Science Fiction for Those Who Don't Read It, Part 3

Hello book lovers:
I don't know about all of you, but lately my life has been HECTIC. Which is why it's been awhile since I've had a chance to push science fiction books on the unsuspecting public. That's right I'm actually telling people to read sci-fi. So here it goes, if you don't read sci-fi you should read Neal Stephenson. Well not just anything by him, but some of his stuff is good for those not inclined to read sci-fi. I think his works will always be classified as sci-fi partly because of the success of Snow Crash and Diamond Age, both fantastically good novels heavily steeped in sci-fi themes. In fact if you LIKE sci-fi and haven't read both those books, go out and get them ASAP.
There are two of his books that I would like to recommend today, Cryptonomicon and Anathem. Cryptonomicon is a novel that has two story lines running through it. One is in the South Pacific during the end of WWII, following a group of POWs being held by the Japanese and forced to build secret tunnels to hide their gold before retreating from advancing Allied forces. The other story line is during present day and follows a group of fortune hunters looking for this gold. There aren't really any major sci-fi themes in this work. Cryptology and computing is as 'sci-fi' as it gets, and I think those are themes that are important to us all, even if we don't realize it. One of the most interesting themes is the idea of privacy rights and distribution and protection of information.
Anathem(just released in paperback!) is a story about a group of monastic scholars who have sequestered themselves from the rest of the world as a repository of knowledge and learning. Then a threat to their entire world draws the scholars out from behind their walls as they help deal with it. I don't want to give away what the threat is as the characters don't know at first either and Stephenson is masterful at revealing things to the characters and reader at the same time. I will say that this book is one of the most thought-provoking books I've read in years, more so than many philosophy texts I read in college, while being exciting at the same time. This one has a bit more in the way of sci-fi themes but not to the extent that it should distract anyone. The themes used compliment the ideas in the story instead of substituting as the ideas themselves.
Both these books are long but Stephenson ambitiously and successfully tackles big ideas with some of the best character development of anyone writing fiction these days, and he's FUN. He is easily one of my top ten favorite authors and deserves a wide readership, even more so than the group of devoted fans he already has.

Listen to an interview with Neal Stephenson talking about Anathem by clicking here.

And to listen to a podcast of the author's November visit to the Tattered Cover by clicking here.

Until next time,
Chuck