book recommendation

[waider]

William Gibson's Pattern Recognition. Easily the best Gibson I've ever read, and fascinating in both its depth and breadth. A funny thing; I thought I detected some traces of Coupland about it, and in the Acknowledgements at the end I see a credit to that very man. I'm not sure what this says about my own pattern recognition...

Comments

[rimrunner.livejournal.com]

I loved Pattern Recognition. I don't know if I think it's Gibson's best, but it's definitely up there.

I reviewed it for Strange Horizons, too.

[bitpuddle.livejournal.com]

Yes, yes. Great book.

Have you read Thomas Pynchon's Crying of Lot 49? I tend to think Gibson was echoing this book.

[waider.livejournal.com]

Despite several recommendations that I read this book, I'm still recovering from waid, er, wading through Gravity's Rainbow which I really, REALLY disliked.

Aside from the bit where he went down the toilet, which made me giggle.

[bitpuddle.livejournal.com]

Lot 49 is a great deal nicer than Gravity's Rainbow. Much shorter, very funny, and exceptionally well written.

The two books are similar in the exquisite detail of the constructed world and the blurring of reality / paranoia. Good stuff.