Until a man is twenty-five, he still thinks, every so often, that under the right circumstances he could be the baddest motherfucker in the world. If I moved to a martial-arts monastery in China and studied real hard for ten years. If my family was wiped out by Colombian drug delaers and I swore myself to revenge. If I got a fatal disease, had one year to live, devoted it to wiping out street crime. If I just dropped out and devoted my life to being bad.
Hiro used to feel that way, too, but then he ran into Raven. In a way, this is liberating. He no longer has to worry about trying to be the baddest motherfucker in the world. The position is taken. The crowning touch, the one thing that really puts true world-class badmotherfuckerdom totally out of reach, of course, is the hydrogen bomb. If it wasn't for the hydrogen bomb, a man could still aspire. Maybe find Raven's Achilles' heel. Sneak up, get a drop, slip a mickey, pull a fast one. But Raven's nuclear umbrella kind of puts the world title out of reach.
Which is okay. Sometimes it's all right just to be a little bad. To know your limitations. Make do with what you've got.
I have a feeling, however, that regardless of my feelings about this particular novel, in a lot of ways, it was more of a challenge for our group than Gilead was. I decided to go with fewer structured discussion topics to see if it doesn't help foster a little more concentrated discussion. I'm very interested to hear your discussions!
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This is just an FYI here. With the semester starting up a week or two ago and me putting off my course prep all summer and waiting until the last minute, my leisure reading time has been hard to come by. As a result I'm only about a third of the way through Snow Crash. However, when I put my shoulder into reading I get it done pretty quick. My plan is to finish it up this week and be ready to comment by the weekend. We'll see how that goes.
ReplyDeleteI'm really digging what I've read thus far and can't wait to discuss. Other than Paul, I think I'm the only other one here who has any significant history of reading pulp sci-fi/fantasy so I'm anxious to add my two cents.
Don't worry - Dan and Courtney aren't done yet either. I figured at least a few people would lag on this book, between the busy end of summer season and the start of the school year. I thought I'd throw the posts up as a reminder, plus I wanted to get them written while the book was fresh in my head.
ReplyDeleteEke! I too need more time. Sorry, kids. Between the start of the school year and spending last weekend in the woods I've, sadly, fallen a wee bit behind in my reading. But like Paul, I gonna bust ass and hope to contribute by the end of the week.
ReplyDeleteI was actually doing ok reading this book, but unfortunately my library took it back from me, and told me I couldn't renew it at all because it was in too high of demand. =(
ReplyDeleteThis was an almost 500-page book though, so I'll be the first to say extra time is probably warranted all around. Hopefully I can get a copy in the meantime.
So is anyone done yet?
ReplyDeleteI'm done!
ReplyDeleteDone. Finally. And sorry it took me so long, but DAAAAAMN - I STRUGGLED with this book! For all their pacing differences, I read Gilead in two days, but it took me almost a month to read Snow Crash for some reason. The fact that I picked it up right around the time when I returned to work certainly didn't help, but I think the biggest issue for me is that I just don't have the head for most science fiction and I REALLY don't have the head for computer-y things. My husband once tried to explain to me how the Internet works, and nearly five sentences in my eyes had glazed over and I was singing show tunes in my head. And thus is was with several passages in Snow Crash - whenever they started explaining the computer-y stuff I tended to zone out, so I ended up having to read several passages twice. It's not the book's fault, though. I guess I'm just not smart enough for Stephenson. :(
ReplyDeleteMaggie's a swift-ass reader, and it took her a month to finish SC and though I'm no slouch myself, and I think I started this bad boy about 10 weeks ago.
ReplyDeleteMy brother's really into sci fi--he's working though every Hugo winner at present--and every time I visit him, he gives me shit for not "even" finishing Hyperion, so I guess there's a precedent in place. But still.
I won't pretend to be floored by all I read, which is a dual function of both my reading this book NOT in 1992, when it could be called, and rightly, prescient, and my not being able to follow lots and lots of this book. When I read something that's so utterly self-contained as this (ne, most sci-fi), it's as if I hedge my bets and don't fully commit to the author's vision. Or something like that. I just resist total immersion. I'll own up this being a Steve Problem and not a Neal Problem. Without a doubt, this book took me places I hadn't really considered.
I'm grateful for your choice here, Paul, and your estimation of our collective booksmarts, which is higher than I, for one, deserve. :)
So is this thing still on?
ReplyDeleteI sent my intern deep into our book club archives, and the list she returned with is thus:
#1: Kevin (Nov. 10)
#2: Steve E (Nov. 16)
#3: Courtney (March 15)
#4: Paul (April 18)
#5: Dan (May 22)
#6: Maggie (May 22)
#7: Paul K (DOB?)
Do we go back to Kev for the next book? Or are we taking a break?
I was actually wondering about this very point myself...
ReplyDeleteWhatever ya'll wanna do is fine with me. I can keep it rolling if others are willing to keep on rolling with me...
ReplyDeleteHow about Kevin has a week to pick a book and we discuss in a month?
ReplyDeleteBack to the Crash...
ReplyDeleteObviously, I have to reiterate the feelings about how long it took to get through this book. It was surprising, because I got through the first third to half really quite quickly and despite the way the plot kind of escalates toward the end, I really dragged to get this one finished. I did get it done a few weeks ago, but went back to read some large chunks over again, an experience that really reminded me of the way I read CoD.
In the end, I can't say that I loved or even *liked* Snow Crash. However, I sure am glad I read it. It's obviously an important book and was very prescient. Like a lot of books though, I think you have to read it in a historical context and that kind of felt strange because it was a book about, well, the future. For a long time I've delved into the world of fantasy literature and since they're often linked together I thought it wouldn't be a problem tearing through this scifi piece the way I tore through Tolkien or Robert Jordan or David Eddings. It just wasn't the case here. Perhaps it's because, like Paul said, Scifi is defined by and is rooted in some kind of imagined future, whereas fantasy is rooted in the myth of the past--a context that stays the same with the forward passage of time.
Of course, once again I'm late to the game and a lot has already been said. I'll try to add my two cents though.
Strap in, baby birds... Daddy's going to feed you. I've got a couple of ideas, and I think I've narrowed it down to probably one book, based on availability and I two plan Bs. Actually, I guess they'd be B and C but they're more equally B. Anyways. Prepare for the next book.
ReplyDeleteIt's Coming! (Fall 2009)