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4.12 AVERAGE
4.12 AVERAGE
A novel of epic proportions weaving two stories, one set in world war II and the other in modern day, with the common thread of cryptography running between them. Gives very nice insights into crypto, and the role it played in the world war, and in today's world, apart from being an amazing work of fiction.
Excellent story, and great if you're a fan of history.
Last night, I glanced at my clock, thinking that it had been at least an hour and surprised that I had lasted that long - usually I fall asleep within 30 minutes of lying down with a book. It was 1:00 AM. It had been 4 hours. That's how engrossed I was in this story.
It's really good. Really, really good. It's a long book, but it goes by at such a pace that it felt more like a 300 page novel than a 1000 page novel. Neal Stephenson hits all of my favorite spots in fiction. He's hilarious. His characters are terrific. I actually had to look up certain settings he used because I knew they had to be fictional but he wrote them so convincingly I wasn't sure. And there's a good deal of geekery as well, but not once was I tempted to skim over a technical explanation.
And now I need to go read everything Neal Stephenson has written.
It's really good. Really, really good. It's a long book, but it goes by at such a pace that it felt more like a 300 page novel than a 1000 page novel. Neal Stephenson hits all of my favorite spots in fiction. He's hilarious. His characters are terrific. I actually had to look up certain settings he used because I knew they had to be fictional but he wrote them so convincingly I wasn't sure. And there's a good deal of geekery as well, but not once was I tempted to skim over a technical explanation.
And now I need to go read everything Neal Stephenson has written.
A good story and characters but more than I wanted to know about cryptology and mathematics. I did like how the WWII story dovetailed with the story involving their descendants in present day, but 900 pages is quite a lot. 200 pages shorter would have been a much better book...
Now that I have finished the book, I'm not sure it deserved as much time and attention as I gave it. I found most of it to be rather boring. Maybe you need to be a math person to enjoy it or at least someone who loves breaking secret codes? Not sure. What I can say is this is not something I will be recommending to anyone I know.
Early on in this read, I had my doubts. About a quarter into it it grabbed me. Toward the end, it began to falter a little. Still, I'm glad I read it. I am no supporter of Readers Digest Condensed Books, but there is so much here that seems almost totally superfluous to character development or the story that I think this 1,200 page behemoth could be pared down to 200-300 pages without much impact on either. That said, there are lot's of basically superfluous passages that I really enjoyed reading. Others not so much.
adventurous
dark
slow-paced
This is a great tale blending the action of the Pacific theatre of World War II with modern day espionage and high finance. As usual, Neal Stephenson turns interesting bits of little known math and science facts into fascinating page turning novels. This one focuses on codes and the importance of decrypting them during war times, as well as the importance of using them in an age of internet spending and e-mail secrets. Great read.
This was so good. I read this right after the Baroque Cycle and the two books complement and expand on each other. This was really a great wartime/caper novel and a lot of fun to read. It's an incredibly smart book as well. I did feel that the character of Amy could have been fleshed out more but I enjoyed the Waterhouses. This book is definitely still timely and worthwhile to read just for the ideas of computers and economic supremacy. A favorite.