Zortoaster wrote a review of a book that might be of interest to folks around here:" In lieu of the Norwegian police's crackdown on 16-year-old hacker Jon Johansen, who broke the DVD copying protection, Paul A. Taylor's book Hackers raises a series of interesting questions about crackers and cracking. The book scores high on content but lacks somewhat in presentation. He manages to spell out issues that are often only implicit in the computer security debate, and is able to paint a multi-faceted picture of the hacker, represented by the cracker, community setting it apart from the very black and white, good or bad, presentation of hackers in the mass media."

jblackman wrote to us with a review of Full Moon. Rather than a more normal book review here, Full Moon is actually a collection of some of the best photographs taken of the Moon over the several decades. It also includes an original essay from Andrew Chaikin, as well. Click below to learn more.

Jayakrishnan, who recently reviewed Java Look and Feel Design Guidelines, has returned with a review of Li Gong's Inside Java 2 Platform Security, Architecture, API Design and Implementation. With the increasing use of Java in many different situations, books like this will only increase in importance - so learn more about now, versus later.

Justin Harvey has written a review of The Pragmatic Programmer, a work famous for helping programmers develop their skills. Click below to learn more.

Our Science Fiction Reviewer in house, Duncan Lawie has sent a review of Ken MacLeod's The Star Fraction. One more interesting point to this review - Duncan sent it from vacation, offshore of Antarctica - off of Cape Royds on Ross Island. That's about 77 degrees south, for the geographers in the crowd. It's a near future setting - 21st century dealing with politics. Click below to read more.

For a thousand years, philosophers, scientists and theologians have struggled over the nature of ultimate reality. Why are we here? What is human consciousness? Can quantum physics, Zen philosophy and subjective experience connect the dots between God, matter and the nature of life? A physicist has written a dense, strange and haunting book that says yes, and wonders where the Gods have all gone.

Chromatic, already a reviewing fixture and well-known AfterY2k junkie, has sent us a quick review of the latest book in Tad Williams' Otherland series. This book is Otherland: River of Blue Fire, which is the book after Otherland: City of Golden Shadow. Click below to learn more.

Tal Cohen, one of our best book reviewers thought that the Slashdot audience would appreciate Pattern Hatching: Design Patterns Applied, a book written by John Vlissides. This book is not one of the many new pattern catalogs, this book shows how patterns are applied in real life -- and also includes some interesting guidelines for would-be pattern writers.

New reviewer Jayakrishnan Nair has brought with him a review of Addison-Welsey/Sun's Java Look and Feel Design Guidelines. There's a lot of work being done in Java right now - make sure that it looks correct. The book covers everything from basic controls, keyboard navigation, tables, toolbars, treeviews to the JFC and effective ways to use the JFC components.

Bringing a little competition to O'Reilly, this Manning Publications book Elements of Programming with Perl seems to be have struck a nerve with reviewer chromatic. Click below to find out how - and possibly add a new book to your library.

I'd like to thank the author of this book for sending it to me. Nick's written a book that's touching and endearing, and one that's well worth reading for everyone who's ever had social struggles to deal with. As well, his involvement with the fine folks of TheVenue. I'll warn you - it's not a tech text. But it's still worth reading. Click below to read more.

Disgruntled Goat sent us a review of Intrusion Detection, a text sure to be of interest to all those working in organizations. The author is a former NSA employee and has written this book as a text to convince upper-level types of the need for security and actually paying attention to it. Click below to read more.

Caldera Systems, who's currently IPO Bound also has created one of the most popular distributions for use in the business environment. Click below to read more about how to use Caldera OpenLinux - and thanks to Terry Collings for the review.

Thanks to Jason Bennett for sending us a review of author Steve McConnell's lastest book After the Gold Rush. The book looks at the maturation of software development and what that means for us. Click below to read more.

Duncan Lawie, our in-house science fiction book reviewer has returned from Christmas, this time with a look at Arthur C. Clarke's Childhood's End. With the recent appearances of Clarke in AfterY2k, I'm almost afraid to put anything up by him *grin*. Nonetheless, click below to read more about this somewhat flawed novel.

James Scott reviewed Mary Doria Russell's book The Sparrow. Though the plot features interstellar travel and first contact with an alien race, it is not strictly a science fiction novel - it's been summarized as "A comic, tragic, category-defying exploration of the human condition." Click below to learn more.

Our science fiction reviewer in residence, Duncan Lawie has reviewed Ian McDonald's Sacrifice of Fools. This book balances an incisive look at human nature to a backdrop of alien settlement. Click below to learn more.

Jim Bumgardner took it upon himself to review two of the major Legos Mindstorms books out on the market. The first, O'Reilly's The Unofficial Guide to LEGO MINDSTORMS Robots, has been reviewed here before, but this review adds a comparsion to the second book. The second is from Apress Press, and is titled Dave Baum's Definitive Guide to LEGO Mindstorms (Technology In Action). Click below to learn how to use your Mindstorms more effectively.

CACL, oh he of the great name, has given us a nice review of Gates of Fire. Gates of Fire is historical fiction set during the Greek Golden Age, historically accurate, with stomach-wrenching battle scenes. Click below to learn more if the thought of being a Spartan gives you great joy.

Well, with Christmas just around the corner, I'd like to thank Joe Mahoney for sending us a review of Can Reindeer Fly - The Science of Christmas, known in the States as The Physics of Christmas: From the Aerodynamics of Reindeer to the Thermodynamics of Turkey. It's an amusing little piece - and just in time for holiday shopping, I offer this blatant plug: Jon Katz' new book Geeks is ready for pre-order at ThinkGeek. It's really good, even though it's dedicated to two bozos who run this site. *grin*