They"re heeeere. Spawn of the ungodly amount of hype surrounding the dread millennium bug, Y2K thrillers have been sneaking onto bookshelves for months now. Deadline Y2K comes a little late to the game, but if you still haven"t acquainted yourself with the new genre on the block, this gripping, well-researched read is a fine place to start. The book"s central plot device may strain credulity--a band of six good-guy hackers called the Midnight Club spends the late "90s secretly preparing to save the entire New York City infrastructure from millennial disaster. However, the story line makes a nice vehicle for getting readers up to speed on Y2K issues without slowing down the action, and it gives them a likeable, multicultural cast of characters to root for. The main attraction is, of course, the main event: the tick-tocking countdown from the early morning of December 31, 1999, to the fateful midnight hour. It"s no spoiler to tell you that all hell eventually breaks loose, but Y2K skeptics may find themselves surprised at how convincing Joseph"s tightly paced and vividly rendered worst-case scenario feels. As disaster creeps around the globe, knocking out power grids and national economies one time zone at a time, Manhattan watches the approach via an increasingly spotty world communications network, while mounting revelry, rioting, and religious hysteria mingle surreally in the streets. It"s enough to give even diehard doubters a goosebump or two. --Julian Dibbell