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A review by compuchip
Seveneves by Neal Stephenson
4.0
I absolutely loved the premise of this book. I absolutely loved the attention to detail this book employed. I loved the overwrought political drama.
However, I almost rated this book 3 stars. After 300 pages, I wanted to rate it 5 stars. What changed?
Unfortunately, the author spends 500 pages on setting up the story and then seems to realize that the book is supposed to be 900 pages long. He then decides, ok, let's wrap up the entire first section in 10 pages. I then turned the page and see this:
OK I finally get over my annoyance at the suddenness of the ending of the first half the story, get into the next 300 pages and BOOM, he does it again. I can almost see the thought process. "This book is approaching 900 pages and I need to wrap things up. Oh who cares. Let's just throw some stuff in the last 20 pages and call it a day so I can cash the royalty checks."
So, why did I give this 4* after those complaints? Despite my intense dislike of the last 20 pages of each half of the book, the rest of the writing was excellent. It was crisp. The characters were well defined. The science was impeccable. The setup was intriguing. After the first 500 pages, I was prepared to add it to my Books Everyone Should Read shelf. If only Neal could learn how to wrap up his thoughts a bit better :(
However, I almost rated this book 3 stars. After 300 pages, I wanted to rate it 5 stars. What changed?
Unfortunately, the author spends 500 pages on setting up the story and then seems to realize that the book is supposed to be 900 pages long. He then decides, ok, let's wrap up the entire first section in 10 pages. I then turned the page and see this:
OK I finally get over my annoyance at the suddenness of the ending of the first half the story, get into the next 300 pages and BOOM, he does it again. I can almost see the thought process. "This book is approaching 900 pages and I need to wrap things up. Oh who cares. Let's just throw some stuff in the last 20 pages and call it a day so I can cash the royalty checks."
So, why did I give this 4* after those complaints? Despite my intense dislike of the last 20 pages of each half of the book, the rest of the writing was excellent. It was crisp. The characters were well defined. The science was impeccable. The setup was intriguing. After the first 500 pages, I was prepared to add it to my Books Everyone Should Read shelf. If only Neal could learn how to wrap up his thoughts a bit better :(