Rating: 
Summary: Excellent, thought-provoking, and an insider's delight
Review: Tautly written coherent, exciting, thought-provoking, and technically right on target. Insiders will delight in the number of thinly-disguised familiar faces. Who can forget the gritty feel of the TWA red-eye from SFO to BOS, with the layover in JFK just before dawn.Thank you, John. Apart from giving us a damn good novel, you captured our crazy world so well....
Rating: 
Summary: okay book
Review: As far as techno-thrillers go, this book definitely deserves some praise:
1) The author attempted to weave a complicated net with many characters all coming together at some point.
2) The book's premise is interesting and somewhat credible (for a science fiction book that is).
Now the criticism:
1) Spelling and grammatic errors everywhere. I lost count of how many times he wrote "therefor" instead of "therefore," for example.
2) The ending looks like it was put together without much consideration and is unbelievably artificial. It looks as if Mr. Sundman originially intended to write a Greek tragedy, but one week before the deadline changed his mind to write a Hollywood happy-ending - hoping for a sequel and a movie perhaps? :-)
Rating:
Summary: thoughtful and entertaining at the same time
Review: A friend who knows the author suggested this book, and I've now recommended it to a number of others. Every time I see a "nano technology" conference I think of it. The story is clear and engaging, with enough twists to lend some interest and keep you thinking. A few more twists and I'd call it Pynchonesque. There are parts that get a bit silly and over the top (the comparison of Bill Gates and Saddam Hussein), but going over the top every now and then can be fun. If you live in the 128 area, silicon valley, or any place that has decided to call itself the silicon something (alley, village, shopping mall, whatever), you should pick this up and read it. Then look around and see if you see some of what is in here going on in this book around you.
Rating:
Summary: Intellectually challenging techno-thriller
Review: So you enjoy novels like, say, Cryptonomicon? You can pick Vernor Vinge out of a crowd? Acts of the Apostles is just what you're looking for. It takes you to the dark side of the computer revolution, where nothing is as it seems and no one is as they seem. Sundman is an outstanding writer who can do more than paint a picture in your mind -- he can start a cinema sequence rolling. So, has someone in Hollywood optioned this property? Enquiring minds want to know!
Rating:
Summary: Engrossing, hip, significant, and mega-geeky - GREAT!
Review: 'Acts of the Apostles' reminds me of a couple other recent books on similar themes -- Neal Stephenson's 'Snow Crash' and John Barnes's 'Candle', both of which are excellent! The common theme in these three works is possibility of merging computer technology with the human mind to yeild ... a higher level of consciousness? A new form of mind control? World peace? Universal slavery? I view 'Acts' is a very worthy contribution to that science-fictional dialog. The characterization and plotting in 'Acts' is really good. The strength of any story -- including science fiction -- lies not in the futuristic sci-fi speculations, but in the human elements, and 'Acts' does not disappoint. The editing is notably bad, but if you don't mind interpolating an omitted word here and there, or ignoring a few repeated words, you'll enjoy the ideas and the characters beneath the words. Finally, female readers might not buy the parts that are written from a female POV -- women admiring their own breasts, that sort of thing, as written by a straight male. Yet still, the female characters also struck me as fleshed-out, complex characters with a realistic inner life, so perhaps the female POV critique is just a nit. If you like good science fiction, then purchase and enjoy!
| 
