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[dougo]

I've been reading William Gibson's latest novel, Pattern Recognition, and really enjoying it; it's his first book set in the present day (2002), and not really science fiction at all, though it's told like sf. Well, I just ran across a site with pictures of locations mentioned in the book, which is a great idea for adding visuals to the experience. Check it out if you've read the book (or are in the middle of it like me).

Update: I forgot to mention, I also found a site about Curta calculators, which are also mentioned in the book. I looked this up after a discussion tonight about Enigma machines, and that's how I thought to look up other things from the book.

Comments

[jfb.livejournal.com]

I think that's my favorite Gibson book.

[dougo.livejournal.com]

Mine too, so far, though I was underwhelmed by Neuromancer and the others I've read have all been very-good-but-not-great. One of the things that always bugged me about his books is the vagueness of the technology—too much handwaving and impressionistic writing—but here he can use real items to avoid that problem. I don't know whether he decided to scale back his ambitions or whether he just realized that the technology had caught up to the stories he wanted to tell. Anyway, so far it's working great, but I'll wait to see if the ending pays off on all the cool (and disturbing, and sad) things being built up along the way.

[jfb.livejournal.com]

Well, we're coming from different places, then--he's one of the only authors whose every book I look forward to. I like the handwaving impressionism, I guess. And I don't mind his, I have to admit, usually weak endings. I think for the most part by the time I get to the end of a book I've already decided whether I like it, so it takes a really dramatically wrongheaded ending to disappoint me.

My impression is that since Neuromancer he's been gradually working his way back to the present, and Pattern Recognition is just the inevitable denouement. I'm not sure, though.

[ahkond.livejournal.com]

I started Thomas Pynchon's Vineland while I was still at UCLA, and a lot of the early action takes place in or around Westwood, the residential neighborhood next door, where I lived. He occasionally mentioned specific locations I knew well, like the Federal Building (where the Post Office was) or Tommy's burgers.

It was made even more interesting by the fact that Pynchon is such an enigma. It made me feel odd to think "maybe Pynchon walked on this sidewalk in the past couple of years."

I never finished the book, though.