Hide this

Results from Google Books

Click on a thumbnail to go to Google Books.

Halting State by Charles Stross
Loading...

Halting State

by Charles Stross

MembersReviewsPopularityAverage ratingConversations
943504,220 (3.86)45
Loading...
won't like will probably not like will probably like will like will love

Sign up for LibraryThing to find out whether you'll like this book.

Showing 1-5 of 50 (next | show all)
While I love the near-future setting and the overly monitored world, I'm a little put off by the second-person narrative. While it ties in neatly with the MMOPRG suject matter, it is kind of jarring and gimmicky to read. ( )
1 vote flemmily | Sep 27, 2009 |
The latest in my light summer reading series is a cyberpunk novel. You will note the cool, trendy, inappropriate capitalization in the title. It has a blurb from William Gibson on the cover. William Gibson is the Pete Seeger of cyberpunk. All the cyberpunks go to him for his blessing, just like the folkies get their records blessed by Pete.

Halting State is a near-future novel. One in which, not surprisingly, the internet has penetrated every facet of people's lives. It starts with a virtual reality bank robbery committed by a bunch of orcs and a dragon. The poor non-gaming cop, in Edinburgh, Scotland of all places, who takes the call, is nonplussed, even though she wears he interfacing glasses and operates in "cop space" all the time. Everyone wears these glasses that give them access to GPS, their address book, email, virual reality games, etc. through their web 3.whatever mobile phones. Cops have their own channel which gives personal information, including rap sheets, of everyone everywhere.



There is a bit of fantasy roll playing, some techophiliac nerdlings, a bit of international intrigue, some cyber crime, quite a lot of action and violence, a touch of love, a bit of implied sex, tastefully handled in a 1940 Hollywood sort of way, something for everyone. I particularly liked the way people were slightly disoriented when the net went down and they didn't have their GPS stream telling them were they were. Just think 20 years ago people could find the bus stop on their own.

I'll Never Forget The Day I Read A Book!
  cbjorke | Sep 10, 2009 |
The novel follows three characters Sue, of the Edinburgh constabulary, Jack, who knits and programmes and, Elaine, forensic accountant and - in her spare time - a medieval swords person. The viewpoint is switched to tell the story from the three perspectives. I tried to race through Sue's because her story was much less interwoven with the other two.

What was really clever though is that it is written in third person. It gives a great effect of throwing you in the story and getting you emotionally involved without giving the game away. After all you assume you knows all about it while I may want to give subtle hints or tell you outright. This way the surprises stay surprises.

The plot moves on from robbery in an online game through industrial sabotage and international espionage the plot becomes a little hard to follow in the last twenty pages or so. The race for 'The End' is fast paced and in that it looses something.

Halting State is, however, a fantastic, realistic near future bit of SF. It gets extra bonus points for having characters instead of caricatures and someone who knits.

Edited from a ramble on my blog; http://solongas.blogspot.com/2009/09/... ( )
  Staramber | Sep 10, 2009 |
Showing 1-5 of 50 (next | show all)
no reviews | add a review
You must log in to edit Common Knowledge data.
For more help see the Common Knowledge help page.
Series (with order)
Canonical Title
Original publication date
People/Characters
Important places
Important events
Awards and honors
Epigraph
Dedication
In memory of Datacash Ltd. and all who sailed in her, 1997-2000
Books do not get written in majestic isolation, and this one is no exception. Certainly it wouldn't exist in its current form without valuable feedback from a host of readers. I'd particularly like to thank Vernor Vinge, Hugh Hancock, Greg Costikyan, Ron Avitzur, Eric Raymond, Tony Quirke, Robert Sneddon, Paul Friday, Dave Bush, Alexander Chane Austin, Larry Colen, Harry Payne, Trey Palmer, Dave Clements, Andrew Veitch, Hannu Rajaniemi, Soon Lee, and Jarrod Russell. I'd also like to thank my other test readers, too numerous to thank today. Finally, thanks to the publishing folks without whom the book wouldn't have been written: my agent, Caitlin Blasdell, my editor at Ace, Ginjer Buchanan, and my copyeditors, Bob and Sara Schwager.
Vernor Vinge
Hugh Hancock
Greg Costikyan
First words
Hello. We're Round Peg/Round Hole Recruitment. We want to offer you a job on behalf of one of our clients.
Quotations
You're a grown-up, these days. You don't wear a kamikaze pilot's rising sun headband and a tee-shirt that screams DEBUG THIS! and you don't spend your weekends competing in extreme programming slams at a windy campsite near Frankfurt, but it's generally difficult for you to use any machine that doesn't have at least one compiler installed: In fact, you had to stick Python on your phone before you even opened its address book because not being able to brainwash it left you feeling handicapped, like you were a passenger instead of a pilot. In another age you would have been a railway mechanic or a grease monkey crawling over the spark plugs of a DC-3. This is what you are, and the sad fact is, they can put the code monkey in a suit but they can't take the code out of the monkey.
Last words
(Click to show. Warning: May contain spoilers.)
(Click to show. Warning: May contain spoilers.)
Disambiguation notice
Publisher's editors
Blurbers
Canonical titleHalting State
Original publication date2007-10-02
People/CharactersNigel MacDonald, Sue Smith, Elaine Barnaby, Jack Reed, Marcus Hackman, Barry Michaels (show all 7)
Important placesEdinburgh, Scotland, UK, Glasgow, Scotland, UK, Ankh-Morpork, Discworld
Awards and honorsHugo Nominee (Novel, 2008), Locus Award Finalist (Science Fiction Novel, 2008)
DedicationIn memory of Datacash Ltd. and all who sailed in her, 1997-2000, Books do not get written in majestic isolation, and this one is no exception. Certainly it wouldn't exist in its current form without valuable feedback from a host of readers. I'd particularly like to thank Vernor Vinge, Hugh... (show all)
First wordsHello. We're Round Peg/Round Hole Recruitment. We want to offer you a job on behalf of one of our clients.
QuotationsYou're a grown-up, these days. You don't wear a kamikaze pilot's rising sun headband and a tee-shirt that screams DEBUG THIS! and you don't spend your weekends competing in extreme programming slams at a windy campsite near ... (show all)
Last words(Click to show. Warning: May contain spoilers.)
BlurbersVinge, Vernor, Carmack, John, Koster, Raph, Gibson, William, Dozois, Gardner, Schneier, Bruce
Book description

Amazon.com Product Description (ISBN 0441014984, Hardcover)

In the year 2018, Sergeant Sue Smith of the Edinburgh constabulary is called in on a special case. A daring bank robbery has taken place at Hayek Associates, a dot-com startup company that's just been floated on the London stock exchange. The suspects are a band of marauding orcs, with a dragon in tow for fire support, and the bank is located within the virtual reality land of Avalon Four. For Smith, the investigation seems pointless. But she soon realizes that the virtual world may have a devastating effect in the real one-and that someone is about to launch an attack upon both...

(retrieved from Amazon Fri, 24 Apr 2009 07:58:02 -0400)

(see all 2 descriptions)

The first test round has been closed. Visit the Open Shelves Classification group for details.

Popular covers

 

Help/FAQs | About | Privacy/Terms | Blog | Contact | LibraryThing.com | APIs | WikiThing | Common Knowledge | 45,442,607 books!