(no subject)

[saint_monkey]

I just finished the "Cryptonomicon." If you haven't read it, and you like a Clancey or Cussler styled adventure, but written properly, then this is for you. It's almost ridiculously nerd handed (including graphs of character's sexual activity,) and overly paranoid (with characters encrypting everything for fear of infiltration and exploitation by nefarious corporate and government elements, at one point a conversation is encrypted using a game of solitaire, with the deck as originally arranged being the "key" and the cards layed out on the floor as the message.) But never fear, the math and related physics concepts are expressed incredibly simply in the text that follows them, and anything that looks like it might be too complex, can simply be skipped, because it is often just in the text for "color." A good read. Dense, but you hardly notice it.

Now I'm working on China Mieville's "Scar," but I'd love any recommendations.