THE TERMINATION NODE

By Lois Gresh and Robert Weinberg
Del Rey/Ballantine $24.00, hc

In a world increasingly dependent on Internet and Web commerce, security is as important as it is fleeting. When Lois Gresh wants to scare you, she doesn't need supernatural creatures. Oh no, with the help of World Fantasy Award winner Robert Weinberg, this specialist in computer security and design scares you witless with her tale of Internet insecurity and government agents gone amok. In this taut thriller, all descriptions of hacking are dead-on, whether into computer files, an on-line bank, or a slightly futuristic auto. The Web is a shiny buffet dinner all spread out for the vultures even now circling overhead, and it's just a matter of time before we are taught that lesson; and then it'll be too late.

Daily we transfer most of our world, it seems, onto the World Wide Web and yet hope to hang on to our privacy, our secrets, our money, and our very identities. Well, Gresh and Weinberg have seen the future, and the future is now. Fear it.

Judy Carmody is TerMight, the legendary hacker who tightens on-line security for banks and corporations. She and her super hacker friends make a good living staying mostly on the lawful side of computer hijinks. But suddenly a pair of thugs try to kill Judy, manage to pin a friend's murder on her, and set her off on a cross-country flight to restore her name and her reputation; and perhaps save the Internet, too, while foiling the massive on-line theft of billions behind supposedly secure sites. Not easy on the best of days, and harder yet when you can't tell the bad guys from the good. TerMight's hacker friend is a legendary genius whose code will allow him to almost literally create life on the net, turning safeguards aside and morphing security into danger without a chance of being stopped in time. But he's missing, so Judy and his brother join forces to solve the mystery of his disappearance, and of a cyber-robbery which took seconds to wipe out a bank. But the robbery was only a test; the real heist, unimaginable in scope, has yet to occur.

The characters are drawn in quick, not always convincing brush strokes, but the plot and background make this a frighteningly effective cautionary tale about our misplaced, blind trust. You'll never shop at Amazon again without a post-click grimace and wince.