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I read Permutation City a few years ago now. It's certainly a very interesting book that I'd highly recommend. Greg Egan is very much an "ideas" man though. I

I read Permutation City a few years ago now. It's certainly a very interesting book that I'd highly recommend. Greg Egan is very much an "ideas" man though. I find that his narratives while intellectually stimulating sometimes don't translate well to a novel format. I find Egan's short stories to be a delight (check out Axiomatic if you haven't) but his novels can be a real slog if you are not a subject matter expert. Neal Stephenson writes in the same "genre" but he has a much more approachable style while not sacrificing on any "hard" elements. My recommendation for anybody who's never read Egan's stuff is to start with his short-stories first.

teraflop 7y ago
I'm a huge fan of Egan's work, but his writing definitely has its strengths and weaknesses. In addition to being an "ideas man", I think his prose is generally excellent. He has a real talent for crafting sentences that are clear, concise, descriptive, and often evocative. (He's mentioned that outside of his writing career, he's a programmer, and I get the sense that any technical documentation he produced would be a joy to read.) It's a testament to his skill that his work is as comprehensible as it is. The downside is that he has a tendency to write character dialogue the same way he writes everything else. Every sentence is carefully constructed to advance an argument, or to reveal a specific detail about a character's viewpoint. The characters end up feeling less like fully-realized people, and more like mouthpieces in a Socratic dialogue. I agree with the recommendation to start with his short stories. Of the ones that are legally available online, I'd suggest "Singleton" (http://www.gregegan.net/MISC/SINGLETON/Singleton.html http://www.gregegan.net/MISC/SINGLETON/Singleton.html) as a good starting point.
- DEADBEEFC0FFEE 7y ago
  I don't know why, I thought Egan was a physics teacher.
  - gjm11 7y ago
    Well, he kind of is. (In the sense that a lot of his novels are, at heart, mostly physics exposition, whether of real or imaginary physics.)

teraflop 7y ago

I'm a huge fan of Egan's work, but his writing definitely has its strengths and weaknesses. In addition to being an "ideas man", I think his prose is generally excellent. He has a real talent for crafting sentences that are clear, concise, descriptive, and often evocative. (He's mentioned that outside of his writing career, he's a programmer, and I get the sense that any technical documentation he produced would be a joy to read.) It's a testament to his skill that his work is as comprehensible as it is. The downside is that he has a tendency to write character dialogue the same way he writes everything else. Every sentence is carefully constructed to advance an argument, or to reveal a specific detail about a character's viewpoint. The characters end up feeling less like fully-realized people, and more like mouthpieces in a Socratic dialogue. I agree with the recommendation to start with his short stories. Of the ones that are legally available online, I'd suggest "Singleton" (http://www.gregegan.net/MISC/SINGLETON/Singleton.html http://www.gregegan.net/MISC/SINGLETON/Singleton.html) as a good starting point.

DEADBEEFC0FFEE 7y ago
I don't know why, I thought Egan was a physics teacher.
- gjm11 7y ago
  Well, he kind of is. (In the sense that a lot of his novels are, at heart, mostly physics exposition, whether of real or imaginary physics.)