No quantity of hack novels will ever heighten your sensitivity to the world around you. That, if it exists, would be the province of literature. This does not have to, but often does, coincide with a general lack of titillation and thrill. Something about the stirring of synapses by plot-driven drama seems to inure them to nuance. 100 pages into Cryptonomicon, and it remains to be seen what this will be 1000 pages later.
For all its detailed invention, reaches for stereotypes too often with its characters.
In the end, more like Battlefield Earth than Gravity's Rainbow.
