The Barnes & Noble Review
Eastern Standard Tribe, Cory Doctorow's second novel, can be best described as a story about a genius suspected of being insane, written by a genius suspected of being insane -- a brilliant blend of Ken Kesey's One Flew over the Cuckoo's Nest and Neal Stephenson's cyberpunk classic Snow Crash.

Art Berry is an agent provocateur in the Eastern Standard Tribe (a secret society bound together by similar sleep schedules) working undercover as a management consultant in England and trying to mire the Greenwich Mean Time tribalists in consumer-unfriendly bureaucracy. Everything is going as planned for Art until he accidentally hits a pedestrian while driving in London. The jaywalker turns out to be a brash American woman from Los Angeles named Linda. After both are treated for minor injuries, they begin an unlikely romance. But when Art comes up with a potential billion-dollar idea that could mean huge gains for the Eastern Standard Tribe, Linda and one of Art's coworkers steal the idea, institutionalize him under false pretenses, and sell the design to the highest bidder. Stuck in a sanitarium for "observation," Art ponders the age-old question: Would he rather be smart or happy?

Like Doctorow's debut novel, Down and Out in the Magic Kingdom, Eastern Standard Tribe is pure literary genius: an irreverent, disturbing, and uproarious glimpse into the future of the global society. Dedicated tribalists can experience more of Doctorow's twisted wit in A Place So Foreign and Eight More, a collection of his best short stories. Paul Goat Allen

Genre: Science Fiction