Personally, I enjoyed the whimsy and the references in GEB. I considered the weak references past the author's knowledge to be a nod and a pointer to go make a bibliographic romp through other material as one wished. It's an inspiration along the discussion of its ideas, but is not complete. That incompleteness may be because it so deeply references itself, hence the book itself being a funny metaphor.
As directly useful reading to get someone more acquainted with a broad discussion of algorithms and logic without textbook depth of individual topics, I'd recommend _The_New_Turing_Omnibus_ by Alexander Dewdney and _The_Advent_of_the_Algorithm_ by David Berlinski. Probably the latter and then the former, actually.
I wouldn't call GEB a bad read. I think because of its high reputation people expect too much from it, like it should be the definitive book of truth about logic and proofs. It's one book, and if one reads it in the light of it being a fun romp through topics that are somehow loosely connected in the vein of James Burke I think it delivers rather well.
As directly useful reading to get someone more acquainted with a broad discussion of algorithms and logic without textbook depth of individual topics, I'd recommend _The_New_Turing_Omnibus_ by Alexander Dewdney and _The_Advent_of_the_Algorithm_ by David Berlinski. Probably the latter and then the former, actually.
I wouldn't call GEB a bad read. I think because of its high reputation people expect too much from it, like it should be the definitive book of truth about logic and proofs. It's one book, and if one reads it in the light of it being a fun romp through topics that are somehow loosely connected in the vein of James Burke I think it delivers rather well.