|
Neil is probably one of my favorite writers. I've gone through three copies of Cryptonomicon, starting my second copy of Anathem and have read the Baroque series multiple times. He's a great author who really gives science and history lessons in the form of his fiction. The only book of his I did not like was Reamde, which I felt was a bit too much Tom Clancy. He had several themes I think went unexplored and the ending was just not something I enjoyed. Question is, what other authors write in similar styles and of similar types of science/history/economics as he does?
|
#
¿
Feb 25, 2014 18:09
|
|
|
|
| # ¿ May 16, 2024 10:53 |
|
|
blue squares posted:Can anyone explain how in the hell Snow Crash ended up on Time's list of 100 best books since 1923? It was a fun read, but c'mon. Pages and pages of dry lecturing on Sumerian myth and the characters don't have one iota of an arc. probably because the editors of Time were wowed by the idea of social media, the internet and chat rooms being discussed in 1992. Snow crash was decent, but not a great book.
|
|
#
¿
Feb 26, 2014 16:11
|
|
|
Hieronymous Alloy posted:Cryptonomicon is a brilliant book, but it may be the only thing Stephenson's ever written that had a half-decent ending. I liked the first half of everything I've ever read by him! I dunno, I thought the baroque saga had a decent ending, and Anathem wrapped itself up too. I've read Eco before, but drat is he hard to get through some times. His sex scene in The Name of the Rose was...different. Dan Brown is just terrible and needs to go away.
|
|
#
¿
Feb 26, 2014 18:37
|
|
|
AlphaDog posted:I enjoyed the hell out of Cryptonomicon, Reamde, Snow Crash, and The Big U, and I absolutely loved The Diamond Age. I couldn't get in to Anathem at all, how long does it take before the twist? (Don't spoil the twist if you can help it, I just want to know how far through the book it is). The twist is after the first third. The second third of the book is I think the weakest part, and the third part gets back up to speed again with some really cool and clever stuff. Also I read that NS will be having another epic historical series coming out this year. About time, hopefully it will be better than reamde.
|
|
#
¿
Mar 1, 2014 03:25
|
|
|
computer parts posted:They actually don't get to the Sumerian stuff until pretty late in the book from what I recall. yeah, that reading that was like reading the elvish poetry in LOTR. "oh, hmmm, dry lecture about Sumeria" *flip flip flip* still going, sigh *flip flip*
|
|
#
¿
Mar 1, 2014 04:57
|
|
|
I believe he was also using that to justify going to brothels. Poor bastard.
|
|
#
¿
Mar 3, 2014 22:32
|
|
|
Atlas Hugged posted:Just started a reread of The Baroque Cycle. I read it before I read Cryptonomicon and liked it a lot better. Anathem still remains my favorite book of his. I'm a total sucker for anything that teaches me a made-up language while I read it. Reading the proofs and axioms and trying to figure out which real philosophers they were based on was a fun game too. Anathem is probably up there tied with Cryptonomicon as my favorite books. Its just so interesting and nerdy. Going from that to Reamde was such a disappointment.
|
|
#
¿
Mar 6, 2014 03:46
|
|
|
Spoilers Below posted:I actually had the opposite experience. I found it so distracting that every chapter was taking 4-5 times longer than it should have, coupled with constantly flipping back and forth from the glossary to translate. His made up language just didn't have the natural flow of, say, A Clockwork Orange, and I ended up quitting about 1/4 of the way through because nothing was really happening. It was a shame, too, because I had really dug all his previous novels. I take it I should give it another go, perhaps not worrying so much about the language and focusing more on the plot and ideas? It picks up a bit, hopefully? Oh yes, it really picks up. You actually dropped it right before SHTF. And once you learn the lingo you will reduce your flipping a lot.
|
|
#
¿
Mar 8, 2014 05:42
|
|
|
Some of the philisophy and technical terms in the book actually lost me such as Procian, Haikarian, hemm space, etc. Other terms like Apert and Speely I picked up without much problem. I don't have a background in either mathematics or philosophy so I got a bit confused on that. But since they are based on real world principals i started to read them a bit.
|
|
#
¿
Mar 8, 2014 16:17
|
|
|
The baroque cycle needs either a few readings to really understand what the hell is going on, or a good background of the scientific, religious and political landscape of Europe certa 1660 - 1715. Its VERY well researched but a lot of the time it left me befuddled and having to go to Wikipedia to figure out who James the II was or what the Glorious Revolution was all about. Once I made it through the books the first time, the second reading was a lot easier and very worthwhile.
|
|
#
¿
Mar 9, 2014 23:51
|
|
|
Coca Koala posted:Double posting to mention that the kindle version of Cryptonomicon is on sale for two dollars; if you've got a kindle and want an easy introduction to Neal Stephenson, this is a good one. A decent mix of action and info dumps, plus some pretty great characters. I wouldnt call it 'easy'. Accessable, yes. Easy, no.
|
|
#
¿
Mar 9, 2014 23:52
|
|
|
Coca Koala posted:Honestly, I feel like Cryptonomicon is one of the easiest of his books to read. It's long, but the plot never goes totally off the rails like it does in Snowcrash or The Big U, and the infodumps are generally short enough that you're never mired in them. As long as you're willing to take the mathmatical notation that pops up occasionally at face value (and truly, the math isn't that hard; he takes the sum of a series at one point, but the reasoning is pretty well explained in prose and you can easily follow along with the idea behind what's happening) and you can keep the characters straight in your head (much easier in Crypto, when each character has not only their own distinct voice, but also a distinct narration style that Stephenson uses during their segments), there's not really anything that's confusing or tricky about it. One of the things I like about cryponomicon (As well as many of his books) are the small details you may never notice. For example, the professor who Randy argues with during the 'war as text' thing is named Günter Enoch Bobby Kivistik, for one of the three possible fathers
|
|
#
¿
Mar 11, 2014 03:49
|
|
|
Ravenfood posted:You don't even need to take the math literally. The first time he tried to explain Van Eck phreaking, I had no idea what the gently caress he was on about, so I just went "okay, the characters are convinced this works. They also know how to do it. Now I won't be surprised when they, or someone else, does this! Huzzah!" It really isn't any different from treating it as an infodump in a scifi book where someone explains positronic transdermal teleoperation or whatever. Is it more rewarding when you can follow him totally? Oh yes. The cardgame cipher is really fun when it clicks. Cryptonomicon especially, I think, can be enjoyed without it all clicking. Anathem really can't: if you didn't follow the discussions in the last third of the book, the ending just makes no sense. At least, that's how I read it. The card game perl script actually works too if you type it in (I did).
|
|
#
¿
Mar 11, 2014 13:28
|
|
|
awesmoe posted:If you don't think that an ex-drug-running millionaire chasing his neice(?) who has been kidnapped by terrorists, assisted by an MI5 agent, a russian killing machine, a biker, survivalist family members, and a bunch of other poo poo I don't remember, while being hunted by a mountain lion is at least self aware if not outright satire, well I don't know what to say. I definitely understand not liking it, but he absolutely went out and wrote the most ridiculous series of events he could think of - doing so was kind of the point of the exercise, I think. I was honestly surprised there wasn't a nuke. I think the problem i had with Reamde is i came out of it not having learned anything cool. Snowcrash I got a lecture on Babylonian mythology Cryptonomicon I got a great lecture about code-breaking and the problems of using secret data appropriately. The baroque series i got a loving huge rear end history lesson Anathem I picked up a bunch of info on philosophy and metaphysics. Reamde I got....nuttin. No real deep themes. It felt more like a rather vapid Tom Clancy book rather than a NS book.
|
|
#
¿
Mar 13, 2014 13:59
|
|
|
Atlas Hugged posted:They discuss this a bit. It's called "collapsing the wave length" or some bullshit like that. It all goes back to the very first chapter of the book where Erasmus is serving as amanuensis. Erasmus's function throughout the whole book is to serve as a witness for the plot. I'd go so far as to say Jaa himself is the protagonist. Jaa is aware of all possibilities simultaneously through some trickery of his order. Further, he is able to allow other people to "see" these possibilities, as dreams or visions or whatever. He then "collapses" the possible narrative with the "real" one, so the witnesses remember what they saw but continue to exist in their original reality. So all these people see the possible outcomes of contact with Arbre, sometimes even witnessing themselves dying in other possible narratives, and retain that knowledge in their original narrative. No, Fraa Jad actually shifts his consciousness to different causal domains. Thats why Fraa E feels the everything killers going off in his belly (they were the big pill they swalloed before taking off) when they were attacked by the guards. But in another casual domain Fraa Jad was able to meet and talk to the space ship captain and figure out questions about the wick, IE Arbe was upstream in the HTW than earth and the other two planets. Also don't forget that Fraa Jad 'died' on launch, which is why he was always so quiet in space until he smashed the transmitters. They developed this ability while sitting around watching nuclear waste. They were getting radiation poisioning from the waste, so they figured out how to shift consciousness to narratives that they did not take the damage at that point in time. Thats also how Fraa Jad is supposed to be hundreds if not thousands of years old. Yes, it was earth. Jules Verne was french, which is why he called it "laterre", it was french, Le Terre. Also the rockets they called the monkyfeeks? He was calling them magnificant when he saw them. C'est magnifique!" But Fraa E was spelling it phonetically. Cimber fucked around with this message at 14:13 on Mar 14, 2014 |
|
#
¿
Mar 14, 2014 14:07
|
|
|
Atlas Hugged posted:I disagree. None of what you posted actually goes against my interpretation at all. I don't think he's shifting consciousnesses, but rather allowing other people to witness the other casual domains. He's not moving from one Fraa Jad to another. Every Fraa Jad is aware of every other Fraa Jad simultaneously. They're working in tandem. That is very possible. Now, how about this. Is Fraa Jad the same thing as Enoch Root?
|
|
#
¿
Mar 15, 2014 04:03
|
|
|
Nevvy Z posted:You just blew my loving mind. 
|
|
#
¿
Mar 15, 2014 04:13
|
|
|
withak posted:Holy poo poo. We have already established that earth is in the same story universe as Arbe. Einstein and Godel are explicitly mentioned, so its very possible that Cryptonomicon and Anathem take place in the same multiverse. And that would really explain what Enoch Root is able to do.
|
|
#
¿
Mar 15, 2014 04:30
|
|
|
Snak posted:Which is possible because in another narrative those atoms were a different element... (I am mostly joking) lets put spoiler tags please. now then Perhaps the heavy Gold Enoch is so involved in is simply the 'newmatter' of Anathem? Slightly different atoms?
|
|
#
¿
Mar 15, 2014 13:05
|
|
|
Dr. Benway posted:This is from days ago but, Not only did he hand write the whole manuscript, he also used three different fountain pens and inks for each of the main characters. I'm sure his editor and publisher were THRILLED with a stunt like that.
|
|
#
¿
Mar 17, 2014 23:17
|
|
|
Spoilers Below posted:I'm working through Reamde for the first time right now, and I can echo that sentiment. It's like a Tom Clancy novel filtered through Something Awful. It's very early in, but watching the JRR Tolkien/Robert Jordan mash-up tear into the Piers Anthony/Terry Brooks guy over the placement of apostrophes by asking the kid with Asperger's if you could just stick volcanoes anywhere you pleased warmed a part of my heart in a way that's difficult to put into words. What game is that?
|
|
#
¿
Mar 21, 2014 04:36
|
|
|
Spoilers Below posted:T'Rain is really reminiscent of Eve's insistence that the world grow organically, and that the "realistic" economy be the driving force of all player interactions. All the parts about mining being the primary focus for many players, and how they need to fund the players that actually get to have fun is eerily close to the way some people play the game, with mining vessels and other craft being really cheap and easy, and the super star destroyer type ships costing the in game equivalent of thousands of dollars. Even the stuff about all your skills training automatically during downtime is in Eve. Stephenson is a big enough geek that I'd be shocked if he wasn't familiar. That actually sounds rather cool. Huh.
|
|
#
¿
Mar 21, 2014 15:15
|
|
|
Ravenfood posted:EVE is the greatest game to hear about other people playing. Apparently his kickstarted venture into doing the MMO with 'clang' isnt doing very well.http://www.wired.com/gamelife/2013/09/clang-kickstarter/ Older story however.
|
|
#
¿
Mar 21, 2014 20:09
|
|
|
Snak posted:Every time I think of Cryptonomicon (which I love), That's the stand-out awkward scene. It's not terrible in context, but it's still pretty bad. If i remember right, the sex scene in TNotR was 95 percent the narrator discussing St. Augustus's writings. It was just bizarre.
|
|
#
¿
Mar 24, 2014 01:06
|
|
|
Strange Matter posted:I far prefer the Daniel portions of the Baroque Cycle to the Eliza or Jack sections, with the exception being the Bonanza portion of The Confusion, which is by far my favorite part of the entire series. Being that I don't usually read that genre of fiction it really riveted me from beginning to end, and those parts kept me going through the Juncto portions, which were far duller to me. Absolutely. I love the 'clever people doing clever things to achieve their goals' aspect of his writings. Cooking up the phosphorus to scare away the bandit king was a great example. The historical parts can be iether really dull or highly interesting. If i can see where things are going its great, if it gets mixed up with lots of characters it can be confusing and annoying to read.
|
|
#
¿
Mar 31, 2014 16:19
|
|
|
Atlas Hugged posted:I think his action sequences that are more a comedy of errors than people being badass work really well. Jack Shaftoe is constantly stumbling his way into fights and they're all really fun and interesting. The kung fu battle in Anathem is great because there are multiple times when Raz probably did die, but the story just switches to a different narrative where he didn't. They outright said he died when the everything killers in his gut were detonated by Fra Jaad
|
|
#
¿
Apr 1, 2014 03:39
|
|
|
Jazerus posted:That's sort of Jack's purpose, really. He's there so Stephenson can write about exotic locales and interesting people that Daniel and Eliza have no reason to ever encounter due to his low class, and to randomly intersect with their stories, usually to move them great distances because traveling chaos is the definition of Jack. This basically. Jack can do what everyone else can't. Too bad he gets screwed over again, and again, and again. But if he does not get screwed well, he would have no reason to travel so much.
|
|
#
¿
Apr 4, 2014 22:11
|
|
|
Atlas Hugged posted:We should really get a mod to spell poor Neal's name correctly. haha, whoops!
|
|
#
¿
Apr 7, 2014 19:42
|
|
|
SnakePlissken posted:I was kind of getting used to its somethingawfulness. I can't spell to save my lif.
|
|
#
¿
Apr 8, 2014 23:19
|
|
|
Atlas Hugged posted:I just finished my reread of King of the Vagabonds and Jack's last line about the prodigious butt-loving of Mr. Vliet is funny every time. It's like something out of the Bible! both of them are really butt monkeys for a good part of the book.
|
|
#
¿
Apr 10, 2014 20:52
|
|
|
SnakePlissken posted:BTW, funny that nobody has mentioned the Mongoliad ITT. It wasn't so bad. One gripe is that I think the trick of suddenly grabbing one's opponent's sword with a gauntleted hand being used I think *three times* was odd. But there was clearly a lot of Neil in that series and I enjoyed it. Honestly I had never heard of it until recently. Is it cowritten by him or what.
|
|
#
¿
Apr 11, 2014 12:05
|
|
|
Atlas Hugged posted:That might be the inspiration, but we literally see him use alchemy to rejuvinate. Yes, he does it in Cryptonomicon after he is shot in Finland, and we find out that he gave Daniel Waterhouse alchemy during his bladder stone operation where he dies. And he's not alone, there are other immortal alchemissts out there too
|
|
#
¿
Apr 18, 2014 15:08
|
|
|
Dr. Benway posted:As well as Roger Bacon, John Dee, The Count of St. Germaine. Right. Well, some of them at least, I'm sure in his world some of them are just try-hards.
|
|
#
¿
Apr 19, 2014 00:48
|
|
|
The glorious revolution was fine, the coded cross stitch part annoyed the poo poo out of me. That series pingponged between being really awesome to dull as poo poo. For the most part, Eliza's stuff was in the dull as poo poo parts.
|
|
#
¿
Apr 19, 2014 14:02
|
|
|
Strange Matter posted:The best correspondence in the Baroque Cycle is between Eliza and Roger Comstock, and I think it takes place in The Confusion but it might be in Odalisque, where Eliza is asking Roger about the english economy as part of a bogus scheme to fund the French invasion of England, and Roger wises up to it and adds a post-script saying "By the way if this is a scheme to fund the French invasion of England, then I'll personally delivery the gold to you crammed up my arse." I missed all of that because reading it was such a chore to read. I ended up skipping many pages until I got to more interesting parts. Really, thats the only parts in NS's works that I ever did that in. Even the Babylonian mythology lessons in Snow Crash I kept up with.
|
|
#
¿
Apr 21, 2014 14:38
|
|
|
AlphaDog posted:"Gamification" is a growing thing right now - from teachers applying MMO-like progression numbers to grading, to stuff like Fitocracy where you lift weights and level up, to stuff like looking for cancer cures via video game (some of which seem to just be game skins over distributed computing programs and some of which seem to actually involve folding proteins as a puzzle game). because you get an instant and tangible result for your effort. You get that sense of achievement, which is why MMO's have the treadmill they make players run. Its thrilling to get a new level and have access to new powers.
|
|
#
¿
Apr 22, 2014 01:31
|
|
|
Atlas Hugged posted:Finally slogged through the Eliza stuff and am back to enjoying Jack's adventures around the globe. The book immediately picks up once they get their hands on the gold. The coinfusion? Yeah, the Jack stuff is fun, the Eliza stuff is important but kind of dull. Just remember, Jack is a huge butt monkey. http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/ButtMonkey
|
|
#
¿
May 6, 2014 12:46
|
|
|
Nevvy Z posted:I'm listening to an audiobook of Reamde, I read it years ago and it and the baroque cycle are the only ones I have't read twice, and I'm really enjoying the constant unnecessary level of detail he goes into. We've talked a bit in this thread about how it's kind of an odd book. I think the reason it's so weird is because when he's doing this about the past, future, or an alternate dimension it's worldbuilding. We are used to that, lots of books like to populate their worlds with a rich history, there's even that little metacommentary about it in regards to T'Rain. But here he doesn't really need to worldbuild, it takes place in the real world, so it comes across a little more awkwardly. I'm currently in the part where Chongor is talking about Hungarian economics and how he had a job converting software to use their integered currency and it doesn't matter at all to the plot, it's just a little thing the author wanted to talk about for a minute in the middle of the heroine being kidnapped. See, the first half of reamde was ok I guess, he seemed to set the stage for really-neat-poo poo to happen. But he forgot to execute on that and just made the last half to last 3rd a Tom Clancy novel with longer adjectives.
|
|
#
¿
May 6, 2014 22:42
|
|
|
SnakePlissken posted:The King of the Vagabonds is no loving butt monkey, thanks. Sure he is, he fits the trope fairly well. He gets Eliza, he loses her and gets enslaved. He gets a pile of gold, then loses it. He gets more gold, loses that again. Gets a ship, loses it. Poor guy gets poo poo on through the entire series to the amusement of the readers. But i guess he gets her in the end.
|
|
#
¿
May 8, 2014 17:47
|
|
|
|
| # ¿ May 16, 2024 10:53 |
|
|
Casimir Radon posted:New book was recently announced, Seveneves will be released in April next year. Apparently it has something to do with the last 7 women to survive a global catastrophe or something. Huh. Not sure if it sounds good or not. Then again, when i heard the one line summary of Anathem (Scientist monks on an alien planet) i wasn't too thrilled either but i ended up loving it.
|
|
#
¿
Oct 21, 2014 18:15
|
|