Matt Richtel, Hooked

The opening scene of Matt Richtel's Hooked is downright gripping: journalist Nathaniel Idle, reading Mystic River in an internet cafe, is handed a note by a mysterious blonde. He follows her outside, loses her, and only then unfolds the paper. It's a warning to leave the cafe. Behind him, the building explodes. The explosion of course triggers a police investigation, and Nat's departure from the building immediately before it blew up makes him an obvious suspect. But that's just the beginning of Nat's problems. He's driven to investigate the explosion himself to find out why he was spared, and to find the person who spared him: he recognized the writing on the note, but the writer can't be who he thinks it is. Nat's investigation leads him to re-examine an old relationship—a year-long affair that ended with his girlfriend's death. In the process, he finds that his connection to the cafe explosion is far deeper and more complex than he could have supposed.

Richtel's debut novel is cutting edge in that he's exploring the darker side of the digital revolution—modern concerns about internet addiction and invasive advertising and the melding of virtual and "meat space" realities are here blown up into a paranoid fantasy. (It's topical, yes, but some of the same issues were explored at least as early as the 1970s, in a memorable Columbo episode. The topic has just been updated to the digital age.)

The book's mystery is compelling, but when Nat begins unraveling the truth, things get confusing and hard to follow. Indeed, the more I think about the book's plot, the more questions about its credibility come to mind, starting with the logistics of that initial explosion and the warning passed to Nat. (Nat's presence at the cafe cannot have been predicted. And the trigger mechanism of the bomb was far from reliable. So when exactly was that note prepared?) I'm left unable to explain as completely as I'd like what led up to the cafe explosion, and why it had to happen. But the fault may be mine. Give the book a read and see for yourself.