Although there are plenty of detours along the way here - weird theme parties with female bodybuilders, a giant and never-ending computer diagram made of Lego blocks, raucous arguments over the decadence or salubrity of breakfast cereals - it's pretty clear from the start that Daniel is trying to figure out Life and Love, with a dead brother, a weak father, a sick mother, and an insecure girlfriend as parts of his equation. When Daniel's father gets sacked by IBM, he and the kids set up their own software concern, Oops!, and look for venture capital in the usual shady places as Daniel gives us the play-by-play. Susan, bored with the misogynist asexuality of nerd life, starts a movement for feminist techies - called Chyx. Michael is a recluse who will eat only crackers, Kraft singles, and other flat foods that can be slid beneath closed doors. Postmodernism has left its mark: Characters are usually described in Jeopardy! categories, or compared to Hanna-Barbera cartoons or 1970s Barbie prototypes. A 26-year-old bug checker at Microsoft, he lives in a group house with five other nerds, all of them vassals of Bill Gates and true children of their age. Although Daniel Underwood (alias has his hands somewhat less than full, he hardly counts as a slacker. Gen-X guru Coupland's (Life after God, 1994, etc.) third offering is a sprawling, amiable novel filled with the deracinated underachievers who have given their author both audience and theme.
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