Deadly Perversions

twos writes "I just read the newly released novel Deadly Perversions, by 2002 ComputerWorld Top 100 IT Leader , well known computer columnist for eWeek, and now author Brett Arquette. The book really rocks with a real virus that's spread via hardware/software during 3D Cybersex encounters. Poof! Kills you in 72 hours." Read on for the rest of twos' review. Deadly Perversions author Brett Arquette pages 406 publisher Lighthouse Press, Inc. rating Excellent & Refreshing. Can't wait to read his next book reviewer twos ISBN 1932211004 summary Deadly virus is spread internationally via the use of Cybersex software/hardware.

This wild novel has a great caricature of Howard Stern and his crew. If you love Howard, he's in the book. If you hate him, Arquette kills him off in chapter 15 (and quite violently I may add). Lots of good computer stuff in it for bit-heads. Tons of Cybersex for chick-heads. It's written in a fascinating self-effacing style where there are just as many laughs to break up the tension as there are chills. I highly recommend this read for anyone under 40. Over that, (unless you're somewhat feral) I don't think you'll get it.

I can't think of a way to traditionally walk you through the book and summarize it, because there are simply too many subplots and wacky characters to do a scene-by-scene breakdown, so if that's what you're looking for it's best to read the back cover of the book.

I'd like to concentrate on Arquette's writing style, which is so unique that I feel there are many reasons this book will become a breakout cult classic bestseller.

First, the novel moves at the speed of light, short, quick, entertaining chapters that keeps you flipping pages trying to find a stopping point, but to no avail. I found I had read half of it before even realizing I had spent hours doing so.

Second - it's fun! How many books can you say were really fun to read, especially fiction thrillers that spend half the time describing characters that get violently killed off right after you get to know them. Arquette's book has zero fluff in it. He has traded in the violence for sex (one of the two are a must for any best selling novel), yet he wrote the book in a way where it doesn't take itself too seriously. I found myself laughing my ass off many times, wondering if this was a thriller or a comedy, but Arquette structured the chapters so the laughs come in just where they're needed, cutting some tension, allowing the reader to take a breath before being consumed in the plot, yet again.

Third - Arquette keeps you guessing. Just when you think you have it figured out, another twist pops up, another character is introduced, and another finding from the CDC comes out, which leads you off in another directly. If you've read the first 21 chapters off his website (for free) don't presume to think you've actually read any of the book or could guess the ending. Not possible unless you have a crystal ball running Linux.

Fourth - It's written in a style I've never read before. I can't compare Arquette to any other writer, which in itself is something of an accomplishment. There are so many authors whose work just blends in with others until their styles all seem the same. Arquette's style, however, is smart and blunt. Where other authors imply things, Arquette writes them in black and white. He takes on subject matter that other authors would just assume leave alone, yet does a wonderful job of spinning it so the characters actions seem perfect reasonable to the character himself.

And lastly, there is freshness in the author's soul, and he writes young, as if he's catering to an 18 through 39 demographic. Most best selling author's are over forty and really don't write their books for the 'instant gratification' world the younger generation is experiencing. For example, books such as Stephen King's bloated 900-page Dream Catcher would have been a tight and quick 400 page novel if Arquette had written it.

I also like Arquette's website and the fact that he's determined to let readers download and read roughly a third of each of his books, before you buy. Some authors let you read a few pages, maybe a few chapters, but Arquette believes if you are going to shell out $15 bucks for a book, you should be able to read enough of it to really know it's something you want to purchase. It will be interesting to see how long his editors let him get away with that, but I find it refreshing that he has that mindset.

You can purchase Deadly Perversions from bn.com. Slashdot welcomes readers' book reviews -- to see your own review here, read the book review guidelines, then visit the submission page.

Comments

linux perversions

[ErikRed1488]

I was just explaining to my co-irker how to mount a floppy drive in linux. Every time I said "mount" he laughed. He said I had "an unhealthy obsession with technology." Two minutes later I go to /. and find this article. This is some kind of strange cosmic coincidence right?

RIAA?

[Lxy]

real virus that's spread via hardware/ software... Poof! Kills you in 72 hours."

Just Wait til the RIAA tries to implement this "copy protection scheme" MWHAHAHAHAHA....... :-)

where have I heard that before

[night_flyer]

death after viewing something on the internet...

hmmm...

oh yeah... Fear Dot Com

Re:where have I heard that before

[runswithd6s]

hmmm... oh, yeah...

Stephenson, Neal, "Snow Crash", Bantam Books, Inc. 2000, ISBN 0553380958.

IMHO, a far better read than smut.

From the review ...

[Daniel Dvorkin]

How many books can you say were really fun to read, especially fiction thrillers that spend half the time describing characters that get violently killed off right after you get to know them.

Um ... most of the books I read? (In other words, things that aren't textbooks or technical references -- although even those can be fun to read if they're written by good enough authors, e.g. Elizabeth Castro or Theo Petersen.) I read a lot for fun, and many of the books I read are, in fact, violent science fiction thrillers. I'm sure the reviewer didn't mean to come off this way, but what the line I quoted says to me is, "I'm someone who hardly ever reads for fun, so you should take my fiction reviews reeeaaally seriously." Someone who doesn't realize that there are a whole lot of fun-to-read books out there is someone whose opinion I have a hard time respecting.

A better story exploring these ideas..

[SiW]

..would be Snow Crash. Alright, alright, so I haven't read Deadly Perversions, but doesn't it sound a bit cheesy? 3D cybersex gives you an STD? Whereas the Snow Crash virus tries to propogate through several means.

Besides, Neal Stephenson is cool, we all know that.

Re:Please don't take this the wrong way

[Kenneth Stephen]

Thats ridiculous. Your argument could also be directed to science-fiction writers in general : "If you love science so much that you spend all day writing about it, why dont you do science?". Well, the answer is often that it is very rare that a good scientist can write about science well and it is also rare that a good writer can do good science. So why not have writers write about science?

this reminds me of that crappy 'tekwar' series

[FreeUser]

"She was killed by that computer virus." Good god.

The show sucked regardless (perhaps even more than this book apparently does), but with that line it surpassed my tolerance threshold and I summarilly shut it off (and have studiously avoided it since). What utter crap ... and now the same nonsensical garbage is being lauded in a book?

Please.

Its hard enough to educate people that computer viruses aren't real viruses, that memory (RAM) is volitile storage lost upon shutdown, while the hard drive ("memory" as it is called by some) is persistent, etc. etc.

We are already dealing with an abysmal state of computer literacy ... and while science fiction and fantasy often takes liberties with the possible and probably, spewing utterly nonsensical tripe like that IMHO simply requires too much of a suspension of disbelief to even be worthwhile, while alas preying on the illiteracy of others and clouding their understanding of real technologies further.

The very, very worst of what science fiction can be (in stark contrast to Greg Egan's works, which educate as well as entertain, and often expand your imagination in the process, and to plenty of other speculative works that don't educate, but do entertain and at least don't misinform and cloud real issues in the process).

Thanks, but I'll give this one a miss.

Uh-oh.

[orthogonal]

Fourth - It's written in a style I've never read before. I can't compare Arquette to any other writer, which in itself is something of an accomplishment.... Where other authors imply things, Arquette writes them in black and white.

Uh-oh. Either:

the reviewer doesn't read a lot, or

Arquette has figurted out something that Dante, Shakespeare, Milton, and Pynchon missed, or

Arquette's writing is a bad attempt a creating a 'new style', apparently ("Where other authors imply things, Arquette writes them in black and white") short on subtlety and long on pure exposition: "See Dick. See Jane. See Dick run."

I am not a demographic

[ENOENT]

To summarize the review:

Like, dude, it's targeted at the 18-39 demographic! And it has, like, really short chapters! And all the sentences are short, too! None of the characters are around for longer than 6 pages! And, check this out, you don't have to look up any hard words in the dictionary! It's like MTV, only on paper! Not at all like books by inaccessibly cerebral authors like Dr. Seuss...

Perhaps the reviewer doesn't realize that some people in the 18-39 demographic are still able to enjoy books that aren't written to the same spec as the latest mindless blow-em-up action flick. Some of us even read books that don't have pictures in them, on occasion. There are even a few of us who read books that have no lines matching "[Cc]yber" or "[Tt]echno".

By the way, I get REALLY PISSED OFF when I'm reading a book and notice that the author is making an obvious overture to a particular demographic instead of following the internal logic of the book. So nyah.

I'm not the only under-40 person who loves to read intelligent, well-written books, am I?

"Most best selling author�s are over forty"

[EnglishTim]

Never use an apostrophe in front of an 's' when you are creating the plural of a singluar noun.

Wow...

[jgerman]

...just started reading the free sample that he gives out. Definitely not going to buy the book. I think I'd describe his style as... childish. Incredibly unrefined. His character development is really poor. It honestly reads like the first efforts of an eighteen year old. (That's not to say that an eighteen year old can't write extremely well, check out Confederacy of Dunces).