The Cybergypsies

Once the Net and the Web were new, and when the adventurous and unwary spent too much time there, flirting with each other in verbal disguise... The story of bad behaviour-- fanaticism about small rows, gender-disguised "Netsex", the spending of other people's money on vast phone-bills--has been told by others--Indra Sinha tells it in a British context where the poverty and uncertainty of the Thatcher era made everything that bit more intense and obsessive. This is also the story of the near-collapse of a marriage--he withdrew from his wife and dragged her off to meet Net chums who never showed up--or showed up and never introduced themselves...These were also the years of his growing political commitment--a highly paid copywriter, he started using his skills for good causes like exposing the use of chemical weapons by Saddam against the Kurds. He writes well about his discomfort his Net friends' games of expensive verbal sado-masochism in the face of real evil. This is a moving and wise book about a man who loved games, and came to feel that he could no longer, in conscience play them; there is real pain here, in his rejection of a sort of beauty. --Roz Kaveney

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Great book (shame about the covers/ blurb). - Rated
I agree with all the other reviews here: riveting book, cleverly woven together, rang lots of bells and made lots of connections for me. My only reservation was the blurb on the back and even the title, which to me suggested some sort of quirky, marginal techie subculture - interesting enough to make me look at the book, but what I found within when I read it (couldn't put it down, 400 pages in record time) was much more than this... I did wonder about the author's children (almost invisible in the story)...

Great book! 'A kind of UFO literary...' - Rated
'With the turning of a page, one strangles oneself suddenly with the reading of testimonys in extreme cases of the bearable one ... Its work is a kind of UFO literary, as destabilizing in the content as in the form... Pêle-mix, one fall thus on dialogues left straight of the BBS, on pieces of codes exchanged with some hacker, of the sections of life coming from "The Shades", the plays of role where the principal character, Bear, spend most clearly his time (with the risk to run its marriage definitively). Improbable characters are crossed, one goes up in time as one walks in space, and the border between cybernetic dream and "true life" is done increasingly fuzzy...'

Love this book! Found it via the review above when browsing the web. The review, originally in French was translated for me by Google! Irresisistible! And Cybergypsies more than lived up to it!... Enjoy! ...Joel

Weird, strange, but really familiar... - Rated
I didn't knew what to expect when I ordered this book. I found something I really know (the life and the adventures of a cyber-addict in a virtual world), but also very touching information about human right, philosophy, marriage and other things. For me, this book was a catharsis and I spent sometime remembering the old BBS days and some facts of my life. Incidentally, I also renewed my support to Amnesty International.

First US review from Kirkus, July 99 - Rated
A strangely fascinating exploration of the dark side of cyberspace, where virus writers, porno peddlers, and fantasy game fanatics have created an anarchic subculture that blurs reality and imagination...Part Dante, part Bill Gates, part Jack Kerouac--however you categorize this bizarre book, it's worthy of attention.

The Cybergypsies is Wonderful - Rated
The Cybergypsies by Indra Sinha is simply wonderfilled. Allegorical, real, non-ordinary, ordinary. Life in a nutshell. Or should that be microchip? Beautifully written, eminently readable. Do yourself a favour and buy a copy. It could be the nicest thing you do for yourself this century.