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However it does this with a terrific plot that's not bogged down with to much irrelevant information. If your at all worried about RFID tags, identity theft, or anything of the sort this novel will certainly increase those fears. I loved it, and would highly recommend it to anyone, less the adult themes may make it inappropriate for younger readers. This is my favorite book of the year. It is very current, without seeming to draw to much directly out of the headlines.
I suppose the story was readable and engaging enough once you get past the terrible misunderstanding and misrepresentation of technology. I suppose reading this book for me would be a similar experience to the way actual crime scene investigators feel when they watch CSI on TV. He just hasn't the slightest clue how computer systems work.
Deaver is the same guy who wrote "The Bone Collector" which was made into a movie with Denzel Washington and Angelina Jolie. I don't know why I even had to bring it up, but it nagged at me as I read the book.Also, nagging at me as I read the book, was the ridiculous portrayal of computer technology. This is another book I snagged from the shelves of the Wal-Mart during a fit of boredom.
Deaver couldn't write a "Hello World" program in TRS-80 BASIC. I think I'd rather just read Neal Stephenson if I want believable technology in my stories. Having read this book, it's fairly clear to me that Lincoln Rhyme is a white guy, which seems odd with a name like Lincoln who has a cousin named Arthur.
I suppose it could just be my prejudice coming through, but it seemed odd to me that the movie character is of a different race than the character in the novel.
It started out as the information age, but the very real possibility for misuse by government, by criminal enterprises, etc. And not get seriously hurt. Every time we buy something at the grocery store using one of the store cards (that give us benefits if we buy so much), every time we hop into the car, all the video recorders used by cops in traffics, all our hospital info, etc. My biggest complaint is that it always seems Amelia Sachs gets into trouble. I hadn't thought alot about all the information being gathered about us as individuals.
But Deaver brings up another more dangerous side of having too much information out there. It's great for doing research. How many times can she have run-ins with villains. I'm not sure I want to since I enjoy access to all of this which wasn't readily available before. Every once in a while I need a break from textbooks and history and bioethics, so I turn to someone I know researches and creates an intelligent mystery. I don't see how we can stuff all this information back into the Pandora's box. Even our DNA can be possibly kept on file if we are diagnosed with a disease which needs to analyze that DNA.then it is in the system, and can be used for discriminatory purposes. I can see where people can get upset about privacy, but it is kind of 'the cat is out of the bag' at this point.
It's pretty scary, this premise that there are corporations out there who gather all possible information which we very careless put in everywhere we go. I know we have to suspend our disbelief for such books, but it does get a little old.The information about data miners was new to me and interesting. Good reading. is there. I can count on Deaver for that.
And, sensibly, as new villains are created, so must be new sleuths. Deaver's point is that anyone with sufficient computer skills can get this type of information on whomever they'd like. As wonderfully demonstrated in Jeffrey Deaver's The Broken Window, the "Hidden Internet"-the information stored everywhere in massive data farms and searchable via data mining-has created a new breed of psychopathic villains.
Rhymes has a skilled programmer do data mining on the personal information of Emilia Sachs, his partner and lover, and compiles a 500+ page file of personal information. In a time when computers are hand-held, cell phones are no longer just for talking, and sharing music by literally tapping someone else's media player with your own is reality, people tend to get caught up in the ease and accessibility of the entire world at their fingertips and freely share personal information over the web. He also data-mines Sach's telephone and credit card usage and obtains a complete record of her activities and movements in real time for the past 24 hours.
The World Wide Web has given birth to a new sub-genre of mystery fiction---internet crime fiction. The Broken Window also happens to serve, though perhaps unintentionally so, as a commentary on the dangers of the internet to our privacy. Deaver brilliantly shows readers that, sometimes, the click of a mouse can be more deadly than a gun, making for a fantastic learning experience as well as a thrilling adventure.For full review, see: Interface, Berglund Center for Internet Studies.
But instead of guns or bombs.these criminal masterminds use the internet as their weapon. Deaver's detective, Lincoln Rhymes, a paraplegic pretty much confined to his admittedly very tricked-out apartment, uses his human powers of observation and deduction to try to defeat the villain; a murderous psychopath with brilliant Internet skills he uses to orchestrate complex crimes beyond anything ever dreamed of by Poe or Conan Doyle.
This killer made a one big mistake. A good thriller with a clever, engaging plot, but probably not the best type of book to listen to each night before bed like a did, given the fact a sociopath, is at work. Lincoln Rhyme has his work cut out for him in this Jeffery Deaver book: The Broken Window. He is intelligent and testy. They know where you were, what you did, what you bought etc, and the fact that a sociopath has access to this data, makes everyone wonder.just who is safe.The Broken Window was a very long audio book ( 12 cds) read by Dennis Boutsikaris, who always does an amazing job. This master criminal thinks that he has what it takes to pull off repeated "perfect crimes" without getting caught, as he's been getting away with it forsome time. The killer is dubbed UNSUB 522, by Rhyme, because the first known crime happened on May 22.
As Rhyme and his staff work on the crime, they discover a business that collects every bit of available information about every man, woman and child in the US. They are dealing with a computer genius who also happens to be a sociopath.
It is not just someone who just steals your money, but one who assumes your identity to commit awful crimes using your name. The evidence looks like Arthur may have been responsible, but, there is no way that he could have possibly murdered the first victim, Alice Sanderson.Rhyme investigates the evidence against his cousin to see if he can uncover any mistakes by police, but he discovers something worse.
For readers who are not familiar with the Lincoln Rhyme character, he is a NY City forensic specialist; he is also a paraplegic. He has framed Lincoln Rhyme's cousin, Arthur Rhyme, for murder.
Recommended The Broken Window is a story about a high tech version of identity theft taken to the extreme.
He sees his victims as numbers.
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