A review by leo9_1
Seveneves, by Neal Stephenson
5.0
An amazing, sprawling and intricate thought experiment about how the human race might overcome the apocalypse. Grueling and highly tense in it's best bits, and a little self indulgently fantastical at it's worst.
Everything about this book is calculated to make the space nerd's heart do somersaults. The ISS features as a loveably familiar 21st-century Enterprise, and the ingenious ideas built on it build to a relentlessly ambitious climax by the end of the book.
The characters have been called stilted, and somewhat mocked for their keen resemblance to modern figures, but I found this effective in helping connect emotionally to such an enormous catastrophe. When it comes to people, and to society, it's a representational style, rather than a realistic one that the book takes. But the scope of the work demands it, I think.
In terms of Stephenson's other work, this is a much more intelligible, relevant Anathem. It's mere size gives it away as a novel in that mold rather than a Snow Crash/Diamond Age-alike. But some of the awe of the Diamond Age is there, as well as a little of the caricatured intensities of Snow Crash.
I really, really enjoyed this novel, maybe not because it's of the best quality I've ever read, but it suited me well in many ways by being detailed, geeky, imaginative and ultimately optimistic about the human condition.
Everything about this book is calculated to make the space nerd's heart do somersaults. The ISS features as a loveably familiar 21st-century Enterprise, and the ingenious ideas built on it build to a relentlessly ambitious climax by the end of the book.
The characters have been called stilted, and somewhat mocked for their keen resemblance to modern figures, but I found this effective in helping connect emotionally to such an enormous catastrophe. When it comes to people, and to society, it's a representational style, rather than a realistic one that the book takes. But the scope of the work demands it, I think.
In terms of Stephenson's other work, this is a much more intelligible, relevant Anathem. It's mere size gives it away as a novel in that mold rather than a Snow Crash/Diamond Age-alike. But some of the awe of the Diamond Age is there, as well as a little of the caricatured intensities of Snow Crash.
I really, really enjoyed this novel, maybe not because it's of the best quality I've ever read, but it suited me well in many ways by being detailed, geeky, imaginative and ultimately optimistic about the human condition.