In general, this is a most enjoyable book. Once you get used to the chop and change style which often had me flicking back and forth looking for the missing pages, the plot comes together nicely and at good pace. I must say I got the feeling that the chop-change approach is born more out of laziness rather than the author's intent but, either way, the effect is quite poignant in itself - reflecting the jaded lives of the main characters.

On the face of it, this book is a sci-fi thriller set in an arbitrary future Earth that is quite probable in many respects (as opposed to the far out and fantastical setting of say Star Wars or Star Trek). The story plot is certainly entertaining and engaging in itself, but ultimately the heart of the story is how we understand what it means to be human in light of and in relationship to the technological world we live in or, more accurately, may form as technology continues to develop. The book works on both levels which is perhaps why a 20+ year old book set in the arbitrary 'near future' is still so popular today.

In general, I recommend this book, but be aware that the style is not particularly smooth and easy in approach. It's simple on the face of it but complex at its heart and sometimes difficult to follow. Like many post-modern works, it is rather disjointed in parts and very much character driven. Fortunately, the characters, particular the main protagonist in Case, are interesting and dynamic enough to keep the reader interested and wanting more. Prophetic, poignant and ponderous modern classic. ( )

Neuromancer left me feeling rather disappointed.

I had expected the cyberspace and AI components to play a much larger part. I went into it thinking that it would be a cyberspace story with a dash of noirish crime caper, but it turned out to be the other way around. I would have liked to have gotten to know the titular 'character' a lot more.

The ending didn't offer much resolution. I suppose it's an ending that's true to each of the characters involved... Still, though, it wasn't satisfying.

While I can't fault Gibson for it, I found the evidence of Neuromancer's age distracting. This is a world with neural interfaces and orbital colonies, but a few megabytes of RAM have black market value and data is stored on tape. ( )

I read Gibson's Pattern Recognition first and, to be honest, I didn't really enjoy it too much. Knowing the fame of Neuromancer though, I had to give it a shot. I got to around 100 pages in and decided to put the book back on the shelf. The futuristic, cyberpunk setting was interesting, but I could get into the story. I had no desire to see any character do anything really. I didn't care of Case survived or if Molly had a happy ending. I feel that the purpose of the book was to describe an atmosphere, which I appreciated for 100 pages, but I just got bored with the story and the lack of information. The cut-up, hard to follow text wasn't so much the reason, but I'm sure it added to my frustration. I get that this style of writing adds to the atmosphere, and I appreciated that, but I kept hoping for something interesting to happen, and nothing did. I'm sorry I couldn't finish it, but with so many other books to read, I couldn't spend another day on this one. ( )

It just blows me away every time I read it. It's THE cyberpunk novel ;-) ( )

Neuromancer is one of those books you know you should love. I like cyberpunk. I appreciate classic science fiction. Every feature Neuromancer presents I can check off. It's the execution that is failing. Gibson isn't a good writer. His descriptions are unclear. His understanding of computer technology was outdated even when it was written. There are some memorable ideas, but everything here has been done better by those who came after. Neuromancer should be appreciated for creating cyberpunk, but it is not a quality novel. ( )