neal stephenson – Grasshopperking(0)

Let me kick off with this: Neal Stephenson is in serious danger of becoming one of my top Sci-fi authors ever. Granting this is only the second book by Stephenson that i’ve read. The first being Anathem. If i get nothing else out of reading NPR’s top 100 Sci-Fi and Fantasy books of all time i’ll at least have been introduced to this talented writer. The Diamond Age is so UNLIKE Anathem (which i loved you can find my Book Club of One review here: Anathem Review) and still just as masterfully done that i tip my virtual hat to the author.

The Diamond Age is set in the indeterminate future. Nano technology is ubiquitous in the sci-fi universe that Stephenson has painted but it’s not the Nano-tech that steals the show. The show stealer is a special book of sorts, a smart book: “A Young Lady’s Illustrated Primer”. The Primer is a smart book that employs virtual actors to provide a sort of “Edutainment” to the reader of the book. A stolen copy of the primer winds up in the hands of an impoverished little girl and has a major effect on her life, an effect that is attempted to be replicated by others in the story but not to the same effect.

The Diamond Age begins by painting a picture of the value of education to affect and change a person’s life and guide their development. It ends with the revelation that education is not enough, that relationship, love and nurture are the real keys to creating a positive effect in the developing life. In a world where we leave the development of our children to their teachers and educators and we leave their entertainment to whatever screen is most accessible to us and them: The Diamond Age is timely message to any who are parents or mentors to young minds.

Book Club of One grade: A. Solid read! Stephenson has used the Sci-Fi genre to make a powerful point with this one.

Anathem is a meaty sci-fi romp through a number of philosophical thought experiments. When i use the term “meaty” here i mean meaty like a primal cut of beef brisket: It’s large (this is quite a read), and dense (i’d guess close to 50% of the word-count of Anathem is dedicated to philosophical debates).

The Title “Anathem” is a mashing together of Anathema and Anthem and refers to a sort of ceremony of disgrace that takes place during the story.

Stephenson does a good job using a sci-fi setting that’s not Earth to make some great observations about life on Earth as we know it. Two of my favorite of these observations were the “Jeejaw” and “Slines”.

Jeejaws are the cell-phones of Stephenson’s world. The world is seperated into Avout and Saeculars. Avout are those pledged to a monastic tradition and committed to a minimalist lifestyle, most of the main characters are Avout. Saeculars represent basically everyone else in the world. The Avout live without Jeejaws and they find them to be intrusive and great distractions when they move out and interact with the Saecular world. It was just another nudge to help me see the intrusive impact my own cell-phone has made in my life.
Slines: Slines represent a sort of popular culture consumer in the Saecular world. If you’ve ever felt like an outsider to those enamored with popular culture you’ll likely find in the Slines a familiar sort of occurrence…

The story-line is pretty sweeping overall (but the book is certainly long enough to contain such an ambitious plot). You’ll travel from simple monastery life, through Anathem’s world-at-large, and eventually wind up in space with pan-dimensional beings… Things wrap up with a very jarring, and intriguing, exploration into the many worlds interpretation of quantum mechanics, with an interesting twist asking, “what if the many worlds have some sort of effect on each other?”.

Book Club of One grade: B+ Worth the read. Anathem is not light reading and sometimes it felt like the story-line was moving in fits and starts, you may spend many pages on a dinner chat then in two pages find yourself across a continent or into space itself. Overall the concepts it lays out, the social insights, and the refreshing story-line make it a fine piece of Sci-Fi.

Tag: neal stephenson

#75 The Diamond Age -Neal Stephenson

#85: Anathem by Neal Stephenson