I read an interview with Neal Stephenson where he mentioned that he can make a living as a writer because he writes things people like to read.\u00a0 That sounds kind of vacuous, but there’s a point in there.\u00a0 Almost without exception, when I read something by Stephenson, I enjoy the experience cover to cover.<\/p>\n
Snow Crash<\/em> is extremely well regarded among geeks and science fiction folks in general, but I’m always a little leery when approaching a book with so much buzz about it.\u00a0 I’ve been disappointed by a lot of cyberpunk in the past, and having a protagonist who is a hacker\/network guy is always dicey for me.<\/p>\n I shouldn’t have worried.\u00a0 Even though I came into the book a little standoffish, Stephenson grabbed me pretty quickly and pulled me into his world.\u00a0 Cryptonomicon<\/em><\/a> is more nearly believable, but the feel of the hackers and others in this world is right.\u00a0 It reminded me a little of Charles Stross’s Halting State<\/em><\/a> in that the hackerish parts of the world felt right even if the details were unfamiliar.\u00a0 Stross’s details are unfamiliar because he’s taking the reader to a near future Scotland.\u00a0 Stephenson is taking us much further into satire and fiction, with the contrast and volume high.<\/p>\n One of the best things about Stephenson is that even when he’s got the throttle all the way open and the speakers blaring, he’s in control of his narrative and his characters.\u00a0 The trip is a lot of fun, but there are things to contemplate as they go by.\u00a0 And is you don’t like what just went by, something else will be along in a second.<\/p>\n Snow Crash<\/em> is a lot of fun, and rewarding as well.<\/p>\n Strongly Recommended.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" I read an interview with Neal Stephenson where he mentioned that he can make a living as a writer because he writes things people like to read.\u00a0 That sounds kind of vacuous, but there’s a point in there.\u00a0 Almost without exception, when I read something by Stephenson, I enjoy the experience cover to cover. Snow […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-667","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-reviews"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lunabase.org\/~faber\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/667","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lunabase.org\/~faber\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lunabase.org\/~faber\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lunabase.org\/~faber\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lunabase.org\/~faber\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=667"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/www.lunabase.org\/~faber\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/667\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":672,"href":"https:\/\/www.lunabase.org\/~faber\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/667\/revisions\/672"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lunabase.org\/~faber\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=667"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lunabase.org\/~faber\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=667"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lunabase.org\/~faber\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=667"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}