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serty406's review
adventurous
dark
reflective
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
3.25
misterjay's review
5.0
An examination of the events leading up to, during, and after a technological singularity that transforms the human race, as told through the eyes of three generations of the same family, Accelerando is the rare book that left me sighing and thumbing back through the book, looking for things I had missed.
In part, that was due to the density of the book. High level programming and mathematical concepts are thrown at the reader from all directions and, largely, left for the reader to absorb on their own. Additionally, things move fast, through a half dozen viewpoints that may all, eventually, end up being the same point of view.
However, the main reason I went back through the book is that I just didn't want it to be over. I was not done with the characters and I wanted to read more about their lives and about the ways they coped with the transformation of the solar system and of themselves. I'm not sure I can praise a book more highly than that.
In part, that was due to the density of the book. High level programming and mathematical concepts are thrown at the reader from all directions and, largely, left for the reader to absorb on their own. Additionally, things move fast, through a half dozen viewpoints that may all, eventually, end up being the same point of view.
However, the main reason I went back through the book is that I just didn't want it to be over. I was not done with the characters and I wanted to read more about their lives and about the ways they coped with the transformation of the solar system and of themselves. I'm not sure I can praise a book more highly than that.
minn3h's review
3.0
The journey beyond the post-human is much less interesting than the journey there in the first place.
davidsteinsaltz's review
4.0
Makes a real effort at juggling all possible implications of effectively infinite computation. What happens to the human personality when individuals can be copied and recombined? Along with many other philosophical games.
peterpeter667's review
4.0
Bij tijd en wijle slecht geschreven, maar de gepresenteerde ideeën zijn zeer indrukwekkend.
rocketiza's review
1.0
Reading this book was like being at a concert right next to the speaker where the music is poorly mixed and way too loud. You keep thinking you hear a song you know and like somewhere, but end up hating it in the end anyways because everything is shrieking at you.
adamchalmers's review
4.0
I read this in high school and liked it, but a lot went over my head. Reread it at the end of my degree, and oh boy do I like it a lot more now.
A lot of the plot points revolve around stuff I'm only just starting to see discussed in my little corner of the SSC/LW/MIRI/CFAR-sphere: autonomous corporations, ascended economies, the Moloch-style race-to-the-bottom which ends in removing the consciousness of ems, etc. If you've read Slate Star Codex or Overcoming Bias or Less Wrong, you'll probably love the ideas in this book.
This book starts off with a call from uploaded KGB lobster AIs and only gets crazier from there. Every third sentence seems to have an idea that could take a whole novel to unpack. Reading this feels like injecting future shock straight into my neocortex.
Would recommend.
A lot of the plot points revolve around stuff I'm only just starting to see discussed in my little corner of the SSC/LW/MIRI/CFAR-sphere: autonomous corporations, ascended economies, the Moloch-style race-to-the-bottom which ends in removing the consciousness of ems, etc. If you've read Slate Star Codex or Overcoming Bias or Less Wrong, you'll probably love the ideas in this book.
This book starts off with a call from uploaded KGB lobster AIs and only gets crazier from there. Every third sentence seems to have an idea that could take a whole novel to unpack. Reading this feels like injecting future shock straight into my neocortex.
Would recommend.
lunaseassecondaccount's review against another edition
4.0
Okay.
Okay, okay, uh, geeze.
Firstly, I have to say that if I was rating this primarily on how much I liked or enjoyed this book, I would not give it four stars. If I was rating it on how much I enjoyed it, I'd give it two stars. If I was rating it on how much I understood it, I'd give it one star. I am way out of my depth with this book. I don't get hard sci-fi novels. I like TV shows, movies, comics and the like, and I like soft sci-fi novels, but I don't enjoy hard ones. This is hard sci-fi. This is also a business and ethics novel. And half of it just went over my head. Strike that, most of it went over my head. It wasn't until I checked out the Wikipedia page for Accelerando while I was on the fifth 'chapter' that I finally realised that people were only avatars of themselves. Nobody was essentially real anymore.
This is very different from the first novel of Stross' I read, The Atrocity Archives. The style of writing is very different, the ideas are different, and if I didn't know the authors were the same, I'd say they were written by different people.
I enjoyed parts of this book. I liked the interaction between Amber and Pierre and Sadeq. I liked the constant mentioning of the lobsters. I liked Aineko when I could make sense about what s/he was going on about. I liked Pamela and Manfred's kinky relationship (and how it's referred to at the end of Manfred asking Pamela to become his mistress again). I guess I sort of enjoyed how it turned out and was confirmed that Aineko had been manipulating them from the start.
But essentially, I didn't get most of it. It was difficult for me to understand. The concepts went over my head. But I can see why it works, and why it was nominated for awards, because it is a good novel. It's just not what I understand. But it is worth my vote for four stars.
Okay, okay, uh, geeze.
Firstly, I have to say that if I was rating this primarily on how much I liked or enjoyed this book, I would not give it four stars. If I was rating it on how much I enjoyed it, I'd give it two stars. If I was rating it on how much I understood it, I'd give it one star. I am way out of my depth with this book. I don't get hard sci-fi novels. I like TV shows, movies, comics and the like, and I like soft sci-fi novels, but I don't enjoy hard ones. This is hard sci-fi. This is also a business and ethics novel. And half of it just went over my head. Strike that, most of it went over my head. It wasn't until I checked out the Wikipedia page for Accelerando while I was on the fifth 'chapter' that I finally realised that people were only avatars of themselves. Nobody was essentially real anymore.
This is very different from the first novel of Stross' I read, The Atrocity Archives. The style of writing is very different, the ideas are different, and if I didn't know the authors were the same, I'd say they were written by different people.
I enjoyed parts of this book. I liked the interaction between Amber and Pierre and Sadeq. I liked the constant mentioning of the lobsters. I liked Aineko when I could make sense about what s/he was going on about. I liked Pamela and Manfred's kinky relationship (and how it's referred to at the end of Manfred asking Pamela to become his mistress again). I guess I sort of enjoyed how it turned out and was confirmed that Aineko had been manipulating them from the start.
But essentially, I didn't get most of it. It was difficult for me to understand. The concepts went over my head. But I can see why it works, and why it was nominated for awards, because it is a good novel. It's just not what I understand. But it is worth my vote for four stars.
rohand0's review
3.0
I really hate the beginning of this book, the author tries to string together tons of technology together in ways that 1) don't make sense. The best description I can say is that he is someone who reads slashdot or technology but doesn't understand it so he just kind of combines elements together into his vision.
BUT once you get into the future where the world is allowed to set up it's own rules instead of being extended rules on our current world then the book gets great! The entire half of the book about his daughter is far better than the story about the beginner character.
BUT once you get into the future where the world is allowed to set up it's own rules instead of being extended rules on our current world then the book gets great! The entire half of the book about his daughter is far better than the story about the beginner character.