Book review: "Neuromancer" by William Gibson

Reading the "Neuromancer" was my last attempt at "getting" the cyberpunk style of books. And this attempt didn't suceed. In fact, it failed miserably. When was my previous (also failed) attempt ? That was Spephenson's "Snow crash".

It gets to me that people with my (obviously geekish/hackerish) mentality are the ones who like these books the most. So what's wrong with me ? Why don't I get them ?

Is it only me who thinks that a hacker who can also fights with swords, throws shurikens, shoots from guns and talks with gangsta' style, is *not cool*. I mean, hackers are mostly geeks who spend their day glued to the computer. This whole stuff (as in the Swordfish movie, for instance) sounds more like a wet dream of some pimple-faced 17 year old computer geek j*rking of in front of pr0n and dreaming of being *cool*.

For me, the plot of Neuromancer is hard to follow. I hate all the twists that make you stop understand what's going on. I don't know, perhaps I'm dumb, but I was quickly lost with all the main characters and their virtual counterparts.

Hell, I even lost the book's point somewhere. What was it that Case is looking for ? Where did it become clear in the plot ? I clearly don't like books in which characters are under-developed, and one must spend a long time guessing who is there and for what purpose.

The only good thing about this book, IMHO, is its relation to The Matrix. Many ideas for the movie (I acknowledge only the first The Matrix as a "movie") were clearly borrowed from this book. People jacking into a "Matrix" - a virtual reality, through the back of their heads, etc...

So, to conclude, enough "cyberpunk" for me. If I'll want some good sci-fi, I'll turn to the classics - Asimov (thought I've already read, and thoroughly enjoyed, the Foundation and Robots series), Heinlein, etc...