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Summary: Stephenson has become the Peter Drucker of the 21st Century
Review: Neal Stephenson becomes the antithesis of Peter Drucker and Alvin Toffler. The Metaverse / Internet is the retail battleground of the future. The best book on the Future of Retail in years. Hiro Protagonist is Bill Gates with an attitude and samurai sword.
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Summary: One of my favorites
Review: This book is one of my all-time favorite sci-fi books. Stephenson has a quirky, imaginitve style that keeps me interested from both intellectual and 'wow-that's-cool' standpoints. I wish he were more prolific, however, I'm still waiting for more after Diamond Age. In the meantime I'll have to endure the dry and flat prose of William Gibson.
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Summary: Poor, fairly poor
Review: As my english prof would say, "Hadn't Neil got anyone to peer-edit his work?"
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Summary: wow
Review: Neal Stephenson has done it again! His other book, The Diamond Age, is just as good as this one. Mr. Stephenson's ideas on futures of the world are very interesting as well as possible. Read it, you won't be dissapointed!
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Summary: A Wonderful Sci-Fi!!
Review: I loved this book. The plot was well thought out, and it was overall impossible to put down. Ok, so naming the main character Hiro Protagonist was pretty lame. The one thing that bugged me (besides Hiro's name) was that many chapters are about Hiro doing research. These chapters are incredibly boring and pointless. They may help understand the plot a little more, but i skimmed them and i still understood the plot. Snow Crash is a great book, read it.
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Summary: Simplistic style, cluttered discription, great ideas.
Review: This book deserves the 3 stars simply for being a thought provoking read and an excellent idea. As science fiction I have read much better, as it's simplistic, occaisionaly childish style was irritating, and in places the narrative was confusingly cluttered. I'd read another of Stephensons books if I thought the ideas were as interesting, but otherwise not. Oh, and the end was poor.
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Summary: Just Fabulous
Review: Excellent book, if you keep in perspective. This is an Action/Adventure book with Cybercunk overtones. Stephenson does a wonderful job of setting up the storyline and following through with creative ideas, such as the Rat Thing and REASON. But the downturn is what I would refer to as his "Achillies Heel", he can't write endings. He loads up ideas till they are bursting at the seams then it seems likes he grows tired of writing so he rushes to find an end. Rushed ending aside this was one of the best books I've read, and one enjoy reading at least once a year.
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Summary: Eager to please, but irritating
Review: Tries, and for in many ways succeeds in, satirising cyberpunk and concentional heroic sci-fi, however is let down by the parts where Stephenson takes himself too seriously and reveals himself to be abit of a smart-alec. Huge chunks of the book are taken up with explaining things to the reader, especially the parts about Summerian culture and language - 'look at me, I'm really erudite!' he screams at you. This is always a sign of inexperience in writing. Elsewhere the narrative moves along at a breakneck pace, with little real character development, though this I assume is part of the satire. Overall this book is like a little Jack Russell dog- eager to please, but so immensely irritating you feel like kicking it.
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Summary: Comic book SF, strengths and flaws
Review: Yes, the plot falls apart. And the characters aren't multi-dimensional. But I laughed out loud at many points, something I don't often do when reading anything, particularly SF. The memo from the Feds about the proper paper to use in the bathroom (not hyperinflated currency), plus the memo about the proper way to read the memo, was a howler. It'll be interesting to see if this makes a fun movie, or ends up being as bad as Johnny Mnemonic--just don't let the director take it too seriously!
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Summary: This book is fabulous!!!
Review: I absolutely LOVED this book. I'm just a kid and hey, even I liked it! I loved the creativity, but he didn't explain how everything worked (like how they control the avatars in the Metaverse). But I really enjoyed reading it and couldn't put it down for days! Read it!
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