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unfoundation's review against another edition
adventurous
dark
sad
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.75
One of my favourite books. Just finished a reread.
The world is chaotic and entrancing. The plot hurtles through it at speed, twisting this way and that, but never getting lost.
It’s incredible to realize that Gibson came up with so many of these ideas and imagery in 1984. The foundational text of cyberpunk. You can see so many themes and ideas stemming from this.
Case is a complex main character but ultimately you root for him. Like seeing a friend make some bad decisions. Molly is a tragic terminator, both intimidating and sympathetic. Armitage, Wintermute and Peter are all ominous antagonists. There are a host of other amazing characters who make the world rich and leave lasting impressions.
The world is chaotic and entrancing. The plot hurtles through it at speed, twisting this way and that, but never getting lost.
It’s incredible to realize that Gibson came up with so many of these ideas and imagery in 1984. The foundational text of cyberpunk. You can see so many themes and ideas stemming from this.
Case is a complex main character but ultimately you root for him. Like seeing a friend make some bad decisions. Molly is a tragic terminator, both intimidating and sympathetic. Armitage, Wintermute and Peter are all ominous antagonists. There are a host of other amazing characters who make the world rich and leave lasting impressions.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Drug use, Drug abuse, and Violence
Moderate: Blood, Death, Sexual content, Gore, Addiction, and Alcohol
Minor: Grief, Rape, and Torture
amorphousbl0b's review
adventurous
dark
mysterious
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.75
Content Warnings
Graphic: Addiction, Drug abuse, and Drug use
Moderate: Death, Medical trauma, and Sexual content
Minor: Suicide
joblo's review
adventurous
dark
mysterious
reflective
tense
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.5
Goooood shit. A little hard to follow at times but it just adds to the vibe. In love with the language and writing style. Lots of very cool concepts and very interesting to see the beginnings of this genre/such a foundational sci-fi piece in general. Will def reread at some point!
Content Warnings
Moderate: Drug abuse, Gore, and Addiction
Minor: Sexual violence
totallyglitched's review
adventurous
challenging
dark
mysterious
tense
fast-paced
5.0
Content Warnings
Graphic: Death, Rape, Sexual harassment, Sexual violence, Toxic relationship, Addiction, Drug use, Violence, Sexual content, Torture, Gun violence, Medical content, Sexual assault, Drug abuse, and Gore
Moderate: Vomit and Suicidal thoughts
myllan's review against another edition
adventurous
reflective
tense
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? N/A
3.0
Content Warnings
Graphic: Drug abuse
binghebun's review against another edition
challenging
dark
tense
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
4.0
getting the ugly out of the way first — this book is racist. east asian people are used as set pieces, the turkish character and depiction of istanbul reek of islamophobia, and the zionites are just walking stereotypes of rastafarians. exploring cultures and countries beyond the vaguely-japanese-america of the typical cyberpunk world would have been great to read, but unfortunately gibson handles it all so stereotypically that it loses any interest or style. this book was written fourty years ago, and usually reading any classical or seminal work means you have to wade through this kind of bullshit, and i get that, but it still sucks. there is also a lot of objectification of women, a lot of talk about breasts, which unfortunately, again, i can’t say i’m surprised by considering the genre and time period. but, also again, it sucks.
onto the good — gibson writes with so much style it’s such a pleasure to read. one of my favourite lines is ‘’i’m doing just fine,’ case said, and grinned like a skull.’ i can picture in my mind exactly what that smile looks like, what case himself looks like, it’s such simple wording but evokes so much. i spent a lot of the narrative completely engrossed but also equally completely lost on what was going on, and i’m not ashamed to say i listened to a podcast outlining the plot of the book upon finishing to really understand what i read. i think part of it is gibson’s writing, but also just the conventions of older sci-fi which i am not accustomed to reading. i still had a lot of fun with this book and found myself always wanting to read more. it’s so fast paced and snappy that you can just keep reading and lose yourself to the world.
i really loved molly, and i’m so glad that gibson utilised the technique of having case being able to see through molly’s eyes to add her pov into the book. while i did say women are objectified in this book, the female characters are fortunately on their own absolutely fantastic — molly and 3jane are as interesting and fucked up as the male characters. case is a great protagonist, the antagonist is truly vile and so hateable, and the depiction of AI is unfortunately as topical as ever. the fact this was written in the 80s is honestly insane.
i found myself a little wanting on the descriptions of everything — a lot of cyberpunk to me is the aesthetic and i found that lacking, but i’m also coming at it with the 2024 perspective with 40 years of visual cyberpunk works, so i think that was an unfair expectation in the first place. the longer out from finishing this book, the more i like it. it was truly so unlike anything i’ve read before and i really enjoyed the shakeup from my usual reading. i definitely want to check out gibson’s other works and more works in the cyberpunk genre.
tw drug use, violence, sexual violence, thoughts of suicide
Content Warnings
Graphic: Violence, Sexual violence, and Drug abuse
josemoya's review against another edition
dark
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
3.5
Lo leí a través del sintetizador de voz y probablemente no sea la mejor manera de hacerlo. Tampoco lo leí en el momento adecuado de mi vida. Por ello me pareció confuso, más que algunas obras de P. K. Dick.
Sin embargo, el mundo reflejado en el libro (aparte los anacronismos que el propio autor menciona en una introducción escrita una década después) es muy interesante.
Volveré a Gibson más tarde, pero ahora creo que no es el momento.
Sin embargo, el mundo reflejado en el libro (aparte los anacronismos que el propio autor menciona en una introducción escrita una década después) es muy interesante.
Volveré a Gibson más tarde, pero ahora creo que no es el momento.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Violence, Drug abuse, Sexual content, Drug use, and Sexual violence
teainthelibrary's review against another edition
adventurous
challenging
dark
mysterious
sad
tense
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
2.5
Content Warnings
Graphic: Body horror, Sexual violence, Drug abuse, and Violence
missdragon's review against another edition
adventurous
challenging
dark
tense
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
4.0
Gosh this was a really interesting, honestly great read and I'm not sure where to begin. This book is considered to be what created cyberpunk as a genre but also was the origin of a bunch of other things I didn't know about - the concept of cyberspace before the internet, the matrix as a concept and the Japanese/science fiction aesthetic you see a lot, especially in the blade runner movie. Think fast paced, heist, Nior type of thing. With the standard cast of characters you'd expect - they don't really develop much past their archetypes.
I loved how the book didn't hold your hand throughout it felt like being thrown into a world at a very quick pace, and you were expected to keep up, especially when it comes to understanding the world, and It's something I really value in science fiction books - there is no exposition you have to work things out, most things really, based on context. This was one of the things I really liked about Do Androids as well.
The dialogue was excellent, and I loved how it was integrated into the action and text of the book. The writing itself flowed really well, it was very entertaining and thought provoking. I liked how the story effortlessly moved between real life stable things, and the dream-like sequences of being in the cyberspace area.
This was very close to being a five star read for me, very very close, but I've opted for 4.75 stars for two reasons, firstly The main character has casual sex with two of the main women in the story and it's written quite badly. and secondly, sometimes information, in the form of random new science fiction words, were casually inserted into the rather fast moving text, with zero explanation as to what they were or what they looked like. As a reader this made it a hard to visualise some of the scenes, and I also don't know how accurate what I'm imagining is.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Body horror, Rape, Addiction, Blood, Gun violence, Death, Drug abuse, Child abuse, Sexual assault, and War
jimgerdes's review
adventurous
dark
mysterious
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? No
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
Neuromancer is a famous and influential novel.
That means it exists not just as a work of its own, but also as the cultural gravitational well its existence creates. This requires looking at this kind of story through a broader perspective, instead of as a work alone in a vacuum. How it has shaped science fiction, and our society more broadly are fascinating questions worth exploring, and indeed we cannot (and should not) avoid contending with a novel like this.
Even if you have only just heard of Neuromancer or have only a passing knowledge of what it is, because of the profound impact it has had on our society and culture (especially American culture) the concepts, tropes, and themes that have since grown to be called "cyberpunk" will be striking in their familiarity. Both literary, and socially, this novel has shaped the way our society view science fiction and technology, and much has been said about this fact in countless other places. As a result, any contemporary reflection cannot separate it from everything that has come after it.
This is probably obvious and is the case for any influential work of literature, but I think it is worth highlighting particularly for a novel like this to contextualize what exactly this book is and how best (or better yet, why) to approach it 40+ years after it was written.
As a casual read in 2024, this book appears on its surface, to not be anything particular to write home about. The book moves extremely quickly, and expects the reader to keep up. Not surprising for an adventure story with a lot of action, but this could be intimidating for some readers. Scenes happen quickly over a short amount of text, suddenly end, and then skip forward expecting the reader to infer extra details. The opening 2 acts (of 4 total) meander a bit, but the book picks up in the second half. Lots of invented slang and lingo is used, without much explanation. "Do try to keep up." Gibson seems to ask the reader.
The characters are fairly stock. We learn a bit about them as the story goes on, but none of them are particularly dynamic and what we do learn is mostly pragmatic exposition about motivation and personal relation to the plot.
Gibson's work shines particularly however with regards to the world he has created in Neuromancer and how that world communicates the novel's themes and provide the sorts of thought provoking quandaries the best science fiction gives us. This mostly happens in the background, (perhaps as it should) but permeates throughout everything, even the assumptions the characters make about their own lives and the world they live in.
The characters seem mostly focused on the task at hand and their personal motivations rather than the larger questions being posed to the reader, but the world they inhabit and the situations they are forced to deal with reveal a lot about the anxieties of the world of 1984 (a world on the cusp of a technological revolution) and what the future might look like.
What may be most interesting, is how little those anxieties have changed over the past 40 years. In today's media landscape, the "Cyberpunk" tropes and aesthetics are still very much alive (notably Cyberpunk 2077 and its assorted related media has launched this type of story back into mainstream discussion). They endure and press on the same fears and worries, and the same hopes that Gibson's work touches on in 1984. In our rapidly corporatizing technological world, particularly with regards to the rise of artificial intelligence, we can see ourselves in Neuromancer, with all the comforts and horrors that come with that vision.
This is perhaps a useful lens to approach this book with. If you are after a science fiction adventure (or "cyberpunk" flavor specifically), this book is that; unfortunately, though, looking back after 40 years at Neuromancer, it is difficult to point to over any of the other books, movies, television, video games, or tabletop roleplaying games it inspired. But looking at this book as a window into a past version of ourselves, an influence on the world we live in today and how connected we are, or as a way to understand how science fiction as a genre has branched and evolved, there is quite a bit to discover in Neuromancer.
That means it exists not just as a work of its own, but also as the cultural gravitational well its existence creates. This requires looking at this kind of story through a broader perspective, instead of as a work alone in a vacuum. How it has shaped science fiction, and our society more broadly are fascinating questions worth exploring, and indeed we cannot (and should not) avoid contending with a novel like this.
Even if you have only just heard of Neuromancer or have only a passing knowledge of what it is, because of the profound impact it has had on our society and culture (especially American culture) the concepts, tropes, and themes that have since grown to be called "cyberpunk" will be striking in their familiarity. Both literary, and socially, this novel has shaped the way our society view science fiction and technology, and much has been said about this fact in countless other places. As a result, any contemporary reflection cannot separate it from everything that has come after it.
This is probably obvious and is the case for any influential work of literature, but I think it is worth highlighting particularly for a novel like this to contextualize what exactly this book is and how best (or better yet, why) to approach it 40+ years after it was written.
As a casual read in 2024, this book appears on its surface, to not be anything particular to write home about. The book moves extremely quickly, and expects the reader to keep up. Not surprising for an adventure story with a lot of action, but this could be intimidating for some readers. Scenes happen quickly over a short amount of text, suddenly end, and then skip forward expecting the reader to infer extra details. The opening 2 acts (of 4 total) meander a bit, but the book picks up in the second half. Lots of invented slang and lingo is used, without much explanation. "Do try to keep up." Gibson seems to ask the reader.
The characters are fairly stock. We learn a bit about them as the story goes on, but none of them are particularly dynamic and what we do learn is mostly pragmatic exposition about motivation and personal relation to the plot.
Gibson's work shines particularly however with regards to the world he has created in Neuromancer and how that world communicates the novel's themes and provide the sorts of thought provoking quandaries the best science fiction gives us. This mostly happens in the background, (perhaps as it should) but permeates throughout everything, even the assumptions the characters make about their own lives and the world they live in.
The characters seem mostly focused on the task at hand and their personal motivations rather than the larger questions being posed to the reader, but the world they inhabit and the situations they are forced to deal with reveal a lot about the anxieties of the world of 1984 (a world on the cusp of a technological revolution) and what the future might look like.
What may be most interesting, is how little those anxieties have changed over the past 40 years. In today's media landscape, the "Cyberpunk" tropes and aesthetics are still very much alive (notably Cyberpunk 2077 and its assorted related media has launched this type of story back into mainstream discussion). They endure and press on the same fears and worries, and the same hopes that Gibson's work touches on in 1984. In our rapidly corporatizing technological world, particularly with regards to the rise of artificial intelligence, we can see ourselves in Neuromancer, with all the comforts and horrors that come with that vision.
This is perhaps a useful lens to approach this book with. If you are after a science fiction adventure (or "cyberpunk" flavor specifically), this book is that; unfortunately, though, looking back after 40 years at Neuromancer, it is difficult to point to over any of the other books, movies, television, video games, or tabletop roleplaying games it inspired. But looking at this book as a window into a past version of ourselves, an influence on the world we live in today and how connected we are, or as a way to understand how science fiction as a genre has branched and evolved, there is quite a bit to discover in Neuromancer.
Content Warnings
Moderate: Injury/Injury detail, Murder, Drug use, Police brutality, Gun violence, Addiction, Classism, Cursing, and Drug abuse
Minor: Sexism, Suicide, and Sexual content