5 comments about The Termination Node.

1. The Termination Mode makes it clear that although the story is fiction, it could really happen. It's non-stop action kept me reading from page 1 to the end. I especially liked the creative character names, which added a touch of humor to this very believable tale.



2. I picked this up from the new fiction books section in one of my University's libraries. I agree with the other reviewers that the book does have an interesting plot and the characters are somewhat realistic. The big however is that this book is written on what appears to be a junior high level. It reminds me of the easy reader book series that I had to read when I was quite small. I have by no means a strong vocabulary, but I struggled very hard to find a single word in the book I did not know. I understand that the author is a computer professional and not an english major, but this was a far cry from an adult level book. It would be better suited for a "young adult" section of a public library.



3. If you're reading this review, you've probably read this book before. Just under a different title, and by a different author.

   There are at least a half-dozen fairly popular books that have all followed this same formula before, and it's starting to wear a little thin. Brilliant hacker who lives in California (doesn't everyone live in CA?) gets caught up in some kind of major computer-crime incident, inevitably involving all the TLA government spook agencies (FBI, CIA, NSA, etc., although this book goes one better and even invents its own such agency: The ISD, or Internet Security Department), and manages to single-handedly solve everything by breaking into seemingly every computer on the planet.

   The Termination Node stands out in my memory, though, as the most tech-heavy of the techno-novels I've read. The authors aren't afraid of showing you command-line entries where they use commands like netstat or ping, which seems kind of refreshing, since it seems to indicate that the authors actually know something about computers. (Actually Lois Gresh is allegedly a real-life computer expert, which is probably what makes the difference.)

   But what makes this book so incredibly annoying, so exasperatingly stupid, is how easily the protagonist can crack into systems. She uses a variety of tricks which almost sound sort of plausible because they borrow from some real-world elements, but are just plain dumb when you think about it. A great example of this is the "blue box" which she uses at one point while making a phone call. No, she's not using it to make a 2600 Hz tone; The "blue box" in this book is a device which makes your phone number untraceable, by using loop lines. Huh? How are loop lines (which really do exist, and really are used for testing purposes as the book states) supposed to help you prevent someone from tracing your phone number? If you have any idea what the authors are talking about, this kind of impossibility just makes you want to scream. And if you don't understand the techno-talk, then the book will fly right over your head anyway and you won't enjoy it.

   It really illustrates a serious problem authors have when they try to create a book like this: The need to strike a balance between actually sounding technological, and being appealing to a broad audience. I appreciate this difficulty, and the book does try hard to do the impossible. Ultimately it was a fun read, which is why I'm giving it 3 stars.




4. I'm a techie...this is an enjoyable novel for a techie...check it out...



5. I read this book when it came out in 1999 and thought it was an entertaining but unrealistic view of the future of computers. I found it interesting that many of the reveiwers claimed they knew so much about computers and all of them seemed to think that the authors' predictions were way out of line. Several of the reviewers went out of their way to point out how much smarter they were than the two writers who had composed the book. Well, all of those hot-shot reviewers are gone and so is their laughter. During the past several years, this book has become famous as the most accurate account of computer crime ever to appear in a novel.

   Recently, the Federal Government released a report stating that over $2 billion had been stolen over the internet by hackers breaking into personal accounts and stealing money from everyday people. That's when I re-read THE TERMINATION NODE and discovered that Gresh and Weinberg had predicted all of the recent problems involving internet robbery five years ago. Though the book never received much coverage in science sections, it should have been on the front pages of newspapers throughout the country. Most citizens still have no idea how vulnerable their bank accounts are to hackers. Maybe it'll take a $50 billion dollar heist like the one in this book to convince everyone that they need to protect their internet investments better. This is a book every person worried about 21st century crime should read!

3 comments about Flame War: A Cyberthriller.

1. Flame Wars is just OK. The tech is good, the dialogue is flip, and the story has been done before.

   Slacker Harry newly graduated from law-school just meets the beautiful daughter of the scientist then he gets blown-up. The scientist dies in the explosion. With nothing else to do, he decides to solve the mystery of the scientists murder and win the girl. This leads him to a serial murderer and a plot involving a Clipper-like national encryption standard.

   The best part of the story was the dialogue. It was hip, and flip. In addition, the author's had their tech straight. Although, I think the scientist's daughter did end-up going on-line in a pizza parlor without a phone connection (or a cell modem) at least once. I also doubt you can squeeze enough C4 inside a 3.5" floppy to create a weapon of mass destruction.

   The problem I had was the story had been told before. There was nothing new in the way it was told. In addition, the characters did not have enough spin to escape cliché. Except for characters getting sliced-and-diced, I'll have to agree with the Kirkus review, that this book would appeal more to Young Adults.

   Read this book, if you want to catch-up on the (now defunct) Clipper national encryption issue without getting technical..




2. _Flame War_ was unimpressive and dull, though it had a few brief moments of enjoyment buried in it. Cute, stereotyped characters (pudgy, asocial hacker; beautiful female geek; clueless man w/ heart of gold) and poorly planned plot devices (going online without modems/getting diskettes in the mail/being blown up by diskettes with C-4), and maddeningly slow pacing make this book resemble a bowl of porridge rather than the spicy curry of intrigue the jacket promises.

   Protagonist Harry Garnet, law student-cum-caretaker, provides a style of narration that seems at first silly and flip, then gratingly cutesy. However, the dialogue in general is better than average. Another point in _Flame War_'s favor is its near-accurate depiction of MOOs and MU*s in general.

   All things considered, though, you'd do well to wait this one out and hope for a more savvy treatment of the 'cyberthriller' premise.




3. a pleasant surprise, not what I was expecting. slow in a few parts but never enough to put down for long. interesting political viewpoints as well. recommended.

No comments about Insuring information security. (Tech Talk).(Brief Article): An article from: Security Management.

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1 comments about Interrupt.

1. Although the book starts out a little tedious, with too much time spent discussing the villain's headache, it builds into a much more interesting theme as it goes on. The last two thirds is very interesting, especially as the phone company gets into fighting the problems created by someone trying to shut down the phone lines. Although the rescue of the hero's son, added to the action part of the book, it was a little odd. Overall, I felt that the book was worth the time spent reading and would recommend it.

5 comments about Bad Memory.

1. Bad Memory is about Simtec (like Dell); big co. selling network cards and PCs, etc, and a hacker, hektor (spelled w a K, yeah cheesy I know) comes in and goes throug their inventory database and mixes up the orders.

   So a client gets the wrong PCs delivered from Simtec and shoots himself. It's stretching credibility a bit. i mean 'excuse me but we're talking wrongly delivered PCs here ok. So the guy's a little loony we're told but still... And this comes in the first 10 pages and supposed to set the pace for the rest of the book.

   I flipped through looking for good bits, but there little suspense or tension to recommend this.

   No doubt the guy's really into the technical stuff but still prety amateurish to computer literate readers; I mean using Netwrok batch commands to mess up Simtec's system? :-)

   No didnt buy the book. Got it from the library.




2. What can I say? Exciting plot, good characters, and an accurate ambiance both within the offices and around the sprawling environs of the countries fourth largest but still somewhat provincial city. If Trollope were working for the US Post Office today, I imagine something like Franklet's Bad Memory would be the result.



3. One of my favorite genres is the techno-thriller. When done well, there is a satisfying feel of surgical precision and great cleverness. "Bad Memory" does not fill the bill. It is a sprawler with a mass of corporate types and thugs. The premise is industrial espionage of a huge computer company.

   The characters are flat and uninteresting. So many threads are begun, and then curiously dropped and never explained. The daughter of the hero is very slow in school causing her parents great worry. We never find out if the child is a late bloomer, retarded, or emotionally upset. It is dropped. The number one villain has a father obsession. We never find out why or who the father is. The corporate bad guy might as well wear a sign around his neck that said "I did it." The story line has little coherence.

   The book was written in 1996, and seems oddly dated. There are pages and pages of computereeze and most of the strategies seem obsolete. Realize that tremendous changes have taken place in the computer industry, but a techno writer should not inhibit himself to what is 1996 cutting edge. A discussion between two techs endorses the plan to give the big boss 32 mgs of memory. Today 128 mgs is common and 256 mgs is the farsighted choice. The cell phones are primitive and fiber optics are unmentioned. A true computer maestro, which I am definitely not, would find the book frustrating. I did not expect the author to be clairvoyant, but I did expect him to have brilliant solutions and some futuristic capabilities.

   This is Mr. Frankjet's first novel, and I don't think he received the editing necessary to tighten up and give his book more focus. I do not recommend the book.




4. The subtitle ~ "a novel of suspense" ~ says it all; the suspense here was excellent; actually, i had to stop reading a couple of times close to the end to catch my breath, and that doesn't often happen to me. The story of a blackmail attempt at a large computer manufacturing company, this book quickly leads you to wonder just how accurate it is, how likely such blackmailing is to happen ~ where has it happened? ~ and how well protected against such disasters are most companies, computer operations or not. Franklet seems to know computers and operating systems; to my ear nothing rang untrue, which is important for the flow of a complex and specialist plot like this one. Not only did he get his ducks in a row though (has he done this himself?), but he can draw characters in a believable way, suggesting an ability to continue his success here with more works, though perhaps with a different cast and plot. I shall watch for his name again, see if he can repeat.



5. I can say that if your not an IT person, you may fnd the book utterly boring. Since I am a Network Administrator, I can say there is a lot of terminology in the book that probably a vast majority will not understand. Packets? Modems? Ethernet? ..well if these words mean nothing, drop the book and walk away immediately. Also the technology was dated, and will be mildly amusing to those in-the-know. I had some laughs about it. The author could have easily skipped numbers and just used the name brands -i.e. 32 megabytes of Ram, and just said -add Ram. I read another review about how how some auther have to give a biography on every person in the book when introducing a new character - Im going to have to agree with that; it's boring at sometimes to read extra pages on someone who isn't in the book much. The book did dry's times but would still make a decent Sunday Night Movie if it contaned a little more action.
   Overall a good book and the last 100 pages hold on your hat because it goes fast.
   *1 Star lost for not tying up some loose ends
   *1 Star lost for massive IT terminology. Not an easy read for those not in the profession at times.

No comments about High-Tech Holmes.(criminal investigation of computers): An article from: Security Management.

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