featherynscale (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
featherynscale) wrote2005-02-23 02:38 pm
featherynscale) wrote2005-02-23 02:38 pm
Entry tags:
Book Report
I'm currently reading Quicksilver, by Neal Stephenson, whose Cryptonomicon I have not read, even though it's been recommended to me frequently.
Quicksilver is set in the late 17th century and possibly somewhere amidst the 18th century and operates in flashback mode more often than not. It's a book about.... well. That's just it. I'm more than 100 pages in, and I still don't know what it's about. I'm pretty sure who it's about -- Daniel Waterhouse, who is possibly a character in Cryptonomicon, Isaac Newton, Ben Franklin, and a cast of other Historical Personages -- but I'm not at all sure what it's about. Certainly, a number of interesting things have happened so far, but nothing that threatens to develop into any sort of a plot. It's not entirely unlike the sort of film that features a group of women, their evolving friendships, and mundane events that befall them in a sort of undirected manner. Like Steel Magnolias, only with scientifically-minded (but naive) English men, instead of scatter-brained (but emotionally resilient) Southern women. The change in cast type doesn't improve the genre.
I've always been sort of ignorant and low-brow, in that I vastly prefer plot-driven fiction to character-driven fiction. Therefore, if something doesn't pick up soon, I'm pitching the thousand-page monster.
Quicksilver is set in the late 17th century and possibly somewhere amidst the 18th century and operates in flashback mode more often than not. It's a book about.... well. That's just it. I'm more than 100 pages in, and I still don't know what it's about. I'm pretty sure who it's about -- Daniel Waterhouse, who is possibly a character in Cryptonomicon, Isaac Newton, Ben Franklin, and a cast of other Historical Personages -- but I'm not at all sure what it's about. Certainly, a number of interesting things have happened so far, but nothing that threatens to develop into any sort of a plot. It's not entirely unlike the sort of film that features a group of women, their evolving friendships, and mundane events that befall them in a sort of undirected manner. Like Steel Magnolias, only with scientifically-minded (but naive) English men, instead of scatter-brained (but emotionally resilient) Southern women. The change in cast type doesn't improve the genre.
I've always been sort of ignorant and low-brow, in that I vastly prefer plot-driven fiction to character-driven fiction. Therefore, if something doesn't pick up soon, I'm pitching the thousand-page monster.
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Hey, if it ain't a good story it's too much like being back in grad school. I'm all about entertainment these days.
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But I mustn't continue talking about stroking to you, lest my outside typing say more than would be prudent ... ;-)
Waterhouse
Stephenson does do plot, but he takes forever to do it. Partly because he likes sidetracks, partly because he likes lots of description, and partly because he likes to make things complicated. I don't think he's either character-driven or plot-driven though; I think his books are driven by "what super-geeky-cool thing comes next", and when that overwhelms both plot and character it gets tiring even for geeks.
Re: Waterhouse
Hrm.