3 ms·

I found Snow Crash to be really childish, and not even in the same league as Neuromancer. I read Neuromancer originally in 1984 and again a few years ago, and

I found Snow Crash to be really childish, and not even in the same league as Neuromancer. I read Neuromancer originally in 1984 and again a few years ago, and for me it still holds up. It's not the greatest book or anything, and I found Count Zero to be much better, but apart from those two books I've yet to read anything else cyberpunkish that comes even remotely close. Before someone mentions Greg Egan or Vernor Vinge, as they have elsewhere in the thread, I read a lot by these authors and didn't like them either. Way too dry, boring, and unimaginative for me. I know some people love them, but they're just not for me.

walrus01 5y ago
Snow Crash is in many places meant to be intentionally silly and absurdist as an extrapolated, exaggerated satire on contemporary American lifestyle at the time it was written, such as in the users manual for the "Reason" railgun
- jhbadger 5y ago
  And it is pretty obviously referring to 1992 current events. To modern readers L. Bob Rife is just a funny villain, but he was obviously a parody of 1992 outsider US Presidential Candidate H. Ross Perot.
  - nonesuchluck 5y ago
    Oh. To this modern reader, L. Bob Rife was just an obvious parody of L. Ron Hubbard. But he wasn't a Texan, so I suppose I see your angle. Interesting bit of flavor.
urthor 5y ago
Snow Crash is childish, that's why it's more successful. Snow Crash is built around an airport novel style narrative. Neuromancer has a far more literary tone, and is trickier to digest. That's the entire reason Snow Crash is cited. Airport novel readership is far more widespread.
- JackFr 5y ago
  To each his own, I suppose. I found Neuromancer and and Count Zero eminently forgettable. I never read Snow Crash, so I can't really speak to it though I've read a half dozen of Neal Stephenson's other novels, all of which I found rich with ideas. While I appreciate the literary style, I honestly can't remember the plot of either Neuromancer or Count Zero.
barry-cotter 5y ago
Dry and boring I can imagine people calling Egan or Vinge but unimaginative? They both throw off ideas like confetti.
- pmoriarty 5y ago
  Here's an example I remember from some Vinge novel ("A Fire Upon the Deep" maybe) I read decades ago: some ancient species/entities were supposed to have transcended a long time ago. What did that transcendence consist of? Where did they go? What's their life like after transcendence? Vinge gives the reader nothing. I call that a failure of the imagination. Yes, I get that the post-singularity world is supposed to unpredictable/unimaginable in principle... but it's the author's job to imagine it anyway, else why am I even bothering to read his books on the singularity? If he doesn't/can't imagine it, I judge it a failure and a disappointment. I don't remember details about Egan's work, except that nothing in it seemed particularly interesting and nothing wowed me... hence I really can't remember much about it except the premises of some of his novels, like Permutation City. This is contrary to works by authors like Gibson, Herbert, and Dick, for instance, which I'll never forget. They're just leagues ahead of lesser authors like Vinge and Egan.
  - VintageCool 5y ago
    Well, he doesn't know. Most of Vinge's works were about getting close to the Singularity without crossing over, because he expected that technology and society would change massively and unpredictably at that time. The point of introducing the fantasy element of the Zones of Thought was to allow Vinge to write a FTL space opera without having to deal with post-Singularity speculation. When species transcended, they left the Beyond and went into the Transcend.

walrus01 5y ago

Snow Crash is in many places meant to be intentionally silly and absurdist as an extrapolated, exaggerated satire on contemporary American lifestyle at the time it was written, such as in the users manual for the "Reason" railgun

jhbadger 5y ago
And it is pretty obviously referring to 1992 current events. To modern readers L. Bob Rife is just a funny villain, but he was obviously a parody of 1992 outsider US Presidential Candidate H. Ross Perot.
- nonesuchluck 5y ago
  Oh. To this modern reader, L. Bob Rife was just an obvious parody of L. Ron Hubbard. But he wasn't a Texan, so I suppose I see your angle. Interesting bit of flavor.

urthor 5y ago

Snow Crash is childish, that's why it's more successful. Snow Crash is built around an airport novel style narrative. Neuromancer has a far more literary tone, and is trickier to digest. That's the entire reason Snow Crash is cited. Airport novel readership is far more widespread.

JackFr 5y ago
To each his own, I suppose. I found Neuromancer and and Count Zero eminently forgettable. I never read Snow Crash, so I can't really speak to it though I've read a half dozen of Neal Stephenson's other novels, all of which I found rich with ideas. While I appreciate the literary style, I honestly can't remember the plot of either Neuromancer or Count Zero.

barry-cotter 5y ago

Dry and boring I can imagine people calling Egan or Vinge but unimaginative? They both throw off ideas like confetti.

pmoriarty 5y ago
Here's an example I remember from some Vinge novel ("A Fire Upon the Deep" maybe) I read decades ago: some ancient species/entities were supposed to have transcended a long time ago. What did that transcendence consist of? Where did they go? What's their life like after transcendence? Vinge gives the reader nothing. I call that a failure of the imagination. Yes, I get that the post-singularity world is supposed to unpredictable/unimaginable in principle... but it's the author's job to imagine it anyway, else why am I even bothering to read his books on the singularity? If he doesn't/can't imagine it, I judge it a failure and a disappointment. I don't remember details about Egan's work, except that nothing in it seemed particularly interesting and nothing wowed me... hence I really can't remember much about it except the premises of some of his novels, like Permutation City. This is contrary to works by authors like Gibson, Herbert, and Dick, for instance, which I'll never forget. They're just leagues ahead of lesser authors like Vinge and Egan.
- VintageCool 5y ago
  Well, he doesn't know. Most of Vinge's works were about getting close to the Singularity without crossing over, because he expected that technology and society would change massively and unpredictably at that time. The point of introducing the fantasy element of the Zones of Thought was to allow Vinge to write a FTL space opera without having to deal with post-Singularity speculation. When species transcended, they left the Beyond and went into the Transcend.