Too dense for me. Kept getting lost. Ended up okay. ( )

Can you spoil a book that's older than you? Given the current state of... *gestures vaguely *... everything, I've recently become interested in the cyberpunk genre. After learning that a lot of the lingo was linked to Toronto kids on various drugs, I decided to check out the source.

I loved it. It was fun. I love the way Gibson played with language. It would be comparable to Burgess' A Clockwork Orange, but it actually impacted the way we talk today. I came of age as the Matrix released, I've sat in classrooms learning of event horizons and I've been told the Singularity is 20 years away for the last 15 years. I wonder if I had read this in high school, would I have delved deeper into software coding?

You can find wonderful summaries of this book elsewhere. But should you read it? If you liked the Matrix, if you thought the Johnny Mnemonic movie was almost good, if you like gritty retrofuturism, then absolutely. Beware, though, the women in the book, even the ones with personalities, often feel like they only exist to make sure our main character doesn't let himself die. ( )

Much of the novel went over my head. I think a re-read is in order, but some time off still.

Curate's egg. Some parts enjoyable, others no idea what was going on. ( )

A Book With A One-Word Title

The back cover of my copy gushes that Neuromancer is "the first truly realized glimpse of humankind's digital future." Its inclusion on Time magazine's "100 Best English-language Novels from 1923 - 2005" (a list I find reasonably accurate) led me to believe this book would be different than most of the science fiction I've read. In its favor, the novel's version of virtual reality reads much like the modern equivalent in effect more so than technical details. And the AI entities driving much of the plot sound eerily familiar with the technology people are warning us against today. But the connections between the virtual and real worlds at the heart of the story rely heavily on physical impossibilities to progress the story. And that, along with writing that is not the "uncanny beauty" the jacket blurbs claim, is where science fiction always loses me. The fact that my copy is the 81st printing of Neuromancer might indicate that my opinion of the book differs significantly from the reading crowd. If you read my other reviews of science fiction, that won't surprise you.

Neuromancer reminds me of Star Trek: The Motion Picture, in which a sentient being, V'Ger, looks to evolve beyond its current, unsatisfactory state. The rag-tag band of criminals working with the AI entity at the heart of the story aren't as virtuous as the members of Star Fleet, but they are every bit as invested in the mission's success. And like the movie, the novel left me questioning exactly what the ending meant. Unlike the movie, there are follow-on novels which might explain, but I didn't find the book interesting enough to want to read on. ( )