Anyone who reads Gibson knows he knows cool. His worlds are full of that intangible quality; his characters make Neo from the Matrix (who could not have existed without Gibson, of course) look dowdy. But this is the first book where he’s talked so explicitly about coolness. His protagonist, Cayce Pollard, is a “coolhunter”, finding the Next Big Thing and passing judgement on proposed brands. Ironically, she is violently allergic to excessive branding, breaking out in hives if she flies Virgin Atlantic and experiencing panic attacks when faced with the Michelin Man.

Anyone who reads Gibson knows he also knows the online world. Again, though, Pattern Recognition takes a new look at a favourite topic. In this case, the characters exist in the real world, but are members of an online community whose group dynamic drives some aspects of the plot. As a long-term member of an online community myself, I instantly recognised the personalities and situations that crop up in any such group, from newbie floods to sock puppets and troll-baiters.

The story centres around snatches of a black and white film that have been released on the Internet. The “footage” is so compelling that several online groups have formed to investigate it, and so mysterious that the groups haven’t learned anything. The plot follows Cayce’s travels from London to Tokyo (a Gibson staple) to Russia in search of the source of the footage, accompanied, aided and hindered by a mix of odd personalities.

It’s standard Gibson, with fast motorcycles and obscure technology. Fun. In some ways, though, Gibson builds the mystery too well. I was almost disappointed to find out the truth about the footage, not because the solution was weak, but because the enigma was so compelling. Apart from that, however, I did enjoy Pattern Recognition.

If you are expecting more of the traditional “Harry Potter Magic”, you won’t be disappointed. There is lots and lots of it. But I found it very frustrating because it just doesn’t go anywhere. Every chapter has its little ups and downs, but the book as a whole is a long, slow climb to a single climax around page 700. It doesn’t read like a novel, it reads like a magazine serialization, where it’s important to have a self-contained, entertaining episode each week. That’s great if you’re reading it to your children, or if you want to maximise the time you spend luxuriating in cuddly, escapist fantasy. It’s severely annoying if you like a book to have a point.

Also, although Rowling plants the seeds for characters with depth, she falls back on Scooby-Doo stereotypes, where sinister behaviour is just a mask for underlying incompetence. She sets up situations with the potential for exploring important social and personal issues, but then turns them into comic sketches, or brushes them quickly aside to make way for cozy normality. It’s like she’s afraid to make any hard choices about where her heroes and her literary world are going, and is making up for this by just keeping on writing. It may be fun, but it’s only filler. There’s no meat in this pie, only gravy.

In this follow-up to the Nebula award-winning Darwin’s Radio, Bear picks up the same characters 12 years after the first outbreak of the SHEVA virus. The first part of the book, ostensibly about the Rafelson family, can also be read as a highly critical commentary of topical Western issues: racism, domestic terrorism, SARS, HIV, universal surveillance and loss of privacy, the erosion of civil liberties in times of crisis, corrupt and uncritical media, and political power obtained without the consent of an informed electorate. Bear hits the point home hard: the vague “they” we fear are, in fact, us. Part two takes a more traditional science fiction route, following the heroes as they make their scientific, social and personal discoveries. Part three is about hope. Unfortunately, although parts 2 and 3 are necessary to wrap up the story, they lack the insight and urgency of part 1, and felt like a let-down in comparison. I think the book would have been much more powerful if Bear had decided not to go for the “happy” ending, but that’s his choice.

Vitals starts out well as a science fiction bio-techno-thriller. Hal Cousins is a freelance scientist doing research into longevity. He raises private funding from extremely rich people with an interest in living a long, long time. He thinks he is very close to cracking the problem. But then he gets some mysterious phone calls from his brother, the scientific expedition he is on is sabotaged, and his submarine pilot tries to kill him. When he makes it back to dry land, his funding is cut off, his lab is shut down, and he finds himself on the run from shadowy forces he doesn’t understand. Where the book goes wrong, though, is that this isn’t Hal Cousins’ story. About half-way through, we’re introduced to another character in an attempt to provide a different perspective on events, but it isn’t his story either. There’s a mysterious conspiracy happening, and there are attempts to unravel it. But too many important events appear to happen behind the scenes, far out of Cousins’ reach, with the end result that he is powerless to change anything. He doesn’t drive the plot–he’s just a passenger. That’s a pity, because the real story would have been very interesting.

The third book in the Ashraf Bey series started well, but left me feeling unsatisfied at the end. The narrative structure is similar to the first two books, with flashbacks providing deep background to the primary plot, and with multiple viewpoint characters exposing different sides of the story. The central mystery concerns an attempt to assassinate the Emir of Tunis, Ashraf’s father. Ashraf goes on a mission to Tunis to investigate this, and also to dig around in his own past. Although both mysteries are partly resolved in the closing chapters, there is a lot of unnecessary running around to get to that point, and some of the plot lines are wrapped up without much explanation at all. It lacks the drive and focus of Pashazade and Effendi. Still, it’s a worthwhile read if you’ve read the first two books. (Maybe not such a good introduction to El-Iskandryia and its characters, though.)