[More detailed review to follow (hopefully) someday. But I found myself resenting interruptions when I was reading this. Highly enjoyable.] ( )

The third installment in the Dagmar Shaw series -- kind of, since it follows an entirely new character. Dagmar and the usual crew are involved, but the first-person narrative pushes them far to the side. I hate to say it, but I think this is his weakest book in quite some time. I loved it as a character study of Sean and of show biz, but I could not buy the plot.

First problem: Four psychos is two too many. I wasn't convinced by most of the supposed motivations involved. Having the "big bad" be some guy I don't even remember being introduced to and have no reason to care about was a let-down.

A much bigger problem for me was that Dagmar has had the law of unintended consequences get all up in her business to a deadly extent before this; we're supposed to believe she's had the attack of blinding naivete required to think the plot as revealed is a good idea?

The cyber posse get some screen time, but as walk-ons; there isn't a game for them to play, as in the last two books. That made me a bit sad.

The main character, Sean Makin, is interesting, not least because he is the only protagonist I can remember liking *less* over the course of the novel. By the time he confronted Joey, I wouldn't have cared if he'd gotten killed. I spent some amount of time trying to figure out if Sean could actually be the killer. He's really pretty disturbing, and I'm planning to re-read the book to study his portrayal. Narcissistic personality disorder, indeed.

I find myself hoping that all of this is actually a setup for another book in which Dagmar will have to deal with the Frankenstein's monster she's just created, either in the form of the network or Sean himself (or both). ( )

I liked this novel in a lot of ways.

The POV character, Sean, rather weird but personable and believable. The secondary characters, too. And the plot is pretty tight yet convoluted, and ends up mostly making sense.

(Mild spoiler here, though it's in the firs 100 pages) One of the foci of the plot rests on Sean's guilt for "killing" a friend. And yeah, the friend died. However, I think if 2 people drunker than lords decide to drive vehicles, and while trying to avoid a collision one of them dies- well, this is not at ALL the same as premeditated murder. Culpable? oh, yeah. But it's not premeditated murder (like others were getting up to). So that struck me wrong, especially as a motive.

Still, a fun twisty plot with good writing and characters.

And I think I will put blocks on the cameras my various devices have. :) ( )

I didn't realize this was in a series. I thought there were some good points. The plot moved quickly. The protagonist is quite self-aware yet simple. There is a lot of satire but not enough science fiction. ( )

Dull - too much Hollywood chit-chat and not enough SF. Plus the ending was a bit lame. ( )