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Samopsa posted:In short (note: heavy spoilers without telling details) Thanks! I assumed as much since there was so much foreshadowing. I also couldn't figure out another reason for the book to still be happening.
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May 26, 2015 16:06
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physeter posted:I devoured the first 2/3rds of the book, the last 1/3rd was pretty weak. It felt like a solid Greg Bear book, or a Stephen Baxter book with actual characters. You get what you pay for, but it's far from NS's best work. It's much better than Reamde though. The USN didn't tell her because they knew she was batshit crazy and would wind up getting them all killed somehow in some incredibly stupid and self serving way, or realistically it as one of possibly many other hail mary efforts that really had no chance in hell of actually working, but was worth a shot because, you know why not, so Julia didn't mention it as she would naturally assume they just died like it was pretty much expected they would. yeah I really liked some parts of it, and it covered some pretty neat ideas, but the first 2/3rds were much better then the second. The secound half felt like an overly long never ending epilogue and just as they start building up the tension between the red and the blue sides it just sort of end. I liked how the time gap gave us a glimpse of how the personalities and ideologues of the seven eves continued to have an effect for so long, although I would of though that the considering how much of an issue genetic diversity was that each lineage would of been so inbreed with each other by the six or seventh generation that there would of been no separation, but what ever. also did they mention what happened to the mars expedition? I'm assuming they all died, but I don't remember it actually being mention.
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May 26, 2015 17:15
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The society described in the last third didn't seem like one that had 5000 years of history. There's an argument to be made that the existence of video recordings etc. slows down the rate of change of culture but still...
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May 26, 2015 17:47
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shrike82 posted:The society described in the last third didn't seem like one that had 5000 years of history. They weren't. They were the society that resulted when they were able to go back down to Earth and start rebuilding. They're a thousand years out from that. dr_rat posted:also did they mention what happened to the mars expedition? I'm assuming they all died, but I don't remember it actually being mention. Wasn't that the group that Aria and Julia were in, the one that went from 800 people to 11 in three years?
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May 26, 2015 18:24
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Wanderer posted:Wasn't that the group that Aria and Julia were in, the one that went from 800 people to 11 in three years? Nah, unless I'm mis-remembering the Mars group was just a small group of people, about 10-20. The Aria and Julia group left a few hours after. Although possibly all the mars group got killed when the explosive decompression happened. I'd have to go back and re-read that bit to be sure Wanderer posted:They weren't. They were the society that resulted when they were able to go back down to Earth and start rebuilding. They're a thousand years out from that. Seemed like they had quite a few aspects of the society continue through the whole 5000 years though. I mean the politics and structure changed but they kept the genetic distinctions and still treated the seveneves as the founding figures for their society as a whole, and ideologue and behavior templates for their specific genetic groupings. Not a clean continuation, but far more then you would expect for through 5000 years of history, resulting in a 3 billion population. Sure there were lots of extra factors to consider with the main restrictions put on to them due to existing entirely inside a sizable asteroid/moon chunk for quite a bit of that, but still 5000 years is a hell of a long time. dr_rat fucked around with this message at 18:49 on May 26, 2015 |
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May 26, 2015 18:36
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I thought that what was intended to be the departure of the Mars expedition got turned into the big split-off, at which point the Mars project got abandoned because they had bigger problems to deal with.
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May 26, 2015 18:43
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As much as the final third was a disappointment compared to what preceded (it was on track to my favorite Stephenson book until Part Three), it took a nosedive when we met the Pingers, and then fell into the deepest nadir of stupid at, like, the final line. Really, Neal? That's your conclusion?
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May 26, 2015 18:54
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Yeah, not sure why you'd set the advent of the orbital civilization a thousand years back considering that they placed a lot of importance in the multimedia recordings of the izzy.
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May 26, 2015 19:06
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To heap more criticism on the third part of the book it just wasn't well done. 5,000 years is a monstrous amount of time for the human social organism. Their society didn't feel like anything any one of us couldn't have adapted to in about 30 seconds. I recommend Stephen Baxter's Coalescent for anyone interested in a more creative look at overcrowding over time. I'm surprised NS didn't rip that off, but I'm guessing he had already helped himself to Baxter's Flood series and didn't want to push it.
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May 26, 2015 19:42
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I liked it. Third part was definitely the weakest, but still interesting. Honestly, though the anthropological side of it was, to me, much more interesting than the continued nerding out about big sci fi objects. The tech stuff was notable during the modern-ish setting because it's all about using tech we basically have today to do awesome space stuff, but once you fast forward a while the tech involved is pretty arbitrary. There was a whole section where he points out that their integrated circuit tech isn't as good as ours in, which was... odd. Why isn't it? Mostly just to have an excuse for Kath to read a book, as far as I could tell. Meanwhile, the interaction between different strains of humanity and the legacy of the Epic was neat to think about, but Neil's better at hardware than software. Why did no one ever sequence DNA from the bodies of people from the cloud ark / ISS that had been floating in space for thousands of years not really decomposing? I guess there might have been a cultural stigma about it, but in 5K years and billions of lifetimes I'm sure there were at least a couple breakaway groups that wanted to do stuff like that. Things of that nature aren't exactly plot holes but it's still sort of bizarre. Doob's body is right there! Make a clone! Mainly it felt like Stephanson wanted an excuse to nerd out about big dumb space objects, and he needed to show that humanity survives and have the 're-connection' moment with the Pingers. Which I did like a lot! Might have even felt a tear squeak out. But it needed to either be a wholly separate work (not just a novelette) or actually resolve things like what 'The Purpose' is. I really thought the Red's big dumb object was going to be a way for them to (finally) head up to Mars but nope it's just a bigger better Eye? I would actually like to read a book set entirely in the 5K years later part, but it felt rushed in some places and not detailed enough in others. NmareBfly fucked around with this message at 22:20 on May 28, 2015 |
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May 28, 2015 21:18
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NmareBfly posted:There was a whole section where he points out that their integrated circuit tech isn't as good as ours in, which was... odd. Why isn't it? Lower population for most of history, investing billions in a new process like Intel does is even more risky if you're doing it in outer space, and radiation hardening.
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May 28, 2015 23:42
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I'm only 20% of the way through seveneves. It's good so far. Some of his best writing has been the small side story about the blond "scout" kosmonaut living in an onion. drat near could feel the poo poo they had to go through working and living up there like that. The chocolate was a nice touch to character development. I really don't understand the poor ratings the book is getting because people feel there isn't enough character development. The peripheral by Gibson is still one of the best books of the year though. This doesn't even get close.
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May 30, 2015 22:07
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Yeah, Tekla was my favorite character. I like how she spoke fluent English but would drop her articles sometimes for emphasis because she knew it had a strong effect on the Americans.
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May 30, 2015 22:24
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Blind Rasputin posted:The peripheral by Gibson is still one of the best books of the year though. This doesn't even get close.  I'm about halfway through Seveneves and while it's interesting, it's written in a very similar style to REAMDE. Rather than the amusingly purple prose of the Baroque Cycle, which could make anything sound interesting, it has the matter of fact dry tone of REAMDE, so there have been so many entire pages where he's just saying "blah blah ten centimeters wide blah blah connected to the main hub by blah blah at the end of that doowacky there is a ten centimeter diddledaddle". I honestly don't need to know, Neal. I'll take your word for it on some of this stuff. It's not bad but it's nowhere near Baroque or Anathem levels of quality and it's really just all due to the style. 
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May 31, 2015 00:49
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It really does feel like he being deliberately bleak. Someone mentioned The Road and it really fits. Some of his earlier books have had bad, dangerous or morose spots but I don't recall anything this relentlessly depressing. Even though it works in general and adds tremendously to the story points, it really makes me miss his humor. Also, I do not have a math brain at all and trying to visualize some of the orbital physics was extremely difficult even with the lengthy explanations. I had a similar feeling towards the various iterations of izzy, making it hard to get a feel for it and by the time it merged/got engulfed by the ice comet I have a feeling my mental image was very off. meanolmrcloud fucked around with this message at 22:00 on May 31, 2015 |
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May 31, 2015 03:56
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I actually really enjoyed Reamde. It just seemed like such a grand adventure to me. When it was over, I really missed some of the characters, especially the two male and female secret special forces roles (can't remember their names. Had a bit of a love interest if I remember). The whole story of funneling funds through an MMO farming group reminded me a lot of Eve farming bots. I don't know if terrorists could ever come in to America the way he supposed, but it seemed plausible enough to be a bit scary. Seveneves is quite a lot like Reamde. Really enjoying the idea of hard rain. What a way to go. 
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May 31, 2015 04:01
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Oh, I loved REAMDE, in that one the dry matter-of-fact tone worked for me because I thought the characters were pretty snazzy. Olivia and Sokolov were definitely two of the best. It's just that it's a novel that isn't good in the same way as his other stuff. And yeah I can't really visualize Izzy, would have been nice if it had an illustration of the station in the same way he included a map of London for Quicksilver.
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May 31, 2015 04:10
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As a player of Kerbal Space Program, and a mathematician I found the LEO mechanics pretty easy to follow and maybe that made me appreciate the book a bit more than I would have otherwise. But I found when I got to the 5000+ years into the future bit my reading speed dropped when I lost the will to demolish it as I did with most of Neil's other works :/ Still one of the best sci-fi books written in a few years for sure though.
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May 31, 2015 04:19
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precision posted:Oh, I loved REAMDE, in that one the dry matter-of-fact tone worked for me because I thought the characters were pretty snazzy. Olivia and Sokolov were definitely two of the best. It's just that it's a novel that isn't good in the same way as his other stuff. You're in luck! He actually provided some illustrations, seen in the link below (spoilers!!!!) http://gizmodo.com/heres-how-space-megastructures-will-look-according-to-1705593580 (
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May 31, 2015 13:36
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Samopsa posted:You're in luck! He actually provided some illustrations, seen in the link below (spoilers!!!!) Do not all versions of the book have the illustrations in the front and the back of Izzy and The Cradle, and of the Ring on a glossy page in the middle? (I got the signed copy.)
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May 31, 2015 18:43
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I guess some ebook readers don't show them though. Also, most illustrations were barely legible in my ebook copy.
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May 31, 2015 18:59
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The eBook version I have does have two pictures. I got the general shape of Izzy right, which is all the picture shows. I was referring more to being confused about the logistics of the things that get added. To be fair I started to half-skim those paragraphs after the 20th one.
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May 31, 2015 19:29
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I loved Seveneves but act 3 should have been its own novel. It had wonderful concepts grounded in the first 2 sections of the book but too rushed and shallow. Welp, on to some Reynolds.
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May 31, 2015 21:06
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Man, New Caird and all of the "politics" surrounding it have turned this book into an absolute loving page turner. Whoever voiced that this is one of his most morose works is so spot on. It's just downright grim. I'm getting a huge kick out of all the orbital mechanics stuff. They are not really a minus to me. The book wouldn't be nearly as good, or suspenseful, without them.
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Jun 2, 2015 04:47
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I loved the bleakness, a book has never given me the sense of mounting horror and dread I felt when the characters suspected and finally confirmed that Ymir had become a death ship. The real kicker was how necessary it was even after continuing to kill what few people they had left. Creepy as gently caress.
Der Luftwaffle fucked around with this message at 07:40 on Jun 2, 2015 |
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Jun 2, 2015 06:58
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I think I am going to have to give this book a go. The whole dread thing is too enticing.
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Jun 2, 2015 07:54
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The problem is that all of the dread goes out the window for the last third and it becomes a boring political thriller where we don't really have a stake in who comes out on top.
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Jun 3, 2015 01:29
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Too late I already bought it.
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Jun 3, 2015 06:08
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Please rename the thread to "Neal Stephenson: Tekla porn" tia Or at least just correct "Neil" to "Neal" because it's driving me nuts. Probably because I grew up with a "Neal".
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Jun 3, 2015 19:07
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precision posted:Please rename the thread to "Neal Stephenson: Tekla porn" tia "Furnature" drives me up the wall, too. I'm down with "Neal Stephenson: Tekla porn and Orbital Mechanics 101"
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Jun 3, 2015 19:14
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Stephenson is one of my favourite authors, but this was a real slog. The tech digressions that were done with charm in previous books just felt dropped in for the sake of it, and there were too many plot points that made no sense. The whole concept that in a global emergency private companies would be launching their own schemes to save the world was ridiculous. The seven races was amateur hour sci-fi - if you're trying to rebuild the human race from scratch with minimal genetic material making seven races with little interbreeding makes no sense. The races were just a bunch of stereotypes, and the resurrection of the Neanderthals was just plain stupid.
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Jun 4, 2015 07:19
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sarehu posted:Minor third act spoilers: Lower population for most of history, investing billions in a new process like Intel does is even more risky if you're doing it in outer space, and radiation hardening. It's the scale of things that gets me. Like, I can understand that devices like smartphones that we see today might not be in regular use because they could get zapped by a cosmic ray in transit -- but the main thing is just the timeframe. 'Not commonly in use' is different that 'the incredible secrets of the pentium chip were lost with Old Earth.' They might have had a lot lower population through most of their history, but this is a population that is mostly bred to be highly intelligent and technically sophisticated. Even considering the rather extreme problems presented by living in space, I find it hard to believe they would make less progress in semiconductors in a thousand years than we have made in 70 down on the ground. Especially with the Red / Blue conflict to drive war spending -- wouldn't having a faster computer be pretty drat useful when it comes to chucking rocks at each other? And they've had people on the Earth again for multiple generations, more than enough time to start nosing around with no worries about a stray ray. In terms of the investment, isn't it mostly just a question of manpower? They have essentially limitless material resources to work with. I guess it could be a question of not having enough trace resources out in space? Might not be a lot of Yttrium out there on space rocks, I have no idea. It's a minor thing, I know. Just saying is all.
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Jun 4, 2015 23:06
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NmareBfly posted:It's a minor thing, I know. Just saying is all.
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Jun 5, 2015 12:53
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DAAS Kapitalist posted:Stephenson is one of my favourite authors, but this was a real slog. The tech digressions that were done with charm in previous books just felt dropped in for the sake of it, and there were too many plot points that made no sense. I thought it was a rich individual, who may or may not of used his company assets, ( which at that point are the shareholders really going to sue and even if they did the dudes off earth so gently caress what the courts say) because the government was screwing things up and loving up any chance for humanity. Now even if he the guy wouldn't just do it out of altruism, and sure the vast majority of billionaires are the last people you would expect to be altruistic, -although you know their is always the exception, and it was just one exception- the guys thinks he's hosed anyway, he can probably get himself a place on the arc by like, the way that he did, but he thinks the whole missions hosed for very good reasons, so just getting a spot is meaningless for him, its just a fast vs slow death. He's hosed either way, so might as well go the third option which is pretty much suicide but does have at least the vaguest chance of success, and if he did succeeded suddenly he's got a spot in an arc that actually has some chance of making it. It's the only option that he sees that lets him live. I mean I think his decision may of been a little more altruistic than that, but even if it wasn't it stills the only plan that makes any sense from his point of view.
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Jun 5, 2015 15:02
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Even though Neal has gone on record stating basically that he wanted to craft a plausible scenario regarding why Star Trek species all look humanoid and can interbreed, I find the "solution" at the end of Part Two (and by extension the entirety of Part Three) irritating. At least the question drove him to write two thirds of a great book. I really would have loved a longer series, each focused on the trials and triumphs of those underground vs. undersea vs. in orbit vs. en route to Mars and their ultimate reunion without the forced speciation malarkey.
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Jun 5, 2015 15:21
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If the world were ending with 100% certainty, wouldn't every billionaire be throwing all their money at trying to survive? Why is that the thing that stretches believability?
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Jun 5, 2015 18:13
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precision posted:If the world were ending with 100% certainty, wouldn't every billionaire be throwing all their money at trying to survive? Why is that the thing that stretches believability? Because, cynically, they would be doing so at the expense of everyone else surviving -- "If me and my harem get to survive, gently caress everyone else."
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Jun 5, 2015 19:15
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Third acty: The main thing I had a problem with was that, given that we know that cross-breeding is still possible, why aren't there a lot more of them around, particularly in the most generally mixed part at the top of the map? Surely some combinations would have proven particularly vigorous. In particular, I was wondering why in the world there weren't enough of them to raise a huge stink about being completely disfranchised from every particularly important decision or task by the whole 'seven' business.
Thranguy fucked around with this message at 19:48 on Jun 5, 2015 |
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Jun 5, 2015 19:45
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Thranguy posted:Third acty: The main thing I had a problem with was that, given that we know that cross-breeding is still possible, why aren't there a lot more of them around, particularly in the most generally mixed part at the top of the map? Surely some combinations would have proven particularly vigorous. In particular, I was wondering why in the world there weren't enough of them to raise a huge stink about being completely disfranchised from every particularly important decision or task by the whole 'seven' business. Because Neal had an endpoint in sight and designed toward it. So: "Because, that's why."
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Jun 5, 2015 21:41
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precision posted:If the world were ending with 100% certainty, wouldn't every billionaire be throwing all their money at trying to survive? Why is that the thing that stretches believability? They wouldn't have any money because the financial system would stop functioning, and any privately owned space launch capability would be nationalised at the start of the crisis.
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Jun 6, 2015 01:47
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