Neal Stephenson

Seveneves

From the #1 New York Times bestselling author of Anathem, Reamde, and Cryptonomicon comes an exciting and thought-provoking science fiction epic—a grand story of annihilation and survival spanning five thousand years. What would happen if the world were ending? A catastrophic event renders the earth a ticking time bomb. In a feverish race against the inevitable, nations around the globe band together to devise an ambitious plan to ensure the survival of humanity far beyond our atmosphere, in outer space. But the complexities and unpredictability of human nature coupled with unforeseen challenges and dangers threaten the intrepid pioneers, until only a handful of survivors remain . . . Five thousand years later, their progeny—seven distinct races now three billion strong—embark on yet another audacious journey into the unknown . . . to an alien world utterly transformed by cataclysm and time: Earth. A writer of dazzling genius and imaginative vision, Neal Stephenson combines science, philosophy, technology, psychology, and literature in a magnificent work of speculative fiction that offers a portrait of a future that is both extraordinary and eerily recognizable. As he did in Anathem, Cryptonomicon, the Baroque Cycle, and Reamde, Stephenson explores some of our biggest ideas and perplexing challenges in a breathtaking saga that is daring, engrossing, and altogether brilliant.

A Novel

Pierre

I was intrigued by the first few pages. Then I thought the whole space part was kind of slow going and not so exciting. And finally I absolutely loved the last part. It was all worth it.

The astounding new novel from the master of science fiction. President Barack Obama’s summer reading choice and recently optioned by Ron Howard and IMAGINE to be made into a major motion picture.

Leo Vogel

Enjoyed Parts 1 and 2. I couldn't finish the book due to the time leap that occurs after Part 3. After the time jump the characters and locations are so completely different that it might as well be a different book—like he had included a sequel novel. Maybe someday I'll find the time to go back and finish this. I really enjoyed the first 2 parts but took a star off of my review due to not being able to finish it. The date finished is approximate; I don't remember when I finished Part 2.

Tobias V. Langhoff

** spoiler alert **
           This epic book encompasses almost all the aspects I love about the broad genre of science fiction. It’s provocative, exciting, intelligent, speculative, ponderous, hopeful, misanthropic, visionary, depressing. The list goes on.

The beginning of the story is set in our near future (Wikipedia, Twitter, Dropbox and GIFs are still around, and often mentioned). Humanity has not yet colonized Mars. The most exciting thing that has happened in space is that the International Space Station has gotten some upgrades. The private space industry is still helping out the underfunded NASA. The president of the United States is a woman.

Part One of the book begins with the sudden and unforeseen destruction of the Moon. Aliens probably did it? Who knows? It’s not terribly important in comparison to the fact that a prominent scientist eventually discovers (after the entire scientific community, weirdly enough, has treated the destruction of the Moon merely as an exciting change in the hitherto unchanging and eternal night sky) that humanity has been given a death sentence in the form of Moon debris, which over the next couple of years will rain hellfire down upon the Earth and cleanse it of all life. The human race bands together in selfless communal work to make the ISS self-sustainable so at least a small contingent of people can survive the bolides. If the chaotic rioting that’s usually a staple of apocalyptic fiction occurs, it’s not shown to the reader (apart from a tiny incident of international war, swiftly quelled). One might think Neal Stephenson has a romantic view of humanity, but fear not (or do, as the case may be): Strife will come in the post-apocalypse.

Together, Part One and Part Two comprise what I call Orbital Mechanics: The Novel. If you love minute technological details that really explain why Neal Stephenson is fantastic at hard science fiction, these parts will delight you. If not, your eyes will glaze over as you read passage after passage about how much fuel is truly needed for something as simple-sounding as boosting the decaying ISS orbit so it doesn’t simply fall down to the Earth as a fireball. 

Part Two of the book actually reminded me of Pushing Ice. They’re both political tales (with female protagonists and deuteragonists, incidentally) about the hardships of establishing a human civilization in a strange and perilous setting, backdropping a thrilling adventure involving a large chunk of ice.

Part Two and Part Three of the book are collectively about power play and politics. For a civilization under duress, which carries the fate of humanity, is an authoritarian technocracy or a democracy the answer? Is pragmatism or idealism needed? Perhaps not surprising in a geeky novel such as this, Stephenson clearly favors the former; the civilization in Part Two is run by a non-elected self-made man who knows what should be done (likely a fictionalized version of Jeff Bezos, the founder of Stephenson’s past employer, the private space organization Blue Origin; perhaps also Elon Musk) with the council of scientists (such as a character clearly based on Neil deGrasse Tyson), but the hoi polloi seek to elect a charismatic catastrophe of a leader (maybe loosely based on Hillary Clinton, and revered by someone whose backstory seems nearly identical to that of Malala).

The aftermath of this schism continues into the far future of Part Three, where we follow a group of evolved humans from what became of the technocracy; they find themselves in a new war with the descendants of the splinter democracy, which has become a secluded and nationalistic propaganda state. This last part of the book, set megayears into the near future of the first two, is the most divisive among readers. I loved it; it almost splits the book into two novels, both of which are different science fiction treaties of genres I usually enjoy. There is also a kind of First Contact scenario that made me think of The Songs Of Distant Earth.

However, the novel is not without its flaws. I will now spend many words detailing them, because I spent a lot of time thinking about them to arrive at how much I loved the book in spite of them.

Stephenson is obviously looking at all the problems faced by humanity from an engineering standpoint. All three parts of the novel could be much deeper studies in anthropology, but that point of view is lacking. In Part One, I found it hard to believe that the discovery and announcement of the end of the world would happen in such a non-bureaucratic fashion, and that scientists around the world wouldn’t immediately consider the consequences of the moon getting split into pieces. In Part Two, the leaders of the technocracy are so naive to the human condition that he doesn’t consider being undermined by people who don’t think like he does, that it almost undoes the human race. Although, on the other hand, maybe Stephenson isn’t actually the guy who’s not considering the human condition, but his characters? At any rate, I found the antagonist faction to fall together towards the end of Part Two, as the aftermath of a reimagined version of John Wyndham’s “Survival” seeds a stigma that lasts for five millennia. This brings us from the hard science fiction of the first part of the book to the more speculative fiction of Part Three, where first of all some suspension of disbelief is needed on the evolution of the human species in such a time span. Five thousand years is a long time. On one hand, while linguistics would probably be the aspect of humanity that changed the most, the only thing that did was the alphabet, even in societies that have been cut off from each other for that time span. On a similar note, the degree of intermingling (or lack thereof) between human races seems implausible. On the other hand, some human races have evolved too radically to be realistic in 5000 years; and I’m not just talking about the epigenetics and artificial selection, but humans who have undergone actual natural evolution, albeit through selective breeding.

There are also some major plot points that aren’t explained, like the catalyst of the entire novel: The “Agent” which blows up the Moon. Since this event culminates in the re-creation of the human race by a group of Eves, the Moon explosion seems slightly biblical as well, perhaps as a sort of Big Bang that unleashes a new “flood” on the Earth and reboots the creation myth and humanity. And much like the actual Big Bang Theory, the reason for the Moon’s disintegration is a mystery; as Stephenson brushes aside the explanation in the epilogue, he also brushes aside “the Purpose” and its followers, a shadowy organization that was hinted at through Part Three but ultimately also never explained, although it is more explicitly said to be of religious proportions. More disappointingly, however, is the lack of backstory for the suboceanic human race the Pingers (and as I mentioned, their rapid evolution seems a little far fetched). If the epilogue is meant to set up a sequel (or even dual companion books for the Epic backstories of the Diggers and Pingers?) that fleshes out these plots, I would be a very happy man.

For I know that others think these criticisms weigh heavily against the book, but to me they were more akin to nitpicking compared to the story itself. I thought this book was fantastic. Another valid criticism is the difference in tone and plot between Part One/Two and Part Three, but I thought this twist worked beautifully, and I enjoyed all parts of the book on their own.

SciFi and Fantasy Book Club, January 2016

Ĉeňdoł

I really wanted to like this book, and it definitely had its ups and downs. However there are many times where page after page is describing the functionality of how a specific technology works, to the point that you could probably recreate the entire technology based on the descriptions in the book.

Overall, this over describing destracted from the main story and really was a grind to read through.

The last section of the book is placed in an entirely different setting, farther into the future, that I couldn't continue in fear of the overly described settings.

All in all, I feel the book was written in a way that the author anticipates it being adapted into a film, and wanted to describe certain aspects in so much detail that film makers have to go with his vision, leaving no detail to the imagination of the reader.

Ed Kay

First two thirds of this were surprisingly compelling, as I'm not really a fan of 'hard sci-fi'. Unfortunately, the final section tipped over from space-thriller into techno-masturbation, and I was intensely bored with page long engineering blueprints describing exactly how the habitats were designed. Yawn.

Also: (view spoiler)[mermen? (hide spoiler)] Really?!

Hernando

I almost gave up about 300p then again about 600p but I finished the book , from cover to cover. 
I do not have any problem with expositions in any book (I actually like it ) but I honestly find that Kim Stanley Robinson does a better job on this than Neal Stephenson (taking Seveneves as a starting point) as I think that KSR when describing Space, ships, planets, etc is way more interesting, compelling and clear. I find the expositions on Seveneves almost boring and with too many ramifications that at the end were not even important to the plot. 
On the other spectrum when the plot is actually happening and there is an argument Neal does an amazing job. I would say this book could be like 300p shorter. 
For the last third that got so much criticism I do not think it is bad but I sympathize with those who say that it could be just another book.

Gavin

Amazing hard worldbuilding from a lunatic seed: 'what would happen if the moon just blew up?' You will stomach pages of physical exposition before scenes can occur, but it isn't superfluous. First two-thirds are psychologically convincing: you will ball your fists at the politics. (By which I mean treachery and irrationality.)

 He does railroad a couple of plot points - e.g. it is taken for granted that a psychopathic war criminal has every right to an equal share of the genetic future. And the last third's extrapolation of 5000 years of cultural creep is less formally ambitious than e.g. Cloud Atlas.

First two-thirds 4*/5, last third 3/5.

[Theory #1, Theory #2, Theory #4, Values #2]

***

How does it do as Serious science fiction?

 Social development: Lots, though the races that develop are primary-coloured and fantastical, including a fantastical war.

 Software development: A little bit, particularly Dinah's cool claytronics.

 Actual Science: Plenty, with the lone exception of the initial moonburst.

Bouke van der Bijl

** spoiler alert **
           Did not finish. This book is actually two in one, the first part I really enjoyed (drama! Science! intrigue! Nukes!) the second part of which just gets into weird bullshit with nonsensical unscientific ideas about what a descendant is. First part was great though

Stefanie Viens

3.5 stars

I enjoyed the first two parts, though they did feel tediously descriptive at times, but overall the plot was solid and the story arc pretty engaging. 

The third part felt unecessary after the climax of the second - and felt disappointingly unfuturistic despite it being a fast forward to several thousand years later.

Jeff

Really wanted to give this a full five stars — the overall premise is absolutely my jam — but the third act had a tricky gear shift, with a lot of technical descriptions of engineering and travel that went a bit over my head. Plus it ends right when it’s getting good! 

As strong as the first two thirds are, I’d have loved a more even split between the two halves.

Adam

Really enjoyed this novel. A hard sci-fi post world end space survival that I could hardly put down. Had a similar feel to The Martian in relation to survival.

Agree with the general opinion that the "5000 years later" final chapters felt like an odd and sudden change of style and feel for the story. 

I read the bulk of the book slowly and savored it, and then speed skim read the final chapters post-main story.

Becky A

The first thing is: this is a Neal Stephenson novel, and thus it is largely about math and science, and not so much about actual characters. (Actual line from the book: "They had forgotten a second piece of good mathematical news.") In fact, this often reads less like a novel and more like a thought exercise - "If the world was ending like this, how would I build a space ark? If (complication X) happened, what would you have to do next? And then (complication Y)?" etc, with those various complications being given names and allowed to bounce off each other. Which, in case that sounds like a complaint: it isn't. It's smart and fascinating, and though not particularly character driven, I do genuinely appreciate that most of the characters it *does* focus on are women (female scientists! multiple POC female scientists!!).

Nope, my actual complaint is that this was two books smooshed into one, and that didn't work out very well. The first "book" read largely as prologue - how to get people into space to save humanity? - but that book was also over 500 pages long. That is a long prologue. It was also, for my money, way more engaging and interesting than the second "book." Book two picked up 5,000 years later, with the descendants of the characters from the first part having created a whole new civilization. That book was only 200-something pages long, and suffered for it.

From here on: spoilers. 

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So, the concept (which I missed because of the title being styled as one word, and also maybe because I'm not that bright) is that the final seven people in space are all women (the Seven Eves, geddit?), and though they're able to use cloning/genetic manipulation to rebuild the species (both genders, even), all future humans are descended from the seven of them, creating seven distinct races. 

What I was surprised and disappointed by was how much those seven races read like bad epic fantasy races - everyone of one race is exactly like this; everyone of another race is exactly like that. The Dinans are all charismatic leaders. The Camites are all humble peacemakers. The Julians are all schemers and the Aidans are basically all evil. And as races, they inherited as politics the way the Eves all felt about each other - so some are natural allies and others hate each other and they've turned into two giant blocs with surprisingly oversimplified political dynamics.

I say surprisingly oversimplified because it's the *only* thing that feels oversimplified in the whole book. Stephenson usually does very thoughtful detail, so this was a disappointment. Especially because, while it gave some lip service to the idea that these politics had grown up culturally as well as being partially in-born to the races, I'm just not sure how that would have happened. In early generations, it would have been all of the races cramped together in quarters too close to allow for a heck of a lot of differentiation - it could have developed later on, I guess, but at that point wouldn't there also be a fair amount of *shared* cultural background to couteract it? idk.

Anyway - there was a lot here about the racial attributes being inborn traits. I did not dig it. Alas.

It also felt like the second "book" was just kind of drifting. The first one had a pretty distinct purpose - get humanity to a point where it can be safe and repopulate, and introduce tons of technical concepts. By comparison, the second book was ... worldbuilding by showing how those concepts had been expanded and improved on through the years, awesome, but then doing ... what?

The idea of first (or first-ish) contact with the humans who did, in fact, survive on Earth, was cool. But it was mixed in with the politics in such a way that it didn't really feel like it said anything or had much point. The characters weren't as well developed, and over all, the whole 5k-years-later part was a bit of a let down compared to the first 500 pages.

All that said, I DID like the mini-theme about building narratives out of real people - carried through in the idea that Izzy had become a reality TV show for people on earth; the way social media worked in the arklets; the Epic in the second half. I wish we'd seen more of that, as it wasn't a very drawn out theme. And at the end it got into some kind of quasi-religious higher purpose thing that felt REALLY pasted on and out of place because it wasn't mentioned until, like, the last 10 pages.

Also: mer people. o.O?

BUT, despite the fact that I just listed a bunch of things that didn't work for me, this was a great, intense read that kept me up thinking about it several nights in a row. I wish the second section had been longer (another 500 page book, perhaps, instead of a 200 page section?) because that would have given some of the race/politics stuff room to expand and feel as thoughtful as the first section, but taken as a whole, it's still a pretty freaking impressive feat of a novel.

Matt

Way too verbose. Good ideas, but too much dry, hard sci-fi. The plot moves slowly and the characters are underdeveloped, which makes it hard to get into the book. I read 446 of 861 pages and I'm done. 

Omar Fernandez

Cal Desmond‐Pearson

Ewan

It's a tricky one to review as it really felt like a couple of separate books. I guess there are some mild spoilers, though I have seen much worse elsewhere. 

The first third started well but quickly descended into mind-numbing tedium to the point where I thought it would end up on the unfinished pile. There is such a thing as too much detail, page upon page upon page of how something worked or how they were making the "Ark". Actually it would be like reading hundreds of pages about Noah choosing specific wood for the biblical Ark, why that wood was chosen, the main properties of that wood, which nails he used, why, how they hold the wood together.

Then it all got better, much better. Part 2 was excellent, still heavy on science and detail but with a real sense of agency and for a book about the end of the world, the first time there was a feeling of jeopardy . This mid section pulled everything back and I really felt invested in these characters. 

It then seemed like Stephenson had a call from his agent telling him to hurry up as he has a lucrative deal to write the TV series "The 100". New characters are very hastily added, part 2 is wrapped up very quickly, and we move 5000 years into the future. 

We then combine "The 100" with Stephenson's new found addiction to writing pages upon pages about nanobots for the final stretch. At this point I was unsure about what, if any, comment Stephenson was trying to make about racial stereotyping, to be honest I just wanted to finish it. The whole final part felt disjointed and unconnected, despite numerous attempts to reference the "history" laid out earlier.

Less is sometimes more

Shay Henrion

Good book, but too much time spent on the present, so that the future portion felt super rushed and abrupt.

Unlike Anathem, this one drew me in right away. Unfortunately it didn't keep me. The scope and theme makes for a great story -- something happens that destroys the moon. How does humanity react? I felt like things went from entirely too optimistic, to way too pessimistic real fast. While relying on imperfect characters to move the plot along, the story leaned too much on their impact on everyone else in a way I felt didn't hold true to those people. Not as good as Anathem, but some interesting points. This book in 3 parts could easily have been 3 books. I appreciate the storytelling, and Stephenson's desire to tell an entire tale at once, but I would have preferred more "Gravity" and less a series of unfortunately decisions.

Mounir Bashour

My first Neal Stephenson book and I must say I quite enjoyed it. Its quite epic in scope and realistic in a technological way bar one major error in Part 3 which I will allow others to find for themselves. I may read more of his books, time will tell.

My favorite entry in the genre of "competency porn". 

, the chief difference being that one is a sci-fi thriller written by a scientist, the other a science book written by a writer of sci-fi thrillers. I will just say that I think Stevenson benefits from being a somewhat better scientist than Weir is a fiction writer, and leave it at that. 

Eric Jacobsen

My favorite entry in the genre of "competency porn". 

It begs comparison to Andy Weir's The Martian, the chief difference being that one is a sci-fi thriller written by a scientist, the other a science book written by a writer of sci-fi thrillers. I will just say that I think Stevenson benefits from being a somewhat better scientist than Weir is a fiction writer, and leave it at that. 

Michael W

Very much enjoyed the first 1/2-2/3. I am sympathetic to critiques that Stephenson gets bogged down in detail and technical tangents, but I found myself liking most of them. It was the too-neat ending and shameless sequel-setup of the last third where my enjoyment waned a bit. Or perhaps it was just the natural fatigue of reaching the end of a marathon...

Stephen Gill 

A book in 3 parts. Well thought out and a really good enjoyable read. The 3rd part is a related but separate novella which packs in a lot of details. The Recommended for hard SF fans. Solid 4 star.

Chris Raastad

I loved my journey listening to this Neal Stephenson gem on Audible, my first non-fiction ~read~ listen in quite some time. This reminds me how much I love science fiction. It's a captivating thriller from the first chapter up to the end of the first section of the book. I get such a good sense of the main characters, that I can feel their thoughts. This book is more so about the good, bad, and ugly of human nature than the realistic science fiction adventure of humans trying to continue civilization after a catastrophe. I couldn't put it down, listening to it on many many long walks and public transit rides in Mexico and Miami.

The second part of the book pushes a lot of people to drop this to 4 stars. All the work of the first part just kinda *poofs* into the distant future. I found it entertaining, but it was missing so much more of that character buildup and attachment that was so captivating in the first part. I was really upset that one question was not directly answered, maybe it was indirectly answered in the last 30 minutes, but still it quite pissed me off. Some may feel the book is unfinished, like Neal just decided to throw in the towel to an already 880 page book.

Still a fascinating book that sparked my imagination like nothing has in the last 10 years, for this 5 stars. I love the mention of my Alma Matter, the University of Washington. :)

Cindy Lieberman

Thought provoking? Yes. Exciting? Not so much. I am glad that I opted for the audiobook, else it might have taken me 5,000 years to wade through some of the more intricate discussions on astrophysics. The book is more a thought experiment than a novel (ok many, many thoughts). If Atlas Shrugged is about Capitalism, and Anathem is about Physics, Seveneves is about Adabtability. It's a good read if you like all the tech woven with a thin bit of plot and insubstantial characters. (I liked Anathem more.) I know he can write the characters (see Baroque Cycle), they just didn't show up in this book as vividly, and I thought the book was poorer as a result.

Seveneves

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