I tried enjoying this but it reads too much like Edgy Slashdot Comments: The Book. I wouldn't be surprised to find a genuine vintage "Natalie Portman, naked and petrified" somewhere in there.

If none of that means anything to you, you're probably not old enough to be in the book's target demographic anyway.

The protagonist is an aloof nerd, the pre-dotcom bubble kind when "nerd" was still used only in a derogatory way. Every page has at least one or two bits of technobabble sprinkled on it for no good reason. At least no immediately plot-relevant reason, maybe it's fan service, maybe it's just fluff. The spy thriller parts seem altogether too cliché, but the book is self-aware enough to point that out so you don't have to do the thinking.

On that topic, it does it's darndest to make sure you understand THE MEANING OF WHAT YOU ARE READING. I swear Stross mentioned three times in the space of six pages that Harriet is Bob's line manager. Or Bob complains three times that he got very wet just two pages ago. I don't need the reminder, I just read that a minute earlier.

This is disenchanting because I'm definitely the intended audience. I know what Lisp Machines were and I remember Beowulf (not the poem). What he's trying to do isn't lost on me, it just doesn't connect. This is nerd-flexing devoid of charm.