The Last Best Thing: A Classic Tale of Greed, Deception, and Mayhem in Silicon Valley

Lampooning the excesses and eccentricities of Silicon Valley's hi-tech moguls with up-to-the-minute detail, this tale of deception, greed, revenge, Internet hype and vaporware was serialized in the San Jose Mercury News and on an interactive site on the World Wide Web. It chronicles the chaotic rise of a new start-up company where, ironically, the only honest executives are in marketing. Maria Cisneros, who spruced up Intel's corporate image in earlier days and handled another successful IPO, is just as seduced by charismatic CEO J.P. McCorwin's maverick personality and visionary proclamations as are his spellbound investors when she joins the enterprise. Brad Roth, fired by Microsoft, is too desperate to be choosy. Both of them are in for a turbulent ride as they struggle to do their jobs without figuring out what it is this bewilderingly New Age operation and its massive R&D deployment are actually trying to create. Brad is drawn into an online affair with the mysterious ""Rose D""--only to have one of the company's problematic laptops explode in his hands during a passionate exchange. Maria becomes embroiled with FBI investigators when someone sends an e-mail from her account suggesting Bill Gates as a Unabomber suspect. The novel's wacky twists and turns probably played out better in serial publication. Taken as a whole, the deliberately silly plot becomes tiresome and the characters unconvincing. Still, Dillon's trenchant depictions of high-tech players--both real and fictional--and their world are the attractions here, and they are entertaining and dead-on. (Oct.)