Pattern Recognition, by William Gibson

After I read Neuromancer, somewhere in the late 80s, I started stocking up on William Gibson books. The insanely complex, well-constructed world of Neuromancer and its fast paced geeky action had left a big impression on me, but, for some strange reason, I never got around to reading the books that I collected. In part, I think it was because Gibson's style is to hit the ground running and hope that you'll catch up with him somehow. He throws you into the story and it is up to you to figure out what his terminology means and what the context of the story is. It's a literary device that worked mysteriously well in Neuromancer, but one with which it took me a while to get comfortable. Even though I had enjoyed the ride immensely, it seemed that I was hesitant to do it again. Then again, there was also a strange feeling that I had read someone magnum opus and reading something else by the author smacked of a heresy of some king.

Pattern Recognition was plucked out of a bargain bin somewhere and sat in my shelf for several years until I decided to take the plunge. When I started to read it, I had a nearly physiological reaction to the writing style that I had enjoyed so much the first time. My heart would start racing as I felt excited to be reading Gibson again. Like the character in this story, who recited a mantra to get over moments of irrational reaction to something seemingly common place, I almost started saying "he took a duck in the face..." under my breath. I got head first into the story set in present day and couldn't wait to finish.

A mysterious series of short film segments, which is distributed on the web by a social network, is the heart of the story. Cayce Pollard, a woman with a talent to predict how products and logos are accepted by the market, is a enthusiast of these films, a "footage head". Spurred by her money hungry magnate, Hubertus Bigend, Cayce sets out to investigate who creates the footage and why. In the process, she visits London, Tokyo, and Moskow, attempting to unveil a sequence of small mysteries that leave the reader guessing at the turn of every page. The action is fast and rife with intrigue. The writing is peppered with socio-cultural evaluation and criticism. Ultimately, this is a fun book that sometimes feel like thrill ride and sometimes slows down to let you breathe and to reason out the pieces of the puzzle you are fed. Gibson is still the man.

The Spy Who Came in from the Cold, by John Le Carré

I had first tried to read this when I was about 15, at the height of my infatuation with James Bond stories. I tried and failed never getting past page 50. Even though I was reading Ian Fleming at the time, Le Carré was too different to seem good. As time went on, I watched a few movies based on his books and slowly I started to come to terms with the fact that I didn't have what it took to appreciate his stories earlier in my life.

After watching the first four MI-5 series (not to mention putting another 25+ years of age on), I thought it was time to retry this book, which is heralded as one of the best spy stories ever. This time, I did manage to appreciate the book very much and to enjoy the story.

It's all cold war, U.S.A., Soviet Union, East and West Germany. The context seems very real, very historic, and perhaps for this reason, exciting. The spies are human beings, flawed and mortal. The intrigue is deep. The plot twists and turns, but doesn't leave you behind.

The premise revolves around Alec Leamas, a British spy who runs an information network in East Germany and who lost one of his most important assets. Alec gets involved in a mission to assassinate the man who would have killed his informant. Just as he is assigned this task, though, his life seems to collapse all around him. He becomes destitute and takes to drinking. Things seems not ready to go anywhere in the story, but that façade crumbles page by page and the reader learns that the plot continues to evolve toward an exciting sequence of events. I enjoyed this a lot and will be reading more from Le Carré soon.