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its not ORC, but its as close to a literary forum as i found so i'll post it here
Snow Crash is a great book, writen in a cyberpunk style, but its different. Kinda Neuromancerish...
What intrests me most is the theory on summerian brain-hacking. Does anyone have any indication of truth in this?
Posts: 13 | Registered: Jul 2003
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posted
Snow Crash is sort of fun, but the Nam-Shub of Enki encoded in binary in such a way that technically trained people recognize it by instantly processing a frame of static... well... it makes me snort.
Snow Crash isn't nuthin' compared to Diamond Age, though, where one has to believe a lot more hokey-science stuff. Nano is better treated by Brin (Earth) and Bear (Moving Mars). Less over-the-edge foolishness. The technologies in Diamond would have killed the society long before the story he's telling could be relevant. It's like Star Trek - too many do-it-yourself godlike powers.
Nevertheless, both are great fun. I like Diamond better - I've reread it, whereas I was content to set Snow aside after one run. The skater girl from Snow turns up as an old nanny in Diamond. Look for the phrase Chiseled Spam.
Other than that, Stephenson's books are quite impressive. I wish Cryptonomicon were less rife with various expletives, but what a clever book. Lacks the wild-speculative flaws of his other two biggies.
posted
Snow Crash is the only one of his books that i've read....what would you guys recomend for a second from him?
Posts: 13 | Registered: Jul 2003
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posted
Crypto was best. The historical stuff was engaging.
Snow was fluffy and Diamond was a bit out-there in parts.
Still, the guy's crossed all 3 of those with no fixed boundaries. Dreamy visions of over-the-top extrapolations of the modern, revisitations of a glorious/murky and mysterious past filled with intriguing intelligentsia, and a street-kid authenticity flare that surpasses Gibson (even in it's low dimensionality).
I like 'em all, rough and full of nonsense fun bits.
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