You may want to consider leaving him out of your will
I told him that I was spending his half of the inheritance on travel when I retire now!
Now, I can hold a note for a long time...actually I can hold a note forever. But eventually that's just noise. It's the change we're listening for. The note coming after, and the one after that. That's what makes it music.
Host ,'Why We Fight'
Literary Buffistas 3: Don't Parse the Blurb, Dear.
There's more to life than watching Buffy the Vampire Slayer! No. Really, there is! Honestly! Here's a place for Buffistas to come and discuss what it is they're reading, their favorite authors and poets. "Geez. Crack a book sometime."
DawnK - May 14, 2010 8:27:44 am PDT #11449 of 28503
giraffe mode
Gudanov - May 14, 2010 8:42:08 am PDT #11450 of 28503
Coding and Sleeping
Oh, yeah, I liked Snow Crash too. Maybe I'll do a re-read one of these days.
Volans - May 14, 2010 8:50:34 am PDT #11451 of 28503
move out and draw fire
You know, if Melville was writing today, I'm betting Moby Dick would be a multi-modal book, with hyperlinks to stuff about whaling and the world of the book.
Gris - May 14, 2010 9:00:11 am PDT #11452 of 28503
Hey. New board.
The Diamond Age is my favorite Stephenson, too. Though I haven't fit Anathem into that list in my head, yet (to even enter the list, a novel must be read at least twice, and I've only read it once thus far), and it has a chance to make it to the top.
My current list is:
1) The Diamond Age
2) Cryptonomicon
3) Snow Crash
4) Zodiac
Quicksilver never made it to the list (I didn't even finish it ONE time, though I intend to someday - I was enjoying it as one enjoys a slog. Much like I'm enjoying Anna Karenina in small bits between other books.)
I would suggest reading Snow Crash next, because it is compulsively readable. Then read the others at will. I honestly couldn't tell you whether you would prefer Cryptonomicon or The Diamond Age without knowing you fairly well.
beth b - May 14, 2010 9:16:58 am PDT #11453 of 28503
oh joy! Oh Rapture ! I have a brain!
I loved The Diamond Age. but i have tons of Stephenson I haven't read -- like Anatham
Volans - May 14, 2010 9:25:26 am PDT #11454 of 28503
move out and draw fire
And there's an iPad in The Diamond Age.
Ginger - May 14, 2010 9:29:13 am PDT #11455 of 28503
"It didn't taste good. It tasted soooo horrible. It tasted like....a vodka martini." - Matilda
I think I need to re-read Moby Dick. Maybe skipping the infodump parts.
I found I appreciated all the whales and whaling stuff much more the second and subsequent readings of Moby Dick. It's like swimming in a grand river of words.
I haven't tackled Anathem yet. There are times in my life when I don't feel up to tackling a doorstop book. I loved Snow Crash, but I should reread it after years online. It is the book in which Stephenson posits that the U.S. does four things better than the rest of the world: movies, music, software and high-speed pizza delivery.
Liese S. - May 14, 2010 6:58:31 pm PDT #11456 of 28503
"Faded like the lilac, he thought."
Is now a good time for me to pipe up with how much I hated Cryptonomicon? Hated. I threw it across the room, damaging its shiny, shiny cover. This is where you all gasp because it is shocking to damage a book. And
on purpose!
Awful! But I hated it that much. Finished it though, because I am a completist, if evidently something of a masochist.
Could not bear the race issues.
Kat - May 14, 2010 8:23:02 pm PDT #11457 of 28503
"I keep to a strict diet of ill-advised enthusiasm and heartfelt regret." Leigh Bardugo
Everytime I see Anathem I have to remind myself that there is an extra A and it's not Anthem. No one should confuse Neal Stephenson and Ayn Rand.
Atropa - May 14, 2010 10:01:42 pm PDT #11458 of 28503
The artist formerly associated with cupcakes.
I love The Diamond Age, but then, everything about the Neo-Vickies would appeal to me.