[HN Gopher] We Are All Nerds: The Literary Works of Neal Stephenson
___________________________________________________________________
We Are All Nerds: The Literary Works of Neal Stephenson
Author : Topolomancer
Score : 164 points
Date : 2022-08-28 16:52 UTC (6 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (bastian.rieck.me)
(TXT) w3m dump (bastian.rieck.me)
| ttepasse wrote:
| > Stephenson's worlds are not populated predominantly by
| Heinleinian larger-than-life characters than can do anything ...
|
| Funnily enough I have in Stephenson's more recent books the
| contrary impression. The last near future books read more like a
| love letter to billionaires, all that seems missing is the long
| flowery dedication to patrons like authors did it in the 1700s.
| Maybe twenty years ago I was to young or blind to register it but
| modern Stephenson has just with this trope put himself from my
| must-read into the meh/maybe category.
|
| (Contrapoint: I can see a structural need for billionaires in his
| storytelling: He needs a source of financing for the fictional
| projects. But somehow Stephenson seems to be to unimaginative as
| to consider other means of realization than the magic
| billionaire.)
| cantSpellSober wrote:
| Anyone successfully convert their "I'm not into sci-fi" friend
| into a Stephenson fan? If so, with what book?
|
| (Having read em all, I would _not_ recommend _Fall; Or Dodge in
| Hell_ as an entrypoint)
| ghaff wrote:
| Snow Crash is maybe the most accessible. And, while one of his
| older books, the association with the metaverse, etc. makes it
| rather timely.
| cl42 wrote:
| Diamond Age has been a hit with a lot of my friends, even ones
| not into scifi.
|
| Agree with you re _Fall_. Terrible book.
| the__alchemist wrote:
| I thought Fall was outstanding; the apes, MOAB, and Ameristan
| parts were remarkably relevant, and the last part was fun.
| cl42 wrote:
| I think the concepts were pretty neat, I agree. However, it
| felt like two books in one. I will admit that I'm not a
| fantasy reader -- aside from LOTR, I'm not a big fan of the
| genre. Spending so much time on that was just not
| interesting to me. If that entire section was missing, the
| book would've been extremely compelling.
|
| But to each their own! :)
| aoanla wrote:
| This seems to be a thing that Stephenson likes: The
| Diamond Age has apparently deliberate significant changes
| in style and genre across it, Cryptonomicon is part very-
| near-future tech thriller and part-1940s spy thriller,
| Seveneves (as noted elsewhere here) has a big genre
| change some way through, and arguably The Rise and Fall
| of D.O.D.O also blends a few different genres together,
| some of them historical. He's certainly more egregious
| about it in Fall, but it's something he obviously likes
| doing...
| roughly wrote:
| I really liked everything about Fall except the main plot.
| The Ameristan parts felt almost prophetic - that's the book
| I wanted to read.
| zxexz wrote:
| I've leant my copy of Cryptonomicon to many people who went on
| to read his other books.
| Ono-Sendai wrote:
| Snow crash
| nocoiner wrote:
| I've had good luck on that with Diamond Age, but I feel the
| need to couple that with a strident warning about how
| incredibly unsatisfying the ending is (which to me is a
| recurring thing with his books).
|
| I disliked Fall intensely. I either didn't finish it, or
| skimmed the last third of it or so just to try to get a sense
| of what happened. I think I did finish it, but only because I
| was on vacation and had nothing else to read by the pool.
| jojoo wrote:
| For educators i always suggest "The Diamond Age". In the last
| few years, AI has just catched up enough for non-tech people to
| take it serious.
|
| I really liked the first half of Fall; Or Dodge in Hell. But it
| has been the only Stephenson book where i needed discipline not
| to get enough sleep, but to get through the second half.
| lelandbatey wrote:
| Agree, "Fall" is not one of the more accessible of his works
| IMO. Neither Anathem, even though it's my favorite of his
| books. I feel like if Neal Stephenson wanted to write a DND
| campaign, he'd revolutionize that niche with his incredible
| world building and excellently pervasive themes.
| haroldl wrote:
| I feel that his novels are becoming more and more mainstream
| friendly, and Termination Shock is my suggestion. The world is
| very similar to our own, set in the near future (versus The
| Diamond Age) of our planet (versus Anathem) and is very
| relatable.
|
| My other suggestions would be REAMDE for people who are into
| action movies or spy novels, or the first half of Seveneves for
| space nerds.
| lb1lf wrote:
| I think they are becoming more mainstream friendly as, well,
| the world has caught up with him, more or less - I find he's
| a master at grasping what technologies will explode into the
| mainstream a few years early, then spin a wonderful yarn
| around that.
|
| Cryptonomicon, REAMDE (to some extent) and The Diamond Age
| seemed really future-y when released - but now, their basic
| concepts are all over the media and on people's minds.
| nibbleshifter wrote:
| REAMDE came out a very short time before awareness of
| ransomware went from "a handful of people in the hacker
| world" to "infosec industry starts becoming aware of it".
|
| To more than a few people, it seemed very prescient.
| ghaff wrote:
| Reamde is much more thriller than SF. My big objection to it
| is that it was one of those novels where if everything didn't
| fall right into place again and again, there wouldn't be a
| story.
| sidibe wrote:
| Anathem if you can convince them the to stick through the
| beginning and learn the words.
|
| Absolutely not Cryptonomicon unless you're sure they're
| libertarian and male. I reread this recently and I think it
| aged very poorly for women and liberals because what was once a
| quirky set of characters in the modern part of the story are
| now a widespread and polarizing demographic today (our free
| thinking hero has to deal with some very exaggerated wokeness,
| and spends a few pages explaining that women aren't as obsessed
| with tech because they're so good at everything else).
|
| This is not the author to start people who aren't into sci-fi
| on though. I really love some of his books but I think anyone
| who can get through one of them is probably already a sci-fi
| fan. There's more immediately fun books that people can get
| hooked on like Vinge and Brin or more literary and less tech-
| describing stuff like Ursula le Guin that appeal to wider
| audiences and from which they can look for other books with the
| same themes
| nibbleshifter wrote:
| Neal is _terrible_ at writing female characters, which is
| probably at its most obvious in Cryptonomicon.
| Barrin92 wrote:
| he's gotten better at it. I really don't like his more tech
| bro-ish books but I liked Reamde a lot, which features a
| pretty good set of characters.
| notahacker wrote:
| Stephenson's take on e-gold might offend some libertarians
| too! In all seriousness, as I recall it the weirdness about
| women was mostly in-character views of nerds whose perception
| of the wider world isn't necessarily supposed to be that
| reliable, and the male-dominated cast actually makes sense in
| context. There are other Stephenson books more likely to
| annoy people in terms of gender roles and digressions about
| liberals and universities...
|
| But yeah, Stephenson isn't the author to start non-sci fans
| on (though Vonnegut fans might love Cryptonomicon and spot an
| influence or two). Atwood's Oryx and Crake is probably my
| answer to that, since it's classic near future sci fi
| disguised as literature. The first book is all about near
| future society and the implications of plausible tech, she
| just writes about the _people_ in it and doesn 't waste words
| describing the details of stuff they wouldn't know or how it
| actually works. And the subsequent books are _cliche-trope
| heavy_ dystopic sci-fi and still probably doesn 't feel that
| way to people who tend to avoid that stuff.
| harrisonhope wrote:
| I really enjoyed Zodiac. It's reads like a thriller novel but
| it's a little more grounded and less weird than Snow Crash. I
| think it's a good entry point for Stephenson novels.
| yetanotherloser wrote:
| The first half or so of Snow Crash is a great entry point if
| the recipient already read some cyberpunk and thought "this
| has something interesting but also has a stick up its arse,
| it's about time someone ripped the piss out of it" - and I
| say this as a fan of Gibsonian prose excess.
|
| The only problem is this puts the recipient in a too-cynical,
| too-stylistically-demanding mode for the rest of Stephenson.
|
| - Posted on my Ono-Sendai Rig, from some kind of Zone, while
| experiencing Hacker News as some kind of geometric
| hallucination, under a sky the colour of a television
| switched off...
| notahacker wrote:
| Zodiac is the easy introduction because it's the least _Neal
| Stephenson_ book of the lot: short, minimal infodumps and
| tangents, and it really doesn 't get much nerdier than the
| protagonist being a chemist [as well as a wetsuit-wearing
| crime fighter] or much weirder than there being a metal band
| in there because Stephenson wanted there to be a metal band.
| pmdulaney wrote:
| This is a curated (or annotated) list of Neal Stephenson's scifi
| novels. Very helpful if you're trying to decide which of his
| books to start with.
| dsr_ wrote:
| It's interesting that it simply leaves out:
|
| The Big U
|
| - About 7/5 on the weirdness scale of the other books. It was
| out of print for quite a while. Strange things happen at a
| thinly disguised Boston University. The Citgo sign becomes The
| Big Red Wheel.
|
| Zodiac
|
| - About 1/5 on the weirdness scale, except for the protagonist
| himself, who is about a 3/5. Modern thriller about pollution in
| Boston Harbor.
|
| Interface
|
| - About a 2/5 weirdness: a candidate runs for US President,
| aided by a direct brain interface that feeds immediate polling
| results and media reactions.
| mpettitt wrote:
| Was going to mention Interface! It's very much Cambridge
| Analytica vibes - you feel that there are teams as described
| doing pretty much the same things, just without the direct
| brain interface.
|
| Personally, I think Anathem is the best of his works,
| although I enjoyed DODO - the sequel, which he wasn't
| directly involved with was less good though.
| jabl wrote:
| I really loved the Baroque cycle; Is there any other author that
| writes similar stuff?
|
| I've liked other Stephenson novels I've read (Cryptonomicon and
| Diamond age), but to be honest they haven't been the mind blowing
| experience of the Baroque cycle.
|
| I'm planning to read Anathem and Termination Shock in the
| hopefully not too far future, but we'll see.
| jimmygrapes wrote:
| Not quite at the same scale, but Dan Simmons writes some pretty
| great alternate/fictionalized history that tend to be pretty
| lengthy (if that's your thing). I particularly enjoyed Drood
| and The Terror (from which the TV series was adapted), and
| Black Hills is pretty nice as well. He also did Hyperion Cantos
| and the Ilium/Olympos series if you're more into s-f.
| cl42 wrote:
| A bit random, but I always think about how _Seveneves_ could be a
| fantastic RPG.
| sprkwd wrote:
| I'm (very slowly) writing a video game mostly based on this
| book.
| cl42 wrote:
| I'd love to learn more!
| tryauuum wrote:
| yeah, sign me up as well, email is nick @gmail.com
| balentio wrote:
| I'm probably in the minority opinion here, but I'd say his newer
| work is in some ways less inventive than his older work. I think
| a lot of it boils down to being around silicon valley weirdos for
| too long wherein the books take on themes the extremely wealthy
| technocrats are actually trying to accomplish. It goes from being
| Sci-Fi to Sci-we-really-are-doing-this.
| decebalus1 wrote:
| I agree with you. Avid Stephenson fan, I read all of his works
| but 'The Rise and Fall of D.O.D.O.' was the last novel I
| actually enjoyed..
| wolfram74 wrote:
| I read Termination Shock and was pretty let down when it seemed
| like the innovative new social dynamic to resolve climate
| change was monarchy. It was a fun enough read, but I don't
| think I'll revisit it like I do with Cryptonomicon or Anathem.
| labrador wrote:
| I wish I could get the time back in invested in reading
| "Cryptonomicon." I had high hopes after "Snow Crash", but they
| never materialized. It's my fault: I knew I should have quit
| after the author indulged himself by going on about his furniture
| sorting algorithm. Inexcusable in a book over a 1000 pages long.
|
| "What is your favorite rambling, tangential aside from a Neal
| Stephenson novel and why?"
|
| https://old.reddit.com/r/printSF/comments/362bej/what_is_you...
| criddell wrote:
| I consider the entire bit about Sumerian history in _Snow
| Crash_ to be an unnecessary aside.
|
| I actually really enjoyed _Cryptonomicon_. For it being a long
| book, I thought it moved pretty good.
| jameshart wrote:
| It's not _the author 's_ furniture sorting algorithm. It's _the
| Waterhouse family 's_. It tells us a considerable amount about
| the Waterhouse family's particular dysfunctions, and the
| various Shaftoes' ability to tolerate, or slot into supporting
| roles around that, and in particular it digs deeply into the
| conflicts that arise between hyperrational people who think 'we
| can build an algorithm that will permit a fair and equitable
| distribution of wealth' and the reality of people who _will
| abuse the properties of that algorithm to make sure they get
| what they want_.
|
| If you think that was an irrelevant aside to the rest of the
| book's themes, I dunno what to tell you.
| labrador wrote:
| Snow Crash appears on at lists of the best Science Fiction
| books of all time, while Cryptonomicon is in no danger of
| appearing on any list of favorite Science Fiction books.
| Cryptonomicon is 25 times less popular than Snow Crash on
| Amazon (rank #6,737 vs #153,999) and no one on reddit
| challenged the assertion that Stephenson sometimes writes
| "rambling, tangential asides." I prefer my Science Fiction
| books have a good story, not teach me about math and game
| theory. There are better books for that. If you liked
| Cryptonomicon, congratulations, you have the same taste as
| the author. I stand by my disappointment going from Snow
| Crash to Cryptonomicon.
| the__alchemist wrote:
| Stephenson is by far my favorite fiction author. His style of
| sci-fi is what draws me to the genre: It's filled with on-the-
| edge-of-plausibility concepts that makes me wonder "What if we
| could do that", or gets me hacking on a project. The only other
| sci-fi I've found on his level have been the Children of Time
| books.
|
| I've read them all except Reamde, and found Termination Shock to
| be the tamest, so perhaps if you're new to Stephenson, don't
| start there.
| Rebelgecko wrote:
| Even though Termination Shock wasn't super out there, I thought
| it's better than a lot of his book wrt characterization (even
| if there were a few moments that didn't work for me)
| skybrian wrote:
| Not mentioned but somewhat related: _The Mongoliad_ series, for
| which Stephenson is one of the co-authors. (It 's a collective
| work that came out of a failed startup; it's complicated.)
|
| This is historical fiction and it's very long, but I found it
| interesting. You might say it arose in part out of Stephenson's
| interest how historical fighting might have actually worked.
|
| https://www.amazon.com/The-Mongoliad-Series-5-book-series/dp...
| lb1lf wrote:
| Much as I love Neal Stephenson's novels, I really wish he'd
| stayed around at the writer's class he surely took until they had
| learned how to wrap up books and write endings; more often than
| not, I turn the page on a Stephenson novel only to find it was
| the last...
|
| (While I exaggerate a little, his stories do not end as much as
| END - I would be thrilled if he could spend a few pages wrapping
| it up in the end before leaving us waiting for the next title...)
|
| The yarns he constructs are definitely entertaining enough for me
| to cope with this very minor annoyance, though.
| narrator wrote:
| Besides his endings, his couples intimacy scenes are also
| absolutely awful and the women can be cartoonish. He makes up
| for everything with his worldbuilding skill though. Authors
| lean heavily on the parts of writing they're good at. For
| example, I've been reading Asimov's foundation, and he almost
| ignores characterization and describing any of the locations in
| the book. The whole thing revolves around the plot.
| rvbissell wrote:
| [Stephenson] To this very day, I still cannot purge the
| phrase "imperial pint of semen" from my brain.
| epberry wrote:
| Good observation. I wonder if this is a reason the TV
| adaptations have been tough. Plot seems best enjoyed in
| written form whereas world building shines on screen.
| mgarfias wrote:
| I _HATED_ Foundation as a kid. Only now do I realize that
| Asimov basically wrote a history book.
| alibrarydweller wrote:
| I think in the last decade or so he certainly learned how to
| end (REAMDE had like 90 pages of climax) but I'm not sure the
| reader is actually better off for it. Seveneves denouement is
| almost its own book with its own characters and the end of Fall
| and Termination Shock just left me wanting to know the next
| development in their respective worlds.
| John23832 wrote:
| LOL man I was looking for this comment. I cannot upvote this
| enough.
|
| He needs to cowrite something with Andy Weir. One can start,
| they collaborate on the middle, and then the other finishes.
| isoprophlex wrote:
| Fantastic idea, but PLEASE let Weir be the one to finish!
| stuartbman wrote:
| Came here to say this. Both Seveneves and Fall have long
| unending psuedo-epilogues which add little to the main story,
| but also don't really wrap anything up satisfactorily either.
| ghaff wrote:
| My issue with Seveneves is the first part (two parts I guess)
| was a pretty first-rate thriller then hard to believe
| transition to equally unlikely and not very interesting IMO
| outcomes which, as you say, weren't really wrapped up either.
| aoanla wrote:
| I think the disconnect here is that I get the impression he
| wrote the entire first part just to justify writing his "SF
| with multiple humanoid species that all have 'hats' but
| there's a good reason for it" story which forms the second
| part. (Part of the problem being that... there's really not
| a good reason for it - Stephenson's grasp of biology is
| much worse than his grasp of computing technology.)
| ghaff wrote:
| Oh I pretty much agree. There's a good argument that the
| whole first part of the book was to get him to a point
| where he could right the story he wanted to write. But,
| if so, there were probably better ways of getting to that
| point.
|
| And, even if you accept how they got there, the last part
| of the book just wasn't very compelling for me.
| usrusr wrote:
| I kind of liked how openly seveneves seemed to be about
| building some fantasy world for storie _s_ (or perhaps even
| for some video game or p &p rpg, with a number of clearly
| cut out character classes?), then getting gloriously
| sidetracked in the background explanation story and finally
| accepting that the world just built isn't remotely as
| interesting as that background explanation story. It's as
| if at some point half way through he realized just _how_
| much he was being "typical Neil Stephenson" and decided to
| go with it, to ten-up himself.
|
| That last part almost seems like a form of trolling, the
| smallest viable story to claim "I had you on a sidetrack
| all the time and you did not even notice"
| haroldl wrote:
| It's clear he _can_ do it: the ending of Anathem ties up
| everything very neatly and it is hard for me to imagine any
| major events happening in the characters ' lifetimes that would
| rival the plot arc they've been through.
| majormajor wrote:
| Anathem is one of his few books with a denoument. It's not
| super long, but it's nice to have some scene hinting at where
| things are going next after the main crisis is resolved.
| MichaelCollins wrote:
| I don't think Anathem had a good ending per-se; rather the
| whole novel sets up a gimmick revealed at the end that
| explains away the lack of a good ending.
|
| It's still my favorite Stephenson novel though.
| majormajor wrote:
| I'm not sure "the whole novel sets up" and "gimmick" work
| together there. :)
| sdwr wrote:
| Yeah, first half of Anathem was captivating, second half
| went off the rails.
| wizofaus wrote:
| Going by the comments on this thread, it's hard to
| believe everyone's talking about the same book... (which
| I haven't read, and I'm now torn as to whether I should!)
| sdwr wrote:
| Yeah it's wild! Second-guessed myself a tiny bit after
| seeing all the conflicting views.
|
| Minor spoilers:
|
| I loved the world-building and mystery in the first half,
| the main character lives in a post-apoc monastary, tons
| of great details and tidbits. It felt vibrant, deep,
| reminded me of Redwall and the 5th Harry Potter, with the
| sexual repression and small-scale rebellion against
| authority.
|
| He leaves the walls in the second half and stuff happens,
| I forgot most of it. The journey part felt like an
| afterthought. Something something aliens, really didn't
| feel earned or connected.
| lb1lf wrote:
| That sounds great; I have had Anathem on my bookshelf for
| years after life got in the way just after starting it; I had
| planned to finally read it this fall. Your observation makes
| me look forward to it even more, thank you!
| dwater wrote:
| I like about 2/3 of Stephenson's novels and Anathem took
| some work for me to get into. It really gets moving several
| hundred pages in and then the last 1/3 makes it all worth
| it.
| DIVx0 wrote:
| It took me a few tries to get past the first 1/3rd of
| Anathem but once I did, it became one of my all time
| favorite books. Stephenson paints a rich rich world which
| I have often thought about outside of the major plot
| points of the book.
| ghaff wrote:
| It's one of those books where you have no idea what's
| going on for the first chunk of the book--and probably
| don't really realize what's fully going on until close to
| the end. Reading a book in at least partial confusion can
| be taxing and hard to hold interest. (Though I certainly
| liked Anathem quite a bit overall.)
| scbrg wrote:
| Way, way back I ran into a comment on Slashdot saying
| essentially:
|
| _Neal Stephenson doesn 't really do endings. At some point, he
| just declares victory and stops writing._ (not an exact quote,
| though the second sentence is probably very close to the
| original)
|
| I thought this was a hilarious observation, and shared it with
| my coworkers. This then became our standard phrase when we
| decided that a task wasn't really worth more development hours.
| _So, should we spend another day polishing this, or do we just
| declare victory?_
|
| So thanks, random Slashdot poster 20 years ago, for
| contributing to our company culture for a few years :)
| ghaff wrote:
| I've certainly run into "Let's just declare victory and move
| on" in many different contexts. And it really is a pretty
| good philosophy for many situations.
| sidibe wrote:
| The beginnings of his books are pretty difficult too, since
| he just drops you into a world with its own vocabulary and
| weirdness that takes forever to understand or in the case of
| Seveneves does many hundreds of pages of infodump details on
| how they build their space stuff. I guess the middle parts
| and ideas of his books are usually a thrill enough to make it
| worth the other parts.
| sanderjd wrote:
| I really felt this with Seveneves, which was otherwise one of
| my favorites of his. That book (or series maybe...) was nowhere
| close to over.
| baggsie wrote:
| One of my all time favourite books too.
|
| I'd recommend 2312 by Kim Stanley Robinson if you've not read
| it - it's in a similar vein / world to the third part of
| Seveneves.
| sanderjd wrote:
| Thanks so much for the recommendation! I love Kim Stanley
| Robinson - _Aurora_ and the _Red Mars_ series are some of
| my all time favorite books - but have had trouble getting
| into the one of his I 'm on right now ( _The Ministry for
| the Future_ ). So I'm very pleased to get a different
| recommendation.
| JZL003 wrote:
| I agree, I don't think diamond age gets enough interest. It's one
| of my favorite books and the ending is unsatisfying but at least
| upbeat. Seveneves is also tons of fun. And if you know anyone who
| likes history, his older Baroque Cycle is pretty great
|
| I haven't heard this in an interview or anything but I think now
| Stephenson is older and successful enough, he just writes the
| books exactly how he likes. Diamond age feels like he was
| agonizing over every word to keep everything so short. But Fall,
| and his newest book Termination Shock (which I also didn't like
| most of) ,just feels like an author who likes writing. Both have
| these amazing moments, which reminds me like a jazz musician,
| where it's almost effortlessly insightful and funny. But with no
| editing or second thoughts
| JZL003 wrote:
| Also for anyone who likes weird scifi, read Cory Doctorow's
| Rapture of the nerds, it has an amazing audiobook and is just
| fun and clever
| cl42 wrote:
| _Spoiler Alert_
|
| The idea that rich people have access to more compute power
| in the cloud, and can experience more compute cycles per
| minute (and thus have more experiences in a metaverse!), is
| exactly how I see a dystopian universe based on cloud
| computing developing. When I read that part in the book, it
| blew my mind.
| notahacker wrote:
| The thing about the Diamond Age is the first half is a
| brilliant book full of great ideas that seems to be set for a
| complex and enthralling finale, and the second half is an
| absolute mess that ruins the first half. Only book I can think
| of comparable in that respect is Stranger in a Strange Land
| (note to sci-fi authors: don't think you can tie the plot of
| your killer high-concept idea together with the first thing
| that comes to mind, especially not if the first thing that
| comes to mind is the need to come up with creative reasons for
| your characters to have orgies)
| cainxinth wrote:
| I sorta agree, but I also think one of the reasons that the
| first part is stronger has something to do with the
| protagonist's age. When she's just an innocent little girl,
| you feel incredible tension every time she is threatened. As
| she gets older and more capable, the danger doesn't connect
| as viscerally to the reader (in my case anyway).
|
| But, warts and all, still one of my favorite novels ever.
| notahacker wrote:
| Agree it's inevitable that it loses some tension and
| sweetness (and the role of the all-important Primer), but
| it's more that Stephenson just takes her in terrible
| directions (she decides to work in a brothel dictating BDSM
| fantasies, then she gets violated by rebels, then she
| _unironically_ becomes the Victorian colonialist ideal of
| the great White Leader the Chinese girls need) and the
| others in even worse directions (disappear from the
| narrative, die a pathos-free death, wake up after 12 years
| of drug induced orgies and have no emotional reaction
| whatsoever but a compelling need to wander into a pace-
| killing subplot about a theatre). The plotting is clunky, I
| 'm not sure the writing is as good despite a few nice
| moments and the whole Drummers orgy-computer concept is
| best reserved for another book, preferably unpublished.
| aoanla wrote:
| Yeah, I think the dissonance I fundamentally had with the
| ending of The Diamond Age is that it seems to not have
| any sense of irony (or any concept that, maybe, the Seed
| _might_ not be the awful idea that his protagonists are
| trying to sell us that it is, for example).
| number6 wrote:
| I can totally relate. Despite the shortcomings I love the
| book; there are parts better to be forgotten though...
|
| I secretly dream of a distributed republic.
| notahacker wrote:
| I secretly dream of discovering a second half of the book
| I enjoyed as much as the first...
| nixlim wrote:
| This. Absolutely the feeling I had after reading both of them
| jamestimmins wrote:
| I accidentally purchased the "uncut" version of Stranger in a
| Strange Land, which included 85,000 more words that were
| edited out of the original release.
|
| If ever there was a book that didn't need an extra 85,000
| words...
| number6 wrote:
| I read Stranger in a Strange Land in my youth and it was
| mind-blowing. The unnecessary Lewdness was nice in puberty
| but looking back today it's more like a thing of its time
| thing...
| mordymoop wrote:
| Diamond Age is the one I keep going back to and getting more
| out of over the years.
| bergenty wrote:
| Seveneves is all women protagonists, cannot get behind that
| though I tried.
| the__alchemist wrote:
| Probably my favorite, edging the others out slightly... as you
| might guess.
| sedev wrote:
| There's a Blood Knife article https://bloodknife.com/inadequacy-
| of-inspirational-scifi/ critiquing Stephenson that makes an
| interesting companion read to this. I have enjoyed Stephenson's
| novels tremendously, but when OP says they're not "preachy," that
| is rather a whopper -- particularly thinking of _Cryptonomicon,_
| but _Termination Shock_ also digresses into it.
| zuluonezero wrote:
| The Baroque Cycle made me understand maths and the impact of the
| 18th century renaissance on computing. It made me more curious to
| learn algebraic concepts that I had neglected. Plus he wrote
| those long books by hand with ink and a feather dip pen! It has a
| kind of crazy genius stupidity to it that is serious and light at
| the same time.
| The_Colonel wrote:
| My favorite Stephenson's novel is Anathem with superb world
| building (as usual) but also a pretty good story and ending.
|
| But it's also a book whose world (specifically the avout society)
| attracts me. I've grown up in a Catholic setting, but "converted"
| to atheism/agnosticism pretty early. But even with its many
| failings, there are certain aspects of religions which seem worth
| preserving - the focus on community, the rituals, a particular
| rule framework, meditation (prayers) and introspection.
|
| The book presents a (on a certain level) pretty attractive model
| of society which combines the practical religious patterns with a
| full rationalism.
|
| I kind of understand why such "atheist religion" is unlikely to
| get off in the real world, but it's still something I would wish
| for.
| jacquesm wrote:
| If anything the Avout are the scientists.
| Rebelgecko wrote:
| Agreed. I think there is definitely a certain kind of person
| who attaches to the idea of academic monks (myself included).
| Especially the slower pace of life and limited pop culture
| influences. I remember a few years ago someone on the Anathem
| subreddit tried to live "cloistered" for a year- not totally
| isolated, but intentionally avoiding media throughout the year,
| then they listened to a few albums and watched the best
| regarded movies.
| oliwary wrote:
| I agree! There is something very beautiful about people having
| the time to just think and learn, without access to distracting
| technology or practical concerns. I wonder what would happen if
| this was a real pathway in society. I also wonder what were to
| happen if driven individuals would take sabbaticals in places
| like this - what kind of ideas would they come up with?
|
| Superb book in any case, may pick it up again.
| bradleyjg wrote:
| Anathem is also my favorite, fairly easily.
|
| I'm not surprised there are Cryptonomicon, Snow Crash, Diamond
| Age, or Baroque Cycle favorite-rs but I am when I come across
| someone that thought Seveneves or Dodge was his best.
| noSyncCloud wrote:
| I absolutely loved Seveneves; easily my second favorite. The
| first part was too long and the second too short, however,
| and it's obviously not as good as Anathem ;)
| stuven wrote:
| I've only read Seveneves to the end and was blown away (and
| simultaneously a bit disappointed if that makes sense?). I've
| started Cryptonomicon and Snow Crash but they didn't interest
| me as much.
| smogcutter wrote:
| Same! I love Diamond Age and to a lesser extent
| Cryptonomicon, but for my money Seveneves found him leaning
| into his worst instincts.
|
| At his best, Stephenson's love of oddball, hyper-focused
| engineers leads him into in-depth explorations of niche
| fields & communities. In Seveneves though it manifested as
| boring Heinlein-esque heroic Mary Sue libertarian engineers
| who are never wrong, while every other character is somewhere
| on a spectrum of stupid to nefarious.
| PBnFlash wrote:
| Fall, dodge in hell has a super interesting take on post fact
| reality.
|
| Ai spam can get a lot crazier.
| anubhav200 wrote:
| Thanks, I was looking for exactly this only.
| progre wrote:
| Not even mentioned in the article, but a book I really like:
| Zodiak
|
| Not sf exactly, it's an "eco-thriller" but it has its fair share
| of science. And it's a pretty good thriller.
| jpm_sd wrote:
| I reread Cryptonomicon every couple of years. It's so very 90s,
| so very startup, I revel in it every time. It's delightfully
| appealing and appalling
| odiroot wrote:
| I really loved Snow Crash. That's a perfect balance between
| science fiction and reality, without crossing the cringe-
| threshold. Really wish someone adapted it into a mini-series.
|
| Encouraged by that lecture, I tried Cryptonomicon and liked it
| even more. I then listened to the audio-book version read by
| Stephenson himself. It's actually hilarious in this way.
|
| REAMDE has actually been quite disappointing. I put it down after
| 2 chapters (it crossed the cringe-threshold for me). Haven't
| picked up any of Neal's books since.
| mgarfias wrote:
| Author here forgot The Big U and Zodiac. The writing wasn't as
| polished as his later stuff, but still good stories. U's
| weirdness rating would be a 5/5.
| jameshart wrote:
| And, since _D.O.D.O_ being included means we 're evidently
| including collaborations, _The Interface_ , which reads as more
| prescient of modern political discourse every year.
| LiberationUnion wrote:
___________________________________________________________________
(page generated 2022-08-28 23:00 UTC)