this is the read that got me into doctorow, of course basically all of his other writing is great. 'little brother' was the 'one city, one book' selection by SF Library last year, and anyone concerned about the surveillance state should definitely give it a read.
"Makers" is fantastic, and has a lot of fun ideas in it. Doctorow nails the tech personalities in his works very well, arguably better than Stephenson.
