This is a Gibson novel that doesn't seem to register much, and I know I read it the year it came out, 1999 - the year I got married, yay! - and I don't remember much about it. Perhaps because it doesn't really add anything new to the world of Virtual Light or Idoru, but synthesizes the ideas in those books into an impending millenarian global paradigm shift. Anyway, it's this nodal point in the flow of digital information that haunts poor Laney, living in a cardboard box in a Tokyo subway station and monitoring the networks while dosing himself with cough syrup. he doesn't know what this nodal point represents, but he knows it is huge and potentially world-ending. He reaches out to Rydell, working as a security guard in a convenience shop, and sends him back to the bridge. It's not just lines of data that are converging on the bridge, however. Rydell's ex, Chevette, is heading there to escape an abusive partner. A smooth, grey killer, a strange young boy, a dealer in antique watches and the idoru herself are all caught up in the unfolding drama.

It's really good. More narrative points of view than the other books, which perhaps makes if feel more diffuse than the other two, but there's some great writing and great thematic development and an exciting plot all building to a strange, subtle moment of transformation.