All of these published essays have been lightly massaged, with the exception of “In the Kingdom of Mao Bell,” which survives only as excerpts.

A couple of items fresh to this volume appear. Additionally, he gives us two actual stories, and an amusing fragment of a third. But he does fold in “Mother Earth, Mother Board,” his brilliant piece on the global telecommunications network he did for Wired, which weighs in at nearly 120 pages. He’s chosen not to include In the Beginning…Was the Command Line, published separately in a volume of 160 pages. Given that Snow Crash, the book that really launched Stephenson into the stratosphere, came out in 1992, this essentially covers his whole career. The book offers pretty much all of Stephenson’s major nonfiction from as far back as 1993. Not unworthy critical targets.įirst off, contents. I can tell you what’s in the book, point out how individual pieces exemplify Stephenson’s virtues (and his few vices), and generally try to place him in the context of modern SF and within his own oeuvre.

Given these parameters, what’s a reviewer to do when faced with a new Stephenson volume? Oh, a fair amount of valid work for us journalistic scribblers remains, I think. His fans are legion and eager and omnivorous for whatever he writes and Stephenson’s proven track record for producing high-quality, uniquely informative and entertaining idiosyncratic prose is unbroken, thus inspiring unconditional, pre-assumed reader confidence. Neal Stephenson has reached the point in his career and public reputation where any review of one of his new books is almost superfluous to its sales potential, for two reasons. Neal Stephenson opens the introduction to his stimulating and highly readable new collection by saying that publishers always reassure him that “I have reached the stage in my life and career where it is not only possible, but advisable, to release a compilation of what are drolly referred to as my ‘shorter’ works.” I will borrow that observation and flip it around from the reviewer’s perspective.

Snow crash di neal stephenson