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Seveneves

by Neal Stephenson

Other authors: Ben Hawker (Researcher), Paul Tobin (Researcher)

Other authors: See the other authors section.

MembersReviewsPopularityAverage ratingMentions
4,4582342,335 (3.86)188
Fiction. Science Fiction. Thriller. HTML:

From the #1 New York Times bestselling author of Anathem, Reamde, and Cryptonomicon comes an exciting and thought-provoking science fiction epicâ??a grand story of annihilation and survival spanning five thousand years.

What would happen if the world were ending?

A catastrophic event renders the earth a ticking time bomb. In a feverish race against the inevitable, nations around the globe band together to devise an ambitious plan to ensure the survival of humanity far beyond our atmosphere, in outer space.

But the complexities and unpredictability of human nature coupled with unforeseen challenges and dangers threaten the intrepid pioneers, until only a handful of survivors remain . . .

Five thousand years later, their progenyâ??seven distinct races now three billion strongâ??embark on yet another audacious journey into the unknown . . . to an alien world utterly transformed by cataclysm and time: Earth.

A writer of dazzling genius and imaginative vision, Neal Stephenson combines science, philosophy, technology, psychology, and literature in a magnificent work of speculative fiction that offers a portrait of a future that is both extraordinary and eerily recognizable. As he did in Anathem, Cryptonomicon, the Baroque Cycle, and Reamde, Stephenson explores some of our biggest ideas and perplexing challenges in a breathtaking saga that is daring, engrossing, and altogether brilli… (more)

  1. 40
    Anathem by Neal Stephenson (Mind_Booster_Noori)
  2. 40
    Red Mars by Kim Stanley Robinson (psybre)
    psybre: Each book contains detailed methods and thinking that goes into solving space-colonization and space disaster issues. They also infuse the issues with politics.
  3. 20
    The Forge of God by Greg Bear (JGolomb)
    JGolomb: All life on Earth is ending, and humanity runs for the stars
  4. 20
    The Martian by Andy Weir (hoddybook)
    hoddybook: Engineering solutions in stressful conditions.
  5. 10
    Reamde by Neal Stephenson (bookfitz)
  6. 00
    The Calculating Stars by Mary Robinette Kowal (g33kgrrl)
    g33kgrrl: When disaster hits and earth becomes uninhabitable, what happens next? Kowal's book is set in the 1950s, but should still satisfy the same itch that Seveneves does.
  7. 00
    Lucifer's Hammer by Larry Niven (Cecrow)
  8. 00
    Macrolife: A Mobile Utopia by George Zebrowski (tetrachromat)
  9. 11
    Schismatrix Plus by Bruce Sterling (szarka)
    szarka: Seveneves and Sterling's Shapers-Mechanists stories are both concerned with what happens to humanity over long spans of time.
  10. 22
    Ringworld by Larry Niven (JGolomb)
  11. 12
    Aurora by Kim Stanley Robinson (JGolomb)
    JGolomb: Earth looks to space to save humankind. Seveneves is much better.
  12. 02
    The Shallows: What the Internet Is Doing to Our Brains by Nicholas Carr (themulhern)
    themulhern: Both books are about social media and connectedness turning people into bad decision makers.
  13. 03
    The Foundation Trilogy by Isaac Asimov (BeckyJG)
    BeckyJG: Both are narratives with a big, optimistic vision of the future of humanity.
  14. 012
    The Hobbit / The Lord of the Rings by J. R. R. Tolkien (JGolomb)
    JGolomb: While not fantasy, Stephenson's work does an amazing job of building Middle-Earth-like mythology.
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» See also 188 mentions

English (231)  German (2)  French (1)  Finnish (1)  Danish (1)  All languages (236)
Showing 1-5 of 231 (next | show all)
Excellent Sci-Fi. Very good first 2/3rds, uncharacteristically (for the author) mediocre the last 1/3rd though.


I felt like the author neglected the psychological impact of living in space for years, though, along with the destruction of planet Earth. I think he kind of glazed over that.
( )
  pspringmeyer | May 28, 2023 |
447 ( )
  freixas | Mar 31, 2023 |
I feel like the 4 stars I rated this is misleading.

If you take the book in the 2 halves in which it's written, the first half easily deserves 5 stars. And the second half maybe 3.

Again, Stephenson writes us a world with rich characters, a fantastic eye for technical detail and a clear love of language. His imagination is staggering in breadth.

But the ending. MY GOD, MAN. THE ENDING. Neal. Mr. Stephenson. Sir. PLEASE. Stop doing this to us. Stop building beautiful worlds with fantastic characters we're bound to love and then just dropping the whole thing on its head in 30 pages to finish the damn thing. Please. If it will help, I'll contact your publisher and beg for the extension myself.

I was so happy (SO HAPPY) when the first half had an actual resolution. Everything was followed through. Loose ends were tied, plots were resolved. It was beautiful. And then there was the second half. Which needed another 400 or 500 pages and as much love lavished on it as the first half had. This book could easily have been a duology or better yet a trilogy with a whole section still to come.

But it's not there. The second half of this book is a chapter. It's a chapter that's several hundred pages long, and will leave you wanting another third of a book you're never going to get.

Read the first half. Leave yourself some time to curl up and really savor it.

And then pound some caffeine and chug through the second half as fast as you can, because that's all it deserves, and more time than you'll want to spend on it. Which is a real shame, because there was a character there I really wanted to have time to like. And if the second half had been written half as carefully as the first half, there would have been several more. ( )
  nightlyfe | Feb 27, 2023 |
I really loved the story, but if it would have been less 'wordy' I would have loved the book. Maybe that sounds crude. Oh well. ( )
  misterysun | Feb 27, 2023 |
Showing 1-5 of 231 (next | show all)
"Seveneves" is as hard as "hard science fiction" gets: cool bits of science and speculation about the future of technology, space and culture, with a plot and dialogue bolted on to make it more enjoyable to follow. That said, Stephenson's speculation is fascinating. He's got a lot to say about the physics of whips, glider transportation, military robotics, and everything else that can be crammed into his premise.
 
"None of this makes Seveneves the kind of hard SF in which you see a writer dutifully populating his universe with characters who have feelings even though you can tell he just wants to write about giant space gadgets. Stephenson’s people are vivid and terrified: they bicker and cry and perform heroic deeds."
added by bookfitz | editThe Guardian, Steven Poole (May 13, 2015)
 
"No slim fables or nerdy novellas for Stephenson (Anathem, 2008, etc.): his visions are epic, and he requires whole worlds—and, in this case, solar systems—to accommodate them."
added by bookfitz | editKirkus Reviews (Mar 15, 2015)
 
"Stephenson’s remarkable novel is deceptively complex, a disaster story and transhumanism tale that serves as the delivery mechanism for a series of technical and sociological visions."
added by bookfitz | editPublishers Weekly (Mar 9, 2015)
 

» Add other authors (3 possible)

Author nameRoleType of authorWork?Status
Stephenson, Nealprimary authorall editionsconfirmed
Hawker, BenResearchersecondary authorall editionsconfirmed
Tobin, PaulResearchersecondary authorall editionsconfirmed
Brooke, PeterNarratorsecondary authorsome editionsconfirmed
Damron, WillNarratorsecondary authorsome editionsconfirmed
Galamb, ZoltĂĄnTranslatorsecondary authorsome editionsconfirmed
Gräbener-Mßller, JulianeTranslatorsecondary authorsome editionsconfirmed
Johnson, AdamCover designersecondary authorsome editionsconfirmed
Knowles, JonathanCover artistsecondary authorsome editionsconfirmed
Kowal, Mary RobinetteNarratorsecondary authorsome editionsconfirmed
Pearce, ChristianIllustratorsecondary authorsome editionsconfirmed
Romero, Pedro JorgeTranslatorsecondary authorsome editionsconfirmed
Stingl, NikolausTranslatorsecondary authorsome editionsconfirmed
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Epigraph
Dedication
To Jaime, Maria, Marco, and Jeff
First words
The moon blew up without warning and for no apparent reason. The time was 05:03:12 UTC. Later it would be designated A+0.0.0, or simply Zero.
Quotations
But Henry wasn't a parent, and he didn't understand that when you were, almost nothing was more satisfying than seeing your kid sleep.
She then called a meeting of the entire human race: Dinah, Ivy, Moira, Tekla, Julia, AĂŻda, Camila, and Luisa.
Smiling, AĂŻda thrust her hand out, thumb down.
“I pronounce a curse,” she said. Luisa let out an exasperated sigh. “This is not a curse that I create. It is not a curse on your children. No. I have never been as bad as you all think that I am. This is a curse that you have created, by doing this thing that you are about to do. And it is a curse upon my children. Because I know. I see how it is to be. I am the evil one. The cannibal. The one who would not go along. My children, no matter what decision I make, will forever be different from your children. Because make no mistake. What you have decided to do is to create new races. Seven new races. They will be separate and distinct forever, as much as you, Moira, are from Ivy. They will never merge into a single human race again, because that is not the way of humanity. Thousands of years from now, the descendants of you six will look at my descendants and say, ‘Ah, look, there is a child of Aïda, the cannibal, the evil one, the cursed one.’ They will cross the street to avoid my children; they will spit on the ground. This is the thing that you have done by making this decision. I will shape my child—my children, for I shall have many—to bear up under this curse. To survive it. And to prevail.” Aïda swept her gaze around the room, staring with her deep black eyes into the face of each of the other women in turn, then looked into the window and locked eyes with Dinah.
“I pronounce it,” she said, then slowly rotated her hand until her thumb was pointed up.
Last words
(Click to show. Warning: May contain spoilers.)
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Wikipedia in English (4)

Fiction. Science Fiction. Thriller. HTML:

From the #1 New York Times bestselling author of Anathem, Reamde, and Cryptonomicon comes an exciting and thought-provoking science fiction epicâ??a grand story of annihilation and survival spanning five thousand years.

What would happen if the world were ending?

A catastrophic event renders the earth a ticking time bomb. In a feverish race against the inevitable, nations around the globe band together to devise an ambitious plan to ensure the survival of humanity far beyond our atmosphere, in outer space.

But the complexities and unpredictability of human nature coupled with unforeseen challenges and dangers threaten the intrepid pioneers, until only a handful of survivors remain . . .

Five thousand years later, their progenyâ??seven distinct races now three billion strongâ??embark on yet another audacious journey into the unknown . . . to an alien world utterly transformed by cataclysm and time: Earth.

A writer of dazzling genius and imaginative vision, Neal Stephenson combines science, philosophy, technology, psychology, and literature in a magnificent work of speculative fiction that offers a portrait of a future that is both extraordinary and eerily recognizable. As he did in Anathem, Cryptonomicon, the Baroque Cycle, and Reamde, Stephenson explores some of our biggest ideas and perplexing challenges in a breathtaking saga that is daring, engrossing, and altogether brilli

No library descriptions found.

Book description
An exciting and thought-provoking science fiction epic—a grand story of annihilation and survival spanning five thousand years.

What would happen if the world were ending?

A catastrophic event renders the earth a ticking time bomb. In a feverish race against the inevitable, nations around the globe band together to devise an ambitious plan to ensure the survival of humanity far beyond our atmosphere, in outer space.

But the complexities and unpredictability of human nature coupled with unforeseen challenges and dangers threaten the intrepid pioneers, until only a handful of survivors remain . . .

Five thousand years later, their progeny—seven distinct races now three billion strong—embark on yet another audacious journey into the unknown . . . to an alien world utterly transformed by cataclysm and time: Earth.
Haiku summary
Moon in seven parts
Destroys all life on the Earth
But man will survive

A seven-piece moon
A bombardment of the Earth
Humans must survive

The Moon is destroyed
Humans escape to cold Space
From Seven, many
(T4NK)

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