Comments on Polybloggimous: a couPle oF thIngs that hAVe NoTHing tO DO wiTH EA...

Bought the book, however I first have 'All Abo...

2012-01-15T14:15:41.149-05:00

Bought the book, however I first have 'All About Roasting' and a bio of Mike Royko to work through.

It does look to be interesting.

That's fine Warner. Like I said, Snow Cra...

2012-01-14T09:40:54.884-05:00
That's fine Warner. Like I said, Snow Crash is really good, but don't take it as necessarily representative.

Snowcrash is available as Nook, so I'll try it...

2012-01-14T09:33:17.831-05:00
Snowcrash is available as Nook, so I'll try it.

My wife and I are taking a very long trip and I have no desire for half our luggage to be reading material, so I've got both a Nook (mostly mine) and a Kindle (mostly hers)

Science fiction, police procedural, good history (...

2012-01-14T09:30:26.996-05:00
Science fiction, police procedural, good history (Ambrose, Shirer, Durant, Gibbons), biography, some general fiction.

Cookbooks and books related to culinary

Twain, Heinlein, Clarke, McCaferty, Bradbury, Sandford, Block, Child, Peppin, Franey, Ruhlman, Bourdain

The book referenced looked interesting as I spend far too much time playing on line games of that type.

My first Stephenson was Cryptonomicon, an...

2012-01-14T09:28:23.122-05:00
My first Stephenson was Cryptonomicon, and then I went back and read some of the others. The Baroque Cycle, a trilogy, is also excellent.

Warning: These are really dense reads in parts. I recall reading pages and pages and wondering where they were going until he suddenly revealed something that made the whole section pay off. The payoffs are totally worth the effort to get there.

I also recommend Snow Crash, but it would be impossible to categorize any particular book as typical Stephenson. Each book (series) is unique and it can be surprising that they were written by the same author.

I don't know your reading tastes, Warner, but ...

2012-01-14T09:13:34.594-05:00
I don't know your reading tastes, Warner, but I wholeheartedly recommend Snow Crash anyway.

I've not heard of Stephenson before, can someb...

2012-01-14T09:07:55.307-05:00
I've not heard of Stephenson before, can somebody make a recommendation for an initial book or two, must be on the Nook.

That is Fabulous. We are Most Pleased.

2012-01-13T22:42:07.388-05:00
That is Fabulous. We are Most Pleased.

Much Better. Thank You.

2012-01-13T21:57:12.735-05:00
Much Better.

Thank You.

I don't mind mixing two stories. It's that...

2012-01-13T17:44:42.291-05:00
I don't mind mixing two stories. It's that he dropped all spec fic elements, including a bunch of plotlines, and ended up with a straight thriller. I was hoping he'd wind it all up by resolving all the plotlines with an SF payoff.

I don't know about that. Stephenson often mix...

2012-01-13T16:52:40.308-05:00
I don't know about that. Stephenson often mixes seemingly unrelated stories and goes back and forth between them. That doesn't bother me, and in this case, I always found myself enjoyably surprised when he'd leap back into the other story.

Personally, I thought most of the excess word count was toward the end of Part I of the book. Things moved along much better in Part II (although the "game" storyline did mostly disappear).

REAMDE should have been two books: a video-game-ba...

2012-01-13T15:54:29.093-05:00
REAMDE should have been two books: a video-game-based SF story, and a terrorist thriller. A number of plotlines from the first half got dropped in favor of running through the mountains with lots of guns. Which is entertaining in and of itself, of course, but I read Stephenson for the SFness, and it steadily trailed away over the (many) pages.

Comments on Polybloggimous: a couPle oF thIngs that hAVe NoTHing tO DO wiTH EA...

Bought the book, however I first have 'All Abo...

That's fine Warner. Like I said, Snow Cra...

Snowcrash is available as Nook, so I'll try it...

Science fiction, police procedural, good history (...

My first Stephenson was Cryptonomicon, an...

I don't know your reading tastes, Warner, but ...

I've not heard of Stephenson before, can someb...

That is Fabulous. We are Most Pleased.

Much Better. Thank You.

I don't mind mixing two stories. It's that...

I don't know about that. Stephenson often mix...

REAMDE should have been two books: a video-game-ba...