Sevenneves by Neal Stephenson

Cafe Society
1

Didn’t see anything on this upcoming book. Has anyone else read the preview?

Synopsis: some mysterious for destroys the moon. Humanity must send out colonizers to save the race. Last two thirds of book skips forward 5000 years and we see the three distinct species that have descended from us as they plan to return to Earth.

I expect lots of monologues on dense technical subjects and possibly an enigmatic wanderer named Enoch.

2

I’m guessing all three species inscribe the Pythagorean Theorem on the hulls of their ships to announce their shared genetic heritage and peaceful intentions?

3

I saw (and read) the preview on his website the other day. If reviews are generally positive, I’ll most likely pick it up. I like Stephenson in general, but I’m not thrilled about the endings of his books; he seems to be able to tell great stories, but he has trouble ‘finishing’ them…

4

I have pretty much given up on Stephenson. I have not had a good enough payoff from one of his novels to take the time for the journey.

5

I’ll get it for sure - I don’t think I’ve ever been disappointed by any of his stuff. I see what people mean about some of his endings, but for me those are at most a small downside after hours of enjoyable reading.

6

Huh. I’ve noticed this, too. He seems to get tired of writing.

7

I’ve never noticed that, and I’ve read them all, except for Zodiac.

8

That’s kind of why I liked Anathem as much as I did. You can kind of tell he was tired of the criticism and wrote the most cliched ending he’s done to that point, which actually happened to work pretty well.

I intend to read the new one but perhaps not immediately.

9

Snow Crash, Cryptonomicon and the Baroque Cycle are some of my favorite books, so I’ll probably read Sevenneves. But honestly, Reamde was so bad I’m kinda I’m kinda dreading this new book will be a similar mess.

Also, he seems to be on a mission lately to make each new book title harder to spell the the last.

10

He’s still on my “I’ll read whatever he writes, sooner or later” list. I like his stuff, though I agree that Reamde wasn’t very good.

11

I have a tab open to the preview. It’s been there for several days. I probably won’t get around to it. Ergo, won’t get around to reading the book.

Since Cryptonomicon, he’s been on a downward spiral of grand proportions.

12

Personally I found Anathem to be his best work by a long stretch though I can see how the math focus could throw people off; Seveneves looks to be in a similar vein and I’m looking forward to it.

13

I’ve only recently read this author - Snow Crash and Zodiac are the only two that I’ve read so far. Both were enjoyable reads, but as I noted above, I’ve been a bit disappointed in the endings.

Can someone list Neal Stephenson’s books in descending order of quality?

14

Seconded - Anathem is one of my all time favorite books so I have high hopes for Seveneves - I’ve already preordered in for Kindle.

I’ve been a lot less enthusiastic about some of his other works – Reamde felt like a 1200 page car chase with bitcoins.

15

Reamde reads (to me) like it was written to be adapted easily into a movie.

But, yeah, I’ll find the audio version when available, and then listen to it (I wish I could make more time for reading for real, again).

16

BTW, if you haven’t already, check out the collection of Stephenson’s nonfiction, Some Remarks: Essays and Other Writing.

17

My ordering:

  1. Anathem - brilliant, mind expanding, Tolkienesque world-building, math is a language that crosses all known universes.
  2. Snow Crash - Classic cyber-punk, hard to believe how long ago it was written
  3. Cryptonomicon - parallel timelines in present and WWII, starts into his tendency to spend pages on minor topic detours which is a love it or hate it thing with readers.
  4. Baroque Cycle (Quicksilver, the Confusion, System of the World) - Sort of an Age of Enlightenment prequel to Cryptonomicon, same family lines.
    WARNING: Committing to Cryptonomicon and The Baroque Cycle is a major undertaking, kind of like reading the Aubrey/Maturin series. Lots of pages and ideas therein.
  5. Reamde - as noted, seems like a movie script. Fewer big ideas and lots more action. The big action sequence midway through is extremely well written and turns the plot on its ear, but the rest pales by comparison.
  6. Diamond Age - Kind of the extended future of Snow Crash but not as satisfying.
  7. Zodiac - Fun, very dated, much shallower than his other works
  8. The Big U - haven’t read it, the author himself rates it poorly

Frankly I don’t mind open-ended finishes or the detours into minutia, Stephenson is on my “Read anything he publishes” list.

18

I’ll second that list, though I haven’t read Zodiac or The Big U.

I don’t need a big payoff ending, either. If you need that, Stephenson isn’t for you, and not just because of the endings. Most book endings suck, anyway; I can hardly fault Stephenson for leaving things open-ended.

19

Yes, even when he’s writing slam-bang action-packed cyberpunk, Stephenson is almost always really heavy.

Me, I dig it. News of a coming Stephenson book always gives me a big stiff rampant raging throbbing brain-schwing. But it ain’t for everybody.

20

This latest book is actually mispelled in the title to this thread. There’s only one N. Without having read the book, it might be Seven Eves just run together. Or perhaps he reversed Seven to get Neves, concatenated the two, and then dropped the extra N. Either way, it makes a palindrome and that should make it easier to spell.

Reamde, which I haven’t read either, looks like he took “read me”, dropped the space, and then swapped the D and M.

I haven’t read anything of Stephenson since the Baroque Cycle, which I never finished. Snow Crash was fairly good, and I just loved Cryptonomicon, but I just got bored reading BC. I tried reading two of them with the same result. Couldn’t finish either.