Red Team Blues

Seriously. Martin Hench is a fantastic character. There is nothing about him or his journey through this novel that I would change.

As always, Doctorow has gotten all of the details right. As an infosec professional, I appreciate that level of research and commitment to verisimilitude. This is a fast paced thriller about... financial and tech crime... I know that sounds weird, and it is even weirder that the main character is essentially an accountant, but it works so well.

I also love that he's old. He's been around the block a time or 7. He knows his shit. He's the last of a dying breed. The computing revolutionaries from MIT. He was at the cutting edge of forensic computing and accounting. But those days are long in his past. Now he's dealing with cryptocurrency. The blockchain. All that other gross crap that tech-bros have come up with. But he's able to cut through the bullshit and use his smarts and his knowledge of tactics to beat them at their own game. It is seriously an awesome story.

There are so many deep characters in this book. A lot of them would be worthy of their own novels. None of the side characters or relationships seem fake or two dimensional.

Overall, if you like mysteries or thrillers, are into tech, or just love good character driven books, this is for you.

I finished @pluralistic’s #RedTeamBlues this evening, and I would highly - highly - recommend it! It’s a short read, just a tad over 200 pages but it’s quite engrossing. I probably could have finished it last night, but I forced myself to sleep instead.

I really like Doctorow’s writing style, and I always learn some new words (and not just technological ones) when I read his books. One of my favorite hallmarks of his fiction is the use of what I would term “non-standard” protagonists - in this case a 67-year-old confirmed bachelor facing retirement. Definitely not someone I would have expected to be enmeshed with a cast of Very Ruthless People ™️ and crypto-bros. That alone makes the stories so much more relatable and entertaining to me and easier to identify with. And as always, the more technical elements of the plot are thoroughly well-researched and expertly woven together like an episode of #MrRobot, but explained in an accessible and easy-to-follow manner.

If you’re looking for a short(ish) techno-thriller to read with a page-turning plot, this book should be right up your alley. That ain’t no lie, cutie pie.