and the ending is a little too quick to be satisfying. Tin Lizzy is well-rendered, however, and the descriptions of surfing the net are truly interesting. It's not hard to believe that the future Scott describes may be the way we're headed. For another, different version of the future Internet, I also recommend Shariann Lewitt's "Interface Masque".
Rating:
Summary: "I Heard a Rumour"
Review: Remember those commercials at the height of the dotcom boom, the ones that showed these amazed, enthusiastic people demanding "are you ready?" in an attempt to lure you to the Internet's supposed wonders? In Melissa Scott's version, people are, but it's hell (many form nostalgiac gated communities just to avoid it). The book is set in an indefinite future America that seems to be a generation or so from now, where most of society seems bent on amusing itself to death, especially people who "play the jazz." And the people who play the jazz in Scott's world don't have saxophones; they have web equipment, and the idea is to spread chaos through rumour. (Anyone whose first wakeup call to the dark side of the Internet occurred on the day they received their first e-mail warning about the Good Times virus will quickly get the idea.) In one sequence, in order to create a diversion at one point the heroine, Tin Lizzy, creates chaos at a shopping mall by sending out false rumors of a new product. But let Scott tell it herself, regarding the ultimate jazz her heroine "Tin Lizzy" plays: "this was something people wanted to hear, and this one, too, was picked up and repeated." The story is told from two POVs, Lizzy's (who takes to the road with the teenager she's trying to help) and the cop trying to capture her while staying on the good side of his boss, who's a borderline psychopath. Scott's prose is spare; her characters seem real; the climax is cynical. Each sequence is a beautiful set piece in itself. Despite the title, nothing seems improvisatory. It's all schemed out as carefully as a Bananarama album, and it entertains in precisely the same way.
Rating: 
Summary: Doesn't live up to its own jazz
Review: The Jazz has lots of well-constructed future paradims, but somehow Scott has not given them enough of a venue to stand on their own. Yes, the web surfing scenes and technology are very cool and well-written, and there is much detail, but the story reasons for the net escapades are so thin that to keep on reading I had to give up on expecting anything from the story. About 50 pages are devoted to Lizzie's plunge into the seamy District, but for what? She needed to use a phone? The book played like a series of vignettes strung together by the tinnest of plots. If you're looking for both a full-imagined future-tech landscape and well-developed characters and story, read William Gibson or Pat Cadigan (if you can find any of hers).
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