Interrupt - Hardcover

Dwiggins, Toni

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0312853459 ISBN 13: 9780312853457

Publisher: Tor Books

Synopsis

In Silicon Valley, profoundly deaf 12-year-old Wayne Faulkner tries to call 911 when an intruder stuns his father in the back yard - and 40,000 phones suddenly go dead. Wayne's father, Andy, can't figure out what happened, and he ought to see it at once: he's a telecom engineer, after all. But the terrorist Interrupt is clever, and Interrupt doesn't mind murder...
Andy, soon a prime suspect, must identify Interrupt before the next killing - for Interrupt has taken Wayne. But Interrupt may be anybody, even the beautiful lineworker, Nell Colson. Anybody at all.

About this title

Review:

A gripping, skillful, technically literate, untrendy roller-coaster of a story centered on that most taken-for-granted technology of all: the U.S. telephone system.... Dwiggins is scarily convincing about both the vulnerability of the phone system and the extent to which our society depends on it. The technical stuff is all very solid, but no one should be scared off by that-Dwiggins works the expertise in effortlessly, is never pedantic, and delivers a story about real human beings... a plausible, original, and at times very tense tale-you may want to take your phone off the hook to finish it. -- Mystery Guide

Meet Interrupt: computer criminal, telecommunications expert, terrorist, murderer, and electrical engineer... The hero, Andy Faulkner, is also an engineer. Brilliant, earnest, and emotionally conflicted, Faulkner may be the most entertaining acrophobe since Jimmy Stewart in Vertigo.... a fast-moving thriller. -- IEEE Spectrum

Riveting.... There have been other mysteries with Silicon Valley settings, but the area has too often been a weak backdrop to the action. Dwiggins uses high-tech turf like a native; it weaves in and out, enhancing the plot in both major and minor ways.... Like the best techno-thrillers, INTERRUPT provides a feel of insider language without over- or under-explaining. Like the best psychological mysteries, the author shows how "good" traits like clear-thinking and tenacity can, with crossed lines and over-worked circuits, fuel a vendetta. -- San Jose Mercury News

This superior techno-thriller combines today's software and telephonic engineering with a suspenseful chase.... Recommended. -- Library Journal

From Publishers Weekly:

Readers keen on the latest phone technology may enjoy this tech-based thriller; those wanting plot, pacing and three-dimensional characters may hang up early on. Protagonist Andy Faulkner is a a young design engineer for AT&T in Silicon Valley who, in neatly symbolic irony, is the divorced father of a deaf 11-year-old boy. Andy tries to appease the memory of his bullying, bridge-building father and (another neat symbol) fights acrophobia. He is chagrined when the failures of two vaunted new systems are tied to calls on his own phone, and humiliated when the telco's security chief fires him. Of course Andy sets out to find the villain. The mysterious terrorist, dubbed Interrupt, triggers more temporary system failures, kills a woman technician and ends up kidnapping Andy's son as part of an extortion plot against AT&T. Much of the narrative is related in techie-talk ("source code and object code"), which sometimes sounds like baby talk ("A crosspoint was the place in a switching network where two communications channels intersected"). Too much action takes place offstage--including the final resolution. The novel's biggest failure is the Interrupt's hokey motive--hardly a live wire on which to base a tale.
Copyright 1992 Reed Business Information, Inc.

About this edition

• Publisher: Tor Books
• ISBN 10: 0312853459
• ISBN 13: 9780312853457
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 317