Neal Stephensen, author of Snow Crash, has created a sprawling epic (the paperback is about 900 pages long!) that spans the world and five decades. Central to the story is a giant heap of war-time gold plundered from the world over. Revolving around the horde are Nazis, 'Nips', Yanks, Brits, Chinese and Phillipinos, whether lawyers, thugs, nerds, hackers, or soldiers. It's a strange, wonderful tale. I suspect Stephensen may be a genius.
Oddly enough, this one even contains a Perl script! Somewhat too much of this book is given over to proving how clever the author is, I feel, but perhaps he's really that clever!
