Glasshouse | ||||||||
Charles Stross | ||||||||
Ace, 335 pages | ||||||||
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A review by Peter D. Tillman
Robin has hot monkey-love with skull-clad Kay. Then they both sign up for an experimental historical-roleplaying project,
which has the stated objective of recreating one of the historic Dark Ages, c.1950-2040 AD. You won't be surprised
to hear that (cue ominous music) things are not as they seem. A twisty, engrossing and very well-done paranoia-thriller ensues.
It's the 27th century. People have moved to space, in habitats around brown-dwarf stars, linked by instantaneous
T-gate wormholes. Their health, wealth and daily sundries are supplied by A-gates, nanotech assemblers that can store,
edit and recreate most anything, including the posthumans. But the security on the gate network, well, wasn't very secure...
I had a whole lot of fun reading Glasshouse, which is a spicy blend of bleeding-edge SF extrapolation, cool,
complex characters, an amazing number of plot-twists, and wonderful storytelling. This is a mature work, with the author
in full control of his tools. The book has the feel of Robert A. Heinlein at his best: a matter-of-fact recounting of
daily life in a far-future world that has taken some very strange turns....
And some familiar ones, like that ole deviant-replicant problem:
"Killing myself always makes me feel like shit..."1
Stross's energy and imagination never flag, and the book comes to a satisfying (if a bit formulaic) conclusion. Look
for it on next year's award-ballots. Highly recommended.
Pete Tillman has been reading SF for better than 40 years now. He reviews SF -- and other books -- for Amazon, Infinity-Plus, SF Site, and others. He's a mineral exploration geologist based in Arizona. Google "Peter D. Tillman" +review for many more of Pete's reviews. |
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