Seveneves

Another one by Neal Stephenson in the bag. Did a fair amount of travelling this winter break, so I broke my book fast with something I knew I would like.

I started out not liking Seveneves. As I explained to Shin, a lot of Stephenson’s writing feels very similar, for example character types, humor, sex. Furthermore, Seveneves starts off with what one would imagine is a climax, then settles into a long lull period on Earth, with lots of explanation and set up. I suppose I wasn’t too entranced with the introduction to spaceflight.

However, the action picks up (yea action!) once the story transitions to space. Also, he gives the reader a good intuition for orbital mechanics, which I reallly enjoyed. The technical (sometimes cheesy) and social problems encountered were pretty fascinating. The realistic treatment of the harsh life in space (radiation sucks) was great. And the “oh I understand the title” moment was awesome.

Then, Stephenson surprised me. He continued with the story and went full speculative, science fiction mode. The intro was a bit too long-winded, but ultimately I enjoyed the new world he created. Some parts were too obvious, like the miners and sea people. The space habitats were cool though, and the brief exploration of how cultures arose from specific events the reader is very familiar with by now was fun. As usual when reading Stephenson, I felt the ending was abrupt and accelerated.

Overall, a fun read, strongly bolstered by techincal soundness.