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Neal Stephenson's earlier work has "more soul" - Snow Crash / Diamond Age actually has characters you care about and like, his later novels get increasingly mor

Neal Stephenson's earlier work has "more soul" - Snow Crash / Diamond Age actually has characters you care about and like, his later novels get increasingly more abstract, though even better in the technical sense. I think the only character I remember from Seveneves is the cannibal leader, that's it. "A Deepness in the Sky" was REALLY good. The Forever War was good for the concept. In short, yours looks like a great list I will come back to, thank you. However, I do strongly dislike Remembrance of Earth's Past / The Three Body Problem - it's vastly overrated in my opinion and the characters make no sense. The best part of it was the intro to the first book which gave an interesting glimpse at history.

arethuza 5y ago
I really couldn't get into Snow Crash and I didn't finish Diamond Age but I love everything from Cryptonomicon forward. Jack Shaftoe is one of my favourite fictional characters!
- throw1234651234 5y ago
  I know what you are talking about, despite being on the opposite end of that spectrum. Snow Crash / Diamond Age are cyberpunk/post-cyberpunk ala Gibson and completely different from Stephenson's other books. I couldn't even get through Cryptonomicon, and Jack Shaftoe did not strike me as a believable genius, nor his story. Anathem kind of strafed the line - it had SOME character development, and SOME action, but was mainly world-building / intellectual exploration. Stephenson's other books fall too far on that spectrum for me.
  - arethuza 5y ago
    Are you by any chance referring to "Bobby" Shaftoe the WW2 Marine Raider or his ancestor King of the Vagabonds, L'Emmerdeur, Half-Cocked Jack, Quicksilver, Ali Zaybak, Sword of Divine Fire, Jack the Coiner...
    - the__alchemist 5y ago
      This gentleman, by whatever named you call him, is perhaps my favorite Stephenson character. I hated him after the first book... it felt too difficult to related to his decisions and mistakes, but loved him by the end.
  - the__alchemist 5y ago
    I can't remember a single character from Anathem, but its world and some of the scenes are burned into my connectome.
- mrslave 5y ago
  I can totally relate, except Snow Crash stayed on my stack for both its popularity and its brevity. The fourth time I took a stab at the first chapter I was in a much lighter mood, broke through the jarring entry to an AnCap society with an unemployed hacker working as a pizza delivery driver for the mafia, and this time I found myself simply laughing at the absurdity of it. Then I was hooked. One or two passages (the library research scene?) drag out a bit. Overall: highly recommended, mostly for the sense of humor.
seer 5y ago
Remembrance of Earth’s past had some of the weakest protagonists in a book I’ve read. It also has this weird thing where characters plan for things and that just … happens. It was strange seeing book arching plans go without a hitch. But I think it was incredibly interesting for me to see the Asian perspective on the west. I’ve read it more as an allegory of the different peoples of the world, shown from a perspective totally different than my own. I do think though that you have to be a bit of a hard sci-fi fan to finish it, but the science-y ideas are very interesting. I think it changed how I view the vast cosmos, at least a little bit.
the__alchemist 5y ago
I agree, re The Three Body Problem. It's a fun story, but not hard sci-fi in the way Stephenson etc are. I also enjoyed the dive into mid-century communist China - it was a jarring, immersive journey into living-memory history I hadn't learned about before. I think Diamond Age was my favorite overall Stephenson story in terms of both story and neat scifi concepts, but all of them were enjoyable. I agree on Seveneves chars all being forgettable. Dodge (The most recent one) had perhaps the dullest start, but I really liked the Dodge, Corvis, and Daisy characters.

arethuza 5y ago

I really couldn't get into Snow Crash and I didn't finish Diamond Age but I love everything from Cryptonomicon forward. Jack Shaftoe is one of my favourite fictional characters!

throw1234651234 5y ago
I know what you are talking about, despite being on the opposite end of that spectrum. Snow Crash / Diamond Age are cyberpunk/post-cyberpunk ala Gibson and completely different from Stephenson's other books. I couldn't even get through Cryptonomicon, and Jack Shaftoe did not strike me as a believable genius, nor his story. Anathem kind of strafed the line - it had SOME character development, and SOME action, but was mainly world-building / intellectual exploration. Stephenson's other books fall too far on that spectrum for me.
- arethuza 5y ago
  Are you by any chance referring to "Bobby" Shaftoe the WW2 Marine Raider or his ancestor King of the Vagabonds, L'Emmerdeur, Half-Cocked Jack, Quicksilver, Ali Zaybak, Sword of Divine Fire, Jack the Coiner...
  - the__alchemist 5y ago
    This gentleman, by whatever named you call him, is perhaps my favorite Stephenson character. I hated him after the first book... it felt too difficult to related to his decisions and mistakes, but loved him by the end.
- the__alchemist 5y ago
  I can't remember a single character from Anathem, but its world and some of the scenes are burned into my connectome.
mrslave 5y ago
I can totally relate, except Snow Crash stayed on my stack for both its popularity and its brevity. The fourth time I took a stab at the first chapter I was in a much lighter mood, broke through the jarring entry to an AnCap society with an unemployed hacker working as a pizza delivery driver for the mafia, and this time I found myself simply laughing at the absurdity of it. Then I was hooked. One or two passages (the library research scene?) drag out a bit. Overall: highly recommended, mostly for the sense of humor.

seer 5y ago

Remembrance of Earth’s past had some of the weakest protagonists in a book I’ve read. It also has this weird thing where characters plan for things and that just … happens. It was strange seeing book arching plans go without a hitch. But I think it was incredibly interesting for me to see the Asian perspective on the west. I’ve read it more as an allegory of the different peoples of the world, shown from a perspective totally different than my own. I do think though that you have to be a bit of a hard sci-fi fan to finish it, but the science-y ideas are very interesting. I think it changed how I view the vast cosmos, at least a little bit.

the__alchemist 5y ago

I agree, re The Three Body Problem. It's a fun story, but not hard sci-fi in the way Stephenson etc are. I also enjoyed the dive into mid-century communist China - it was a jarring, immersive journey into living-memory history I hadn't learned about before. I think Diamond Age was my favorite overall Stephenson story in terms of both story and neat scifi concepts, but all of them were enjoyable. I agree on Seveneves chars all being forgettable. Dodge (The most recent one) had perhaps the dullest start, but I really liked the Dodge, Corvis, and Daisy characters.