This is a tough book to review, and I am torn between 3 and 4 stars. It's full of fascinating ideas and discussion of virtual copies of real humans and the issues they might deal with; it's amazingly forward thinking (especially considering it was written in 1994) and I might have been more blown away had I read it back then instead of now. However the characters are unfortunately very flat and for the most part rather unlikable, and the writing is not particularly exciting. I found myself struggling to finish the last quarter of the book despite the interesting subject material because it's just not told in a way that grabs you, and I really found most of the characters dull to the point I had trouble telling some of them apart. So, a fascinating setting and a lot of interesting SF speculation but unfortunately let down a bit by the writing in my opinion.