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We are all nerds: The literary works of Neal Stephenson

by Pseudomanifold on 8/28/22, 4:52 PM with 220 comments

• by The_Colonel on 8/28/22, 8:24 PM

  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.

• by JZL003 on 8/28/22, 5:57 PM

  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

• by lb1lf on 8/28/22, 5:56 PM

  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.

• by Derbasti on 8/29/22, 6:15 AM

  Snow Crash is probably the one formative book that made me who I am. I bought this book in the English section of a Norwegian bookstore while on a bike trip there. I was just out of school and I had not decided yet what to do with my life. My English was just barely good enough to understand Snow Crash.

  At its essence, Snow Crash introduced me to the idea of hacking. That is, hacking in the abstract sense of using knowledge about the inner workings of things to influence the world. At the time, I didn't know anything about software yet. Even though the main hero of the book is a master hacker and part of the book plays out in cyber space, it never really talks about the act of writing code. I would learn about that later.

  Snow Crash was my red pill. Re-reading it today, after having been a professional software engineer for a number of years, I can't overstate how influential this book has been in my life. It instilled in me the desire to understand the deep structures of things. And with that, the ability to influence and create the world around me. It set me on the path to becoming who I am today.

  Snow Crash also served as my introduction to modern utopian cyberpunk. Even though I spent my youth playing video games and reading bad sci-fi, I still remember Snow Crash as my formal introduction to cyber space, virtual avatars, megacorporations, and light cycle races. And it told of the awesome power of reason.

  My second favorite Stephenson is Zodiac, strangely.

• by cletus on 8/28/22, 11:56 PM

  It's always fascinating to read people's takes on Stephenson's corpus.

  For me, Cryptonomicon to this day remains one of my most favorite books of all time. It harkens back to Douglas Adams and the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy in that it meanders through what many would describe as filler. Some seem to dislike that. To me it helped paint such a great picture.

  I guess some people are more interested in the destination than the journey. Stephenson is much more about the journey.

  I love his description of those who just seem to have a gift for cryptography with the example of the street map of London [1]. Likewise his satire of academic writing with the paper on beards [2].

  But it also captured (at least for me) the spirit of the dot-com era like nothing else I've ever read. It also wove together a cohesive mix of the (then) modern era and the code breaking of the Second World War (eg the abhorrent treatment of Alan Turing by the British Government).

  I really don't know if it would translate to the small screen (it's too long for the large screen and it would be a crime to try).

  Snow Crash, which I read years earlier, was highly memorable. It was really the closing days of the Cyperpunk era and I loved the world building.

  Both of the above suffer from Stephenson's achilles heels: actually ending a story.

  Anathem I also enjoyed. But the Baroque Cycle I never finished. I can't even remember where I stopped. I think it was early in the third book. I just found it so tedious. Early on I find it way more interesting.

  [1]: https://tentacle.net/~chrisr/bookshelf/Stephenson,%20Neal%20...

  [2]: https://tentacle.net/~chrisr/bookshelf/Stephenson,%20Neal%20...

• by the__alchemist on 8/28/22, 5:55 PM

  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.

• by uptime on 8/28/22, 11:10 PM

  Count me as a Zodiac reader. I grew up in the era where falling into the Charles River bought you a tetanus shot, and the opening scene is in an industrial corridor I used to explore. I also liked Snow Crash and Cryptonomicon and thought the Baroque cycle was a bold achievement, tying science and credit and warfare together. I haven’t invested in his later work enough to have an opinion, but he must have a lot of pages left in him - I hope he keep going and give us another good yarn with an ending.

• by skybrian on 8/28/22, 7:48 PM

  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...

• by jabl on 8/28/22, 7:09 PM

  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.

• by cantSpellSober on 8/28/22, 5:41 PM

  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)

• by WastingMyTime89 on 8/29/22, 12:55 AM

  I am probably not going to make myself a lot of friends here but my issue with Stephenson is that he is not really a good writer.

  I liked Snow Crash. It’s a very fun book. It doesn’t overstay its welcome too much. Of course, the ending is awful and the prose average but I could forgive that for the enjoyment value.

  I then tried to read Cryptonimicon and the Diamond Age. I couldn’t go further than thirty pages. I’m sure there are interesting ideas somewhere in these books but I can’t really imagine having to plod through the rest to reach them.

• by beaugunderson on 8/29/22, 12:10 AM

  If you like his books but haven't read "Mother Earth Mother Board", a piece of hacker tourism published in WIRED in 1996, do yourself a favor:

  https://www.wired.com/1996/12/ffglass/

• by sedev on 8/28/22, 7:20 PM

  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.

• by odiroot on 8/28/22, 8:30 PM

  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.

• by mgarfias on 8/28/22, 9:02 PM

  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.

• by zuluonezero on 8/28/22, 9:28 PM

  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.

• by jpm_sd on 8/28/22, 10:41 PM

  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

• by madrox on 8/29/22, 5:27 AM

  Stephenson has an incredible style that I appreciate more with every book I read because he has some regard for what you're probably thinking while reading it.

  Some of his books are incredibly easy to read. Some, like Quicksilver, are a slog. However, pretty much all of his books have a point near the end where a couple of characters sit down together to talk about what the story was really about in a way that puts a new lens on everything that happened. Usually, I never see it coming.

  His ability to obfuscate the theme until he's ready to surprise you with it is an impressive mental feat. I don't think I've encountered another author that's so consistently good at it.

• by InTheArena on 8/28/22, 11:06 PM

  Since adaptations of some of Neal's earlier work are in development now for the streaming services, I think he's about to become much more popular.

  That said, every time I read the Baroque Cycle, I feel like he wrote it just for me. It will be a bit - but I suspect that just like Snow Crash seems to be taking over from Neuromancer in terms of the great metaverse work of fiction, I think his later work will also eventually come into vogue. I also adore the ending of the Baroque Cycle. Unlike virtually every other conclusion to a Stephenson novel, it feels like the ending is the satisfying moment where the whole story comes together - the total synthesis of the thesis of his works.

• by labrador on 8/28/22, 8:16 PM

  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...

• by the__alchemist on 8/29/22, 4:02 AM

  Does anyone have recommended books or authors for people who like Stephenson?

  My primary recommendation is Adrian Tchaikovsky's Children of Time books; their attention to detail is almost on Stephenson's level, although without as much edge in their tone and metaphors. I think most Stephenson fans would like them.

  I'd also recommend Carl Sagan's Contact, and any of the Andy Weir books, although these are milder in tone, scope, and world-building.

• by cl42 on 8/28/22, 6:16 PM

  A bit random, but I always think about how Seveneves could be a fantastic RPG.

• by ttepasse on 8/28/22, 9:38 PM

  > 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.)

• by progre on 8/28/22, 7:56 PM

  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.

• by pmdulaney on 8/28/22, 5:47 PM

  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.

• by LordViper128 on 8/29/22, 8:02 AM

  Neal Stephenson, I love his work. I accidentally fell into seveneves, while that has it's problems, especially near the end, I absolutely devoured it. from there I just started reading all his stuff. Such a cool way to integrate science with story telling.

• by PBnFlash on 8/28/22, 6:57 PM

  Fall, dodge in hell has a super interesting take on post fact reality.

  Ai spam can get a lot crazier.

• by pbj1968 on 8/29/22, 3:30 AM

  He’s worth seeing in person. A very thoughtful question and answer session. His books are an exhausting read, but he does have a beautiful command of language.

• by chillpenguin on 8/29/22, 12:42 AM

  Just read Cyptonomicon (the only Stephenson book I have read so far) and was thinking about what to read next, so this post was timely for me :)

• by sylens on 8/28/22, 11:25 PM

  My first Stephenson book was Seveneves and I feel like its discussion of social media feedback loops in the 2nd act was eerily prescient

• by reubenswartz on 8/29/22, 2:29 AM

  Stephenson is one of my favorite storytellers and one of my least favorite writers. It’s quite maddening. :)

• by LargoLasskhyfv on 8/29/22, 10:33 AM

  Again. Why no love for "The Years of Rice and Salt"?

• by wdr1 on 8/29/22, 3:48 AM

  Am I the only one who is continually disappointed by his inability to write a good ending?

  He does an _excellent_ job building worlds, creating compelling characters, intriguing plots... but I've just been let down by so many bad endings I stopped reading him.

• by anubhav200 on 8/28/22, 7:23 PM

  Thanks, I was looking for exactly this only.

• by balentio on 8/28/22, 9:19 PM

  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.

• by tobbe2064 on 8/29/22, 5:24 AM

  To me he writes like a person who mainly likes hearing his own voice. Further, all his female characters are morons and serve only to hamper the guys or as sexual objects. If the later they tend to be teenagers or at least have the brains of teenagers.