Digital Fortress: A Thriller [Hardcover]

A very gripping read! Mr. Brown writes in a way that keep you wanting to know what happens next. I have read his other books and can't wait for his newest. I can recommend this to everybody who likes adventure and thrilling stories.

The book starts off as a cheesy romance (and flutters in and out of that mode between its various changes of Point of View), and ends by making hackers, certain educators and the NSA look like incompetent fools. If you're fighting the clock for something you truly believe is important, are you really going to dance around the answer in a halfhearted attempt at flirting?

There is a Linguist in the book. He is the stereotypical sort who knows multiple languages and can speak them in any dialect he needs at whim. While these people do exist, like the beautiful genius, it's more a series of a "look how special this character is!" moments for me as a reader. There are also many times in the book where a character will say something in one language followed by the same thing in English. I am never sure if the author meant that these characters were speaking both languages, or if he didn't feel like taking the translation (there for the reader's sake) out of the dialogue.

There are so many laws, International and American, broken by characters in this book in the name of "National Security" that it made me a little sick to think that anyone would just set out one day and decide that their country is above all others in importance and the extent to which it can defend itself.

Purporting the "you have nothing to fear unless you're a danger" mentality from the point of view of the NSA character, the book does not present any opposing views to this dangerous mindset. After all, who decides who is dangerous? As a very minor mantra in the book, the question is posed: Who will guard the guards? No answer is given, of course, and an instance of rather poetic justice is painted as the vilest of evils.

Unless you really want to read a novel that describes a woman in a way that suggest a good part of her character was created to allow the reader to mentally ogle her, see a pair of adults act like hormonal teens, have a cluster of characters live by "the ends justify the means" and see yet another coincidence pop up every few scenes, I'd suggest you steer clear of this book.

I couldn't give it just a single star, though, as it does have some good moments and a very small bit of historical information on codes and code breaking that might interest some readers.

After enjoying Da Vinci Code I was excited to see this one on the shelf. The excitement didn't last 10 pages. If you know nothing about software this might be a good read. However if you know even a tiny amount the errors are so glaring that the most strenuous attempt to "suspend disbelief" fails. I expected better from Dan Brown. Add that to the weak and silly plot contrivances and flat characterizations I finally put the book down half read, something I never do. This is an adventure/thriller and my standards are not high there but this book fails to meet even that minimum.