Digital Fortress   (book)

Digital Fortress

Techno-thrillers (like Swordfish, for example) tend to be a bit unbelievable, and even just frickin' stupid sometimes, especially on the technical end. Digital Fortress doesn't suffer from this tendency. While the premise might seem ridiculous to experienced cryptographers to begin with, the book is a fun read, the characters are interesting, and the story is addicting. In the end, the story has several (I think) clever and realistic twists to tie things up nicely.

Digital Fortress is the third book I've read by Dan Brown. I read them in reverse chronological order: The DaVinci Code, Angels & Demons, and Digital Fortress. In retrospect, I think I would have appreciated all three books more if I had gone in chronological order. Going backwards, it's just as easy to see his evolution as a writer, but the complexity and scale of the storylines goes down as you get into the earlier books. Still, one of my favorite books (Without Remorse, by Tom Clancy) is under par for the course (author) when it comes to complexity and scale, yet stands up against any of Tom's more epic and ambitious books, in my opinion. Same goes for this book, but fair warning. If you're looking for a globe-trotting adventure like The DaVinci Code, Digital Fortress isn't quite that.

Anyway, this is a good book, even if you're not a techno-weenie. Danny-boy goes to the trouble to give sufficient explanations of the more obscure topics, so that the less cryptographically-aware among us can still enjoy the story.