My thoughs on Neal Stephenson's new novel _Reamde_

[kestrell]

I downloaded _Reamde_ either Wednesday or Thursday, and I've been pretty much reading it continuosly since then. While it is another one thousand page tome, I found it to be fast-paced and enjoyable from start to finish.

I think Reamde_ may be Stephenson's most technically mature work so far: not only is it well-plotted and well-paced, but the story keeps going right up until the end (saving a very short but satisfying epilogue chapter), completely avoiding Stephenson's weakness--until now--of having very weak abrupt endings.

I don't really want to say too much about the story, since it has lots of surprises, but I will say that it is a cyberthriller which involves an online game, and all fo he characers are believably non-superhuman. Also, there's a believable disabled character and everybody keeps their scars at the end, as opposed to to the sort of story where everyone seems to have access to magic healing spells.

For the curious, Jaws unexpectedly but happily pronounces the title (which I think is correct) as "reamed," although Jaws pronounces "reamed" as "re-aimed."

Comments

[jesse_the_k]

Hmmm. I have bounced off other Stephenson as too baroque for my wee weak memory. Is there a dramatis personae in the front to help me out? Or don't I need one?

[rinue]

I'm so glad. I love Stephenson from as far back as Zodiac, but he lost me about halfway through The Baroque Cycle (liked the history; disliked Shaftoe and Waterhouse and found Eliza both ludicrous and offensively ill used) and I consequently stayed away from Anathem. This sounds like it could be worth getting back into.