Headcrash

One of my favorite books ever. I keep hoping they put it on the Kindle marketplace but they havent yet.

Bruce Bethke is one of the founders of the cyberpunk genre and the man who invented the term cyberpunk itself. I love his short story of the same title which started it all! Headcrash was his first novel and its a crazy ride through the early days of cyberpunk. Many authors and readers take the genre extremely seriously, some even see it as a political movement--which is, of course, total nonsense. Others believe cyberpunk is dead while some purists dont want to touch anything that was written after 1990. In Headcrash Bruce Bethke makes fun of this in a hilarious way. The book is a parody of the most common cyberpunk tropes and he even makes fun of the term cyberpunk itself. At a certain point in the story, the hero of the book, a hacker named Max Kool is introduced to several secret groups in cyberspace. There are cryopunks, cipherpunks, ciderpunks...and the worst of them all: the cyberpunks. This is clearly a very loving slap on the hand to those who complain theres not enough punk in cyberpunk... Sadly, this wonderful book is out of print and hard to come by. But if you can find it somewhere secondhand, I highly recommend giving Headcrash a shot. Its brilliant and a must-read for all cyberpunks!

Headcrash is a very good Cyberpunk-style book, especially considering that it is his first effort. The style is straightforward and much easier to ingest than Gibsons novels, which tend more towards the artsy end of things. I preferred Stephensons books Snowcrash and especially The Diamond Age, but Diamond Age and this book suffered the same problem: a weak ending. I dont know if it is something about this subgenre that demands obtuse/confusing endings, but I get the feeling that it is the ride, not the destination that is the point. I will certainly read any other efforts by this author-- the ride is good enough to keep me interested.

Delightful take on the whole cyberpunk genre. Particularly amusing to me, because I went to work at the IRL inspiration for Monolithic Diversified Enterprises and I worked for a Director who kept a laser-cut, transparent aluminum model of one of his products from his work in the Sanguinary Tech-Systems Division on the credenza in his office.

I enjoyed Snowcrashed as a parody of Snow Crash and cyberpunk books. I do not share other reviewers opinion that it is better than those other books. In fact, Headcrashed will only make sense if you have read those other books.

HeadCrash by Bruce Bethke is a cyber-satire with a great mix of action, plot and humor. Jack Burroughs, the protagonist, is a computer nerd who works for an exceptionally large corporation by day, and by night on the Internet as the too-cool Max_Kool. But, when Jack is fired, he takes up a job as a free-lance cyber-mercenary. The action and hilarity ensues from there including hand-to-hand combat with seven-foot virtual Vikings, Nazis, and cross-dressing mob girls. Bethkes writing style is so entertaining and fluid that you dont ever want to put down the book. This book is like a cyberpunk version of the movie OfficeSpace, but unlike most other cyberpunk books, HeadCrash does not take itself seriously in the least. This comes as a refreshing change to anyone who has read many cyberpunk novels, but despite that, I would recommend this book to anyone (with the exception to young children, if you get my drift).

This is the official notice that cyberpunk isnt really dead, but maybe it should be. An excellent send up of both the oh so cool cyberpredators and their heartless corporrate foes. Dilbertesque management humor meets cyberpunk and neither side wins. Highly recommended.

In a massive sea of cyberpunk books that take themselves way too seriously, HeadCrash is a shining example of how humor can turn an ordinary novel into a piece of literature that everyone should read. Bruce Bethke has created a book that is truly engaging for the reader. One way he accomplished this is through an interesting plot line with numerous twists that kept me constantly on guard. HeadCrash follows the story of :cybergeek Jack Burroughs; a.k.a. Pyle; a.k.a. MAX_KOOL. The story starts with Jack going through a management shake up at MDE, Monolithic Diversified Enterprises. Later on, after Jack suddenly finds himself in a sticky situation, the reader watches as Jack uses his cyberspace alter ego, MAX_KOOL, and an embarrassing way to interface with the internet, to do a hack job for a mysterious woman known only as Amber. Saying anymore about the plot would lessen the amazing experience that any reader would have reading this book. The engaging plot and Bethkes outrageously funny style of writing made reading this book a truly positive experience.

Neal Stephenson meets Alfred Bester and the result is quite wonderful. I read at least half of it out loud to my <long suffering> girlfriend. A *great* summer read.

This is the book that Snow Crash should have been. Now, before I am attacked as a heretic, let me say that Id be the first to admite that Neal Stephenson is a much better writer than Bethke. Its just that Stephenson has a tin ear when it comes to humor, whereas Bethke is spot-on. As good as Stephensons writing is, I found much of the humor in Snow Crash (which was another attempt at a send-up of the cyberpunk genre) to be slightly funnier than a dumb Saturday Night Live skit. Bethkes parody is much more inspired. It helps to be familiar with the shopworn cliches of cyberpunk before you read this. All the elements of your standard-issue cyberpunk thriller are mercilessly skewered in this book: characters who are so impossibly cool that they have to drink antifreeze, the ritualistic scenes of suiting up in incredibly cool cyber-equipment, hopelessly optimistic portrayals of the future of virtual reality, pointless fads of the present extrapolated into earth-shaking trends of the future, and the Incredibly Greedy and Faceless Corporate-Government Cartel that Controls the World. Tom Clancy, Jerry Pournelle, and Michael Crichton are also spoofed. Once again, Bethkes writing style is only marginally better than what youd expect from a bright college sophomore, but it does the job. Now, if only we could have a novel with Stephensons gifted writing and Bethkes sense of humor, we might really have something.