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3.18 AVERAGE
3.18 AVERAGE
hugely enjoyable stuff from doctorow and stross. I've not read any Doctorow before now, will have to make amends directly.
At the tail end of the 21st century, after the Singularity has resulted in all but about a billion humans uploading into a transformed solar system, neo-technophobe Huw Jones is called up for jury duty. Not for passing judgement on criminals, but deciding whether or not ideas, memes, technology etc beamed (or spammed) down from the cloud should be allowed on earth. It doesn't start off well, as he is infected with some sort of technological virus and his day goes rapidly downhill from there.
There are an awful lot of ideas in this book. Stross and Doctorow gleefully throw them at you rapid fire and if one or two don't stick, well, never worry, there's another one coming at you before you have a chance to think about it. Overnight home gender reassignment surgery and AI genies in lamps are just some of the tamer ideas. The book is very much split into three sections, each of which feels like they were possibly independent novellas before being combined. The first starts with Huw's original jury duty, the second picks up as he crash lands in the isolated, fundamentalist remains of the USA on the way home and the final part takes place in the cloud, after Huw is forcibly uploaded.
The first section is interesting as it's introducing the world and the idea of this council for protecting earth from unwanted technologies, the third has a pretty strong story but I found the middle bit unsatisfying. The ideas just didn't really gel for me and Huw was altogether too passive as our PoV character which I found frustrating.
Still, there's lots in here to enjoy, particularly in the final section, as the authors indulge in a little existential philosophy, about what makes up an individual, what happens when it's possible to fork off copies of yourself, diff and merge and the ethics of shutting down instances. There's a whole lot of fun in the book, but you may have to swim through the deluge of ideas to find the gems.
There are an awful lot of ideas in this book. Stross and Doctorow gleefully throw them at you rapid fire and if one or two don't stick, well, never worry, there's another one coming at you before you have a chance to think about it. Overnight home gender reassignment surgery and AI genies in lamps are just some of the tamer ideas. The book is very much split into three sections, each of which feels like they were possibly independent novellas before being combined. The first starts with Huw's original jury duty, the second picks up as he crash lands in the isolated, fundamentalist remains of the USA on the way home and the final part takes place in the cloud, after Huw is forcibly uploaded.
The first section is interesting as it's introducing the world and the idea of this council for protecting earth from unwanted technologies, the third has a pretty strong story but I found the middle bit unsatisfying. The ideas just didn't really gel for me and Huw was altogether too passive as our PoV character which I found frustrating.
Still, there's lots in here to enjoy, particularly in the final section, as the authors indulge in a little existential philosophy, about what makes up an individual, what happens when it's possible to fork off copies of yourself, diff and merge and the ethics of shutting down instances. There's a whole lot of fun in the book, but you may have to swim through the deluge of ideas to find the gems.
I have heard the argument that this book feels like Doctorow and Stross competing to see who's cleverer, but in fact that works in the book's favor. They both do their best to write the cleverest, most thoroughly imagined trans-/post-human work I've read to date, and for that it's worth the occasional eye-rolling while reading. Huw's (the main character) single-minded drive to live simply and to a certain aesthetic clashes with everyone else's plots and schemes, leading Huw deeper and deeper into the post-Singularity Solar System. Because Huw is a technophobic misanthrope, we as readers get to experience this truly alien land- and mind-scape as Huw does. So even though it's dizzying at times, it's also accessible to our un-evolved, baseline-human minds.
The last sections, which greatly expand the scope and stakes, really satisfy. I'll likely end up using this to represent post-Singularity fiction in my SF Novels or Science, Technology, & Society courses. If the Singularity is your thing, you'll love this book. Even if it's not a topic that interests you, it's still something we need to prepare for, and what better preps the human mind for inevitable change than SF? (Don't know about the Technological Singularity? See Vernor Vinge's essay where he first defines it: "What is the Singularity?") Recommended.
The last sections, which greatly expand the scope and stakes, really satisfy. I'll likely end up using this to represent post-Singularity fiction in my SF Novels or Science, Technology, & Society courses. If the Singularity is your thing, you'll love this book. Even if it's not a topic that interests you, it's still something we need to prepare for, and what better preps the human mind for inevitable change than SF? (Don't know about the Technological Singularity? See Vernor Vinge's essay where he first defines it: "What is the Singularity?") Recommended.
I had a hard time getting into the world the authors created. However, I loved the gender fluidity! They get 4 stars for that. Showing that the person is the same no matter what body they were in amazing!
Did Cory Doctorow actually write a single word of this novel? I couldn't detect his influence at all, unless he was the one keeping some semblance of plot going. This felt to me like a Stross novel through and through. I have a fairly low tolerance for Stross and his shenanigans, but having said that, I enjoyed this novel...I just wish Cory had reigned Charlie in a bit more.
This book was not as pleasant a read as previous Doctorow books I've read. Sometimes you just stumble over the words. Sometimes the dystopian future depicted is just repulsive. Sometimes the profanity got a bit overwhelming (but then, this was a collaboration between Cory Doctorow and Charles Stross). I'm glad I finished the book but hope to never read it again.
Listening to this I didn't really remember what was going to happen, but found that the plot felt really scattered and dragged for me. I had a hard time believing in the psychological reality of any of the characters, let alone the world.