"Neal Stephenson’s Seveneves is a typical Neal Stephenson novel: expansive and nearly constantly geeking out over something. If a character in one of Stephenson’s SF novels is about to get into a spacesuit, you know that’ll take five pages because Stephenson will want to tell you about every single element of the suit’s construction. If a spacecraft needs to rendezvous with a comet, and must get from one orbital plane to another, Stephenson will need to explain every decision and the math underlying it, even if that takes fifty pages — or more. If you like that kind of thing, Seveneves will be the kind of thing you like"
getting so hard i pass out whenever I read a book with these described traits is my permitted cis male trait. Fuckkkkkkkkkkk Ogggghhhh I just gotta read through these 15 pages of technical jargon that I don't even comprehend at all
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Chatting with a friend last night, Neal Stephenson and his 30+ years of influential sci fi novels came up. And we agreed that, as with getting started reading Terry Pratchett, a guide to starting with Stephenson might be helpful.
Here's my "if you like X in your media/fandom, try this book" guide to Stephenson.
All of Stephenson's works are longreads - some are dense and massive. 20th Century Takes On The Genders pop up, usually balanced by Stephenson's foundation respect for women. I've noted a few warnings where these reader challenges come up.
Gritty, action-packed sci-fi
You like The Matrix, Mad Max, that meme about Toledo Killswitch.
Try: Snow Crash
Still a banger! Vivid and sarcastic characters are making their way in a dystopic U.S.A. Delivering pizzas, scrounging skateboard courier jobs, trying to save humanity from toxic data and from fundamentalists abusing the power of language. Today, the role of capitalism-gone-wild in the story seems more prescient than the Metaverse, though both are presented as equally dystopic. I hear there's a TV show in the works.
Sci-fi with fairy-tale/historical tropes
You like: steampunk, Six of Crows, Fables, Sandman.
Try: The Diamond Age: Or A Young Lady’s Illustrated Primer
A data-and-nanobot-heavy dystopia may be a little redeemed when a fairytale-themed education package winds up outside of its elite. Is it possible for a book to be spicy and dispassionate at the same time? If it is, it’s The Diamond Age. This tale is part of why steampunk was cool for over a decade, and it’s got the colonial awareness a lot of later steampunk lacked. Warning for sexual violence and assault.
Also consider: The Rise and Fall of D.O.D.O, with co-author Nicole Galland and magical overlap.
You like: Becky Chambers and Ursula LeGuin, Star Wars, Dune, and A Canticle for Liebowitz.
Try: Anathem
This book is both loved and hated. It’s a deep favorite of mine and IMHO the sleeper in Stephenson’s bibliography. This story's math monks are here for friendship and mentoring and found family and human curiosity – and saving a couple of worlds. Longread warning: it’s 900 pages and one of the themes in the book is differing perspectives on long-term time.
Gritty, action-packed wartime and history
You like: the Marvel universe – specifically, its fandom – and spy movie tropes.
Try: Cryptonomicon
When this came out it blended history (WWII) and the future (late ‘90s programming) in a hunt for WWII gold – now both narrative streams are history. Another galloping read by Stephenson standards. Warning: the weakest female character representation in this bibliography.
Deep history nerdery
You like: pirate movies and Our Flag Means Death and Pratchett’s Making Money.
Try: The Baroque Cycle: Quicksilver, The Confusion, The System of the World.
In the same ‘verse as Cryptonomicon, in mostly the 18th century. A handful of intellectuals and adventurers ride the tides of conflict, heresy, politics, and currency, with acres of swashbuckling along the way. I lost an entire month of my life to devouring these three tomes. Eliza/Jack 4eva! Longread warning: this makes Anathem look short. The Silmarillion is an accessible standard narrative compared to this. And, also, warning for sexual violence and assault.
Hopepunk and romances
You’re old-school-fandom enough to respect a good Mary Sue.
Try: Termination Shock
Solar engineering to try and undo climate change, subtle international warfare, and deepfakes undoing royalty are the three plot streams here. Also, will a dispossessed aristocrat find love and passion again? Very accessible for Stephenson.
Hard queer sci fi
You like: The Locked Tomb series and fandom.
Try: Seveneves
Moon’s broken! And that means the end of life on Earth as we know it. After a series of “space is hard” misadventures, it's up to the parthenogenetic space queers to preserve humanity. Another one that is loved or hated. I don’t love - but other Tumblerites give it a five-star rating.
this one’s a bit constrained to form, I’m taking an evolution course this semester and the assignment was a project providing a timeline from the beginning of life.
It’s interesting to be here, now, in my mind, because not six months ago I could not fathom believing in evolution. The Christian god had lost his hold on me, but having been non-human? It took page upon page of Huxley, Hanna,…
flamingos flying over tanzania’s lake natron, a salt lake which is home to three quarters of the world’s three million lesser flamingos, as well as toxic multicoloured extremophile cyanobacteria that thrive in water so hypersaline it would strip away human skin. for the flamingos, however, the tough skin and scales on their legs prevents burning, leaving them uniquely free to drink from the near boiling freshwater found from springs and geysers at the lake’s edges. (x, x, x, x, x)
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hiyori tomoe . regarding imperfection, loss/lack of self, and the sun .
emily palermo, what i could never confess without some bravado // andrea gibson // georges bataille, the dead man // @/hyenahunt on tumblr’s translation of conquest, originally by akira // @/honeytuesday on tumblr // nulut, fixer, // edvard munch, the sun ++ hafiz, the gift // @/ojibwa on tumblr // unknown // @/hyenahunt on tumblr’s translation of conquest, originally by akira
My plane is small, the first one, an Embraer RJ145. Small enough to feel the take off a little more viscerally than I am used to. I like that. Weightlessness. Small enough that they check my (tepid pink, violently grimy) carryon. I download the first episode of as many kdramas as my cell service allows. My phone heats up, straining. I am glad to be going home. It’s been a year and a half, but…
I watched Barbie and Oppenheimer with people whose moralities slide along mine like silk on a hang nail you don’t get to clip because it’s not on your hand. How the nerves connect I do not get to convey to you, but my side (the silk actually) here:
[Pause I don’t think I mentioned this: both are about power!! Very important point. Unclear why (because everything for me is about power right…
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Models wearing peeresses' dresses by designer Norman Hartnell, to be worn under robes for the coronation of Queen Elizabeth II, May 16th 1953. The designs from Hartnell's 'Gold and White Collection' conform to the Earl Marshal's 'orders', meaning colours are barred and tiaras are worn. (Photos by Kurt Hutton, John Chillingworth/Picture Post/Hulton Archive/Getty Images)
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