If Pattern Recognition is William Gibson's bid for acceptance as a mainstream writer, I don't know that it is likely to succeed. I don't believe it is, um, novel enough, to excite people to that extent. However, the book is an entertaining look at some of the trends of capitalism at the beginning of a new century.

Pattern Recognition is one of the most economical novels I've read in a while. About a half-dozen characters make up the significant cast, with the focus never leaving Cayce Pollard. Cayce (pronounced Case) is a rare young woman. Literally allergic to marketing symbols, especially logos, she has turned that aversion into a unique career as an arbiter of whether new logos are likely to succeed. Her 'illness' allows Gibson to have some fun with the character. For example, her clothes, which she strips of their labels, are called CPUs — Cayce Pollard Units.

Cayce's strange career takes an even more intriguing turn during a trip to London. She encounters a woman, Dorotea Benedetti, a liason for a footwear company she is sniffing a logo for, who, unaccountably, sets out to scare her away from Britain. Oddly, her nemesis knows Cayce is particularly fearful of the Michelin symbol — information shared with few, except her family and psychiatrists. Meanwhile, the cold-blooded international rising star of marketing also has a special interest in Cayce. It turns out the angle that has attracted both is her affection for "the footage."

The footage is a series of film clips released to the Web that has attracted the attention of enough browsers to become a cult favorite. No one knows who produced the segments of film or even what they mean, since they don't tell a coherent story. Cayce's obsession with the footage is innocent. She became aware of it and it struck a deep-seated psychological chord in her. However, the interest the film has attracted elsewhere is anything but pure. The marketing genius, Hubertus Bigend, (his buttocks aren't described) puts Cayce on the case: She and another independent contractor are to track the footage to its source. He wants to exploit the film's maker.