Mr. Penumbra's 24-Hour Bookstore

It's a crude definition (books > movies), but this felt like the National Treasure for bibliophile computer nerds. As both of these things (I picked this up partly because the protagonist was described as a web designer), it was delightful. There's a mysterious ancient bookstore set in the Silicon Valley startup scene, a cast of genius coders and designers, references to both a fictional fantasy series and game, a dash of wry humor, a secret society, lots of code, espionage, and a hacker thrown in for good measure.

The protagonist is a privileged millennial assumed to be navigating an economic crash. All the characters are likeable. It feels a bit like the “least successful” friend in an extremely successful group writing with awe about how brilliant everyone else is and feeling inadequate.

Starts off a tad slow but not for long.