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For me, this is the one of the things that makes Gibson’s books fascinating. Feature, not a bug. Often his stories are told from the points of view of three di

For me, this is the one of the things that makes Gibson’s books fascinating. Feature, not a bug. Often his stories are told from the points of view of three different characters, each of whom doesn’t fully understand what’s going on, and as events are generally instigated by vastly powerful AIs, corporations or ogliarchs, they have little power to do anything but hold on and try not to die. The fun for the reader is to piece together the clues and work out the implications of what the characters are experiencing.

atombender 7y ago
Sure; I'm not against the idea. But if you follow Gibson's entire oevre as a reader, it quickly becomes a very obvious, tiring pattern. Gibson has a template, which goes: A wealthy, shadowy figure with nebulous intentions hires the main character, a professional of some sort, to investigate/seek out/collect something which isn't what it seems, and meanwhile machinations are happening behind the scenes, and at the end it appears the main character's purpose was peripheral and/or the intent was to lure some sought-after person to reveal themselves. The template becomes incredibly obvious once you recognize it. Interestingly, for some reason Gibson makes the mechanics of his plots painfully transparent. Another favourite author of mine, Iain M. Banks, has a few books that, if you think about them, follow a similar pattern: The Player of Games, Against a Dark Background, The Hydrogen Sonata, and Consider Phlebas all have the main character trapped in a trajectory where they're effectively secondary to large-scale background machinations and all-powerful AIs. (Against a Dark Background is maybe the most Gibsonesque here, and is less satisfying as a result, while still being very enjoyable.) One of Gibson's better books, I think, is Cont Zero — not a popular opinion, as far as I can tell — precisely because he eschews some of his normal narrative tics. But that novel also clearly justifies the lack of agency by following characters who are, from the outset, on the run from forces beyond their control.
- mattkevan 7y ago
  And if the main character is called Case or Cayce then so much the better...
- nottorp 7y ago
  [quote]But if you follow Gibson's entire oevre as a reader, it quickly becomes a very obvious, tiring pattern.[/quote] I don't know, it's refreshing. Too many books where the hero saves the world. I've never read Gibson for the action, but for the world that slips through the cracks in the action. Not even the technological, the social. Guess that's why I liked Pattern Recognition and its sequel as much as Neuromancer.

atombender 7y ago

Sure; I'm not against the idea. But if you follow Gibson's entire oevre as a reader, it quickly becomes a very obvious, tiring pattern. Gibson has a template, which goes: A wealthy, shadowy figure with nebulous intentions hires the main character, a professional of some sort, to investigate/seek out/collect something which isn't what it seems, and meanwhile machinations are happening behind the scenes, and at the end it appears the main character's purpose was peripheral and/or the intent was to lure some sought-after person to reveal themselves. The template becomes incredibly obvious once you recognize it. Interestingly, for some reason Gibson makes the mechanics of his plots painfully transparent. Another favourite author of mine, Iain M. Banks, has a few books that, if you think about them, follow a similar pattern: The Player of Games, Against a Dark Background, The Hydrogen Sonata, and Consider Phlebas all have the main character trapped in a trajectory where they're effectively secondary to large-scale background machinations and all-powerful AIs. (Against a Dark Background is maybe the most Gibsonesque here, and is less satisfying as a result, while still being very enjoyable.) One of Gibson's better books, I think, is Cont Zero — not a popular opinion, as far as I can tell — precisely because he eschews some of his normal narrative tics. But that novel also clearly justifies the lack of agency by following characters who are, from the outset, on the run from forces beyond their control.

mattkevan 7y ago
And if the main character is called Case or Cayce then so much the better...
nottorp 7y ago
[quote]But if you follow Gibson's entire oevre as a reader, it quickly becomes a very obvious, tiring pattern.[/quote] I don't know, it's refreshing. Too many books where the hero saves the world. I've never read Gibson for the action, but for the world that slips through the cracks in the action. Not even the technological, the social. Guess that's why I liked Pattern Recognition and its sequel as much as Neuromancer.