Little Brother is Watching You

Hey, quick book postin’ here.

Just did a review that’s coming up for Now but I wanted to get this all out here. Just finished reading Little Brother by Cory Doctorow. Good GAWD that’s one helluva book. It’s a dynamite rocket packed pipe bomb of ideas that is going to blow minds all over town. If you can find it, read it. If’ you’ve got smart teenagers in your life– give it to em. Or leave it lying around so they can steal it. It’s truly the real thing.

Here’s the review I’m posting. But basically– shit. This book reads like all blazes. It’s as much of a kick ass adventure as a really good graphic novel or Buffy the Vampire Slayer. That kind of push to the narrative, combined with the moral weight of it’s character’s mission. Anyhow it kicks 8 kinds of ass and doesn’t stop kicking until you turn the last page.

Here’s the review in the more formal language like. But lemme tell ya. It’s good.

Boing Boing coeditor Cory Doctorow’s fiction used to read like the accretion of ideas more than novels; technological longings steps ahead of their time, with narrative as an afterthought. Well no longer. In Little Brother, his first young adult book, Doctorow busts loose with a propulsive story of teenage rebellion, and in the process frames his ideas in their most accessible incarnation yet.

Teenaged hacker Marcus Yallow uses his knowledge of his school’s security to skip class and run around San Francisco with his friends, chasing after clues in an Alternate Reality Game. When their game places them at the site of a terrorist attack, they are picked up by the Department of Homeland Security as suspects. After they are released, one of his friends is left behind, prompting Marcus to launch his own counter-attack on those responsible: the government itself.

Along the way Marcus knocks against family, friends and an entire city caught up in a Patriot-Act style security gone wild. But the same technology that allows government surveillance empowers Marcus’ mission, as he employs undetectable networks, flash mobs, and online games to rally a movement to his cause.

You don’t need to be a technology geek to read this book—which is part of the point. The secret is its narrator, who in easily digestible terms offers a how-to-guide on everything from cryptography to sixties counter-culture. Marcus’ story is guaranteed to make you think, about issues of privacy and security, the true meaning of freedom, and what any one person can do about it. What’s more, it will give you the tools to do it.

Little Brother directly confronts our worse fears and newsworthy realities head on with the optimism and ingenuity of the most determined teenaged gamer. And if Doctorow is on the money—that’s a very good thing indeed.

Reviewed By Ian Daffern