Instruct: Classify a given review into positive or negative sentiment.
Query: Decent potential, some plotting issues

I generally enjoy Hamilton's work, having read everything he has in print, but this book seems weak. My comments contain spoilers.The Julia thread could have been heavily compressed. It seemed a combination of comic relief (the comments about her clothing by a tv personality), a venue for discussing future-earth's technology, and something to fill the book up. I ended up skipping almost all of her pages, just reading where something important to the plot actually happened. Her romance-life issues and banter with her grandfather were page-skippers.Hamilton seems weak on ending stories, and the way the antagonist is flushed out on a murder spree at the end seemed a bit odd. Aside from vengeance, what else would be gained by killing mandel?I did like this book much more than the bizarre Nano Flower that followed, but not nearly as much as mindstar rising.