Detective Inspector Liz Kavanaugh is head of the Rule 34 Squad, monitoring the Internet to determine whether people are engaging in harmless fantas...
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Feb 15, 2012
David
rated it: 
The second Liz Kavanaugh book is a loose sequel to Halting State. Just like Halting State, Rule 34 is written entirely in a shifting perspective, second person present tense. This makes it hard to really connect to them, but Rule 34 is mostly about its world-building, ideas and technology.
DI Liz Kavanaugh: You realise policing internet porn is your life and your career went down the pan five years ago. But when a fetishist dies on your watch, the Rule 34 Squad moves from low priorityMore...
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Feb 20, 2012
Alan
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All right (not "alright," dagnabbit—I don't think I'm ever going to get used to that one). Let's get it out of the way. If you don't already know, you need to: Rule 34 is the made-up maxim that states "if you can think of it, there's at least one porn site on the Internet about it." Or words to that effect. Its wording is variable and its provenance is murky. But in any case, what Rule 34 is here is the basis for a near-future police procedural novel set in Edinburgh and feat
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Feb 07, 2012
KG
rated it: 
Ehhh, I was pretty much underwhelmed! It was NOT (by a longshot) as dynamic as I expected it to be...based on the title. I guess I just had higher expectations for the level of oddity (which was minimal) in a book with this title. As a result, it had quite a few things that just didn't work...for me.
First - the thick, heavy Scottish brogue - which was used, almost exclusely during only the first several dozen pages of the book - was off-putting, and almost unintelligible (ok More...
First - the thick, heavy Scottish brogue - which was used, almost exclusely during only the first several dozen pages of the book - was off-putting, and almost unintelligible (ok More...
Dec 05, 2011
Libby
rated it: 
Charles Stross envisions a not too distant future in which our social networks, our data sources and our use of an increasingly complex internet have created a rather grungy dystopia. The story is narrated by several viewpoint characters, but Detective Liz Kavanagh is perhaps the most important. The story begins when Liz is called to the scene of a truly nasty, kinky death. The victim is strapped up in leather and attached to an electric colonic irrigation machine. The victim is already known to
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Oct 25, 2011
M
rated it: 
Stross is a visionary
and his books often just make you just stunned because you can not grasp the ideas he is coming up with...
I think Accelerando, Glasshouse and Saturns Children belong amonst the most ambitions must reads written in recent times. So the man has somethign of a Genious.
But I also think he is not necessarily a Poet.
I feel quite often does he struggle with plot (in most books actually) - it feels as if he has ideas for world building and details, but not f More...
and his books often just make you just stunned because you can not grasp the ideas he is coming up with...
I think Accelerando, Glasshouse and Saturns Children belong amonst the most ambitions must reads written in recent times. So the man has somethign of a Genious.
But I also think he is not necessarily a Poet.
I feel quite often does he struggle with plot (in most books actually) - it feels as if he has ideas for world building and details, but not f More...
Jul 31, 2011
Tim
rated it: 
It's near future Edinburgh, Scotland and DI Liz Cavanaugh is in charge of a special computer-crimes unit that tries to sniff out illegal Internet crime before it can get a foothold. Meanwhile, Anwar Hussein, recently out of prison for computer related crime, is recruited to run the Scottish embassy of a previously unknown central Asian republic. Charles Stross, one of the premier science fiction authors in the genre ties all of these threads and many more involving rouge artificial intelligence,
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Jul 24, 2011
Laura
rated it:
“I didna want to spread this’un around, skipper, but it’s a two-wetsuit job. I don’ like to bug you, but I need a second opinion.”
“Wow, that’s something out of the ordinary. A two-wetsuit job means kinky beyond the call of duty.” (4).
And so Detective Liz Kavanaugh begins investigating a wave of murders that involve repurposed house hold appliances and criminals, seemingly petty and not, worldwide. She’s assigned to the Rule 34 squad, specializing in meme-crime – memes that may More...
“Wow, that’s something out of the ordinary. A two-wetsuit job means kinky beyond the call of duty.” (4).
And so Detective Liz Kavanaugh begins investigating a wave of murders that involve repurposed house hold appliances and criminals, seemingly petty and not, worldwide. She’s assigned to the Rule 34 squad, specializing in meme-crime – memes that may More...
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Jul 20, 2011
Michael
rated it:
Stross is back in form with the sequel to Halting State, a grimly humorous cyberpunk police procedural set in Tomorrow's Scotland, where nobody knows what an honest job is anymore, and household appliances are murdering spammers.
I won't spoil the book, but Stross is at his best when he takes Big Ideas, twists them upside down, and shows you how they could happen. In Rule 34, he on the relationship between the police state and the Panopticon, and how at the end of the day, our system o More...
I won't spoil the book, but Stross is at his best when he takes Big Ideas, twists them upside down, and shows you how they could happen. In Rule 34, he on the relationship between the police state and the Panopticon, and how at the end of the day, our system o More...
Jul 08, 2011
Jon
rated it:
Rule 34
Stross is one of my favorite authors. Saturn's Children was a good read, and Halting State was flat out brilliant. Rule 34 is even better.
Each chapter takes the second person viewpoint of a different character, and is told in the second person. This is an uncommon approach, but Stross pulls it off and after the first few chapters it seems natural.
Each character appears unrelated at the start and their actions gradually start to affect each other. Each sees More...
Stross is one of my favorite authors. Saturn's Children was a good read, and Halting State was flat out brilliant. Rule 34 is even better.
Each chapter takes the second person viewpoint of a different character, and is told in the second person. This is an uncommon approach, but Stross pulls it off and after the first few chapters it seems natural.
Each character appears unrelated at the start and their actions gradually start to affect each other. Each sees More...
Jul 08, 2011
Chris
rated it:
There are writers who can world build, and there are writers who build worlds. Stross is one of the latter, a writer who can build a world full of characters, places, and ideas. A writer who can then present said world to the reader without an overload of information, and just a pinch of theater.
His newest book, Rule 34 is no exception. For the short review, I can say that the book itself is very well crafted piece, and a very thoroughly enjoyable read.
Set in the same mi More...
His newest book, Rule 34 is no exception. For the short review, I can say that the book itself is very well crafted piece, and a very thoroughly enjoyable read.
Set in the same mi More...
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Jul 06, 2011
John Carter
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Stross's weakest work in a long time. Sequel to the brilliant _Halting State_, this lacks the unleashed imagination, the gleeful sense of wonder, however twisted, that make reading Stross so much fun.
It's written in a nearly impenetrable mix of Scottish dialect and internet meme-speak: I found myself wanting to turn on subtitles, or read the wikified version.
I have to wonder if the future has just become tedious and pedestrian since 2007, or if Stross has just gotten bored. More...
It's written in a nearly impenetrable mix of Scottish dialect and internet meme-speak: I found myself wanting to turn on subtitles, or read the wikified version.
I have to wonder if the future has just become tedious and pedestrian since 2007, or if Stross has just gotten bored. More...
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Oct 21, 2011
Jayaprakash
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I didn't care much for Singularity Sky and had sort of dismissed Stross as someone who dealt in a nerd-friendly thriller-mode SF that was of little interest to me. Still, when one of my favourite booksellers showed me this shiny new trade paperback with its title ripped straight from yesterday's internet memes, I was intrigued.
So what we have here is a near-future police procedural, broadly put. It revolves around a police detective from the internet porn tracking squad who gets inv More...
So what we have here is a near-future police procedural, broadly put. It revolves around a police detective from the internet porn tracking squad who gets inv More...
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Sep 02, 2011
Claudia
rated it:
Wow--Charlie is really coming into his own. Most excellent (obvious disclaimer: I do know the author socially).
The book works as a straight-up thriller, and it weaves multiple point of views together well. But the really fun, unsettling thing is the world as Charlie sees it, which is to say our everyday world in too few years, with certain elements extrapolated just far enough out to make one really uncomfortable. International intrigue and corporate crime, murder and sex, Internet mem More...
The book works as a straight-up thriller, and it weaves multiple point of views together well. But the really fun, unsettling thing is the world as Charlie sees it, which is to say our everyday world in too few years, with certain elements extrapolated just far enough out to make one really uncomfortable. International intrigue and corporate crime, murder and sex, Internet mem More...
Jan 21, 2012
Melody
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This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers.
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Jan 20, 2012
Kris
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Rule 34 could be loosely called a sequel to Halting State. Loosely because the setting in the near future in Scotland is the same and the Edinburgh police are main characters but that is about the only connection. This makes the background things going on a little more accessable if you read Halting State as well as puzzling out the near future Stross is representing in the book. I enjoyed Rule 34 though not as much as Halting State but I think the two stories subject matter is the biggest reaso
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Oct 31, 2011
Tim
rated it:
Hugo. Nebula.
But you might not like it. I happen to be quite comfortable with techspeak, and Scottish slang (thank you, Inspector Rebus). If you're not, you might get lost in this complex book. If you prefer sex to be mentioned as no more than a raised eyebrow and waves crashing on a beach, you might be offended.
If you read and liked Stross's Halting State, you'll probably like this more.
If you liked Ian McDonald's Dervish House, you'll probably like this.
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But you might not like it. I happen to be quite comfortable with techspeak, and Scottish slang (thank you, Inspector Rebus). If you're not, you might get lost in this complex book. If you prefer sex to be mentioned as no more than a raised eyebrow and waves crashing on a beach, you might be offended.
If you read and liked Stross's Halting State, you'll probably like this more.
If you liked Ian McDonald's Dervish House, you'll probably like this.
More...
Jul 19, 2011
Jessica
rated it:
This book is not for everyone. Stross holds the backdoor of the internet open with both hands and shoves you in elbow deep - yes, you, as the entire book is written in 2nd person. You, a hardened lesbian investigator from Edinburgh and head of the Rule 34 Squad, will probe the nastiest holes in cyberspace while your cohorts assail you with colloquial Scottish invective. Ye ken?
Despite the lingo and meme-LOLs, the storyline is tight and Stross' writing is both richly poetic and More...
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Jan 18, 2012
Dragos C.
rated it:
A vividly post-modern near-future rant on a plethora of subjects. Stross weaves a spider's web of plot lines to build his narrative, intersecting through grimy pubs, bunkers in breakaway central Asian republics and high-tech augmented reality police stations. The characters are compelling and well constructed, be they cops or psychotic criminal-CEOs. The second person narrative is oddly effective, I would have not expected it to work had I not just read this book. The setting... Well it has been
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Aug 29, 2011
Helen
rated it:
I'll do it like the academy awards and say thank you first.
I'd like to thank Regretsy for introducing me to Goatse so when I got to that point in the book I didn't naively head off and look it up unwarned.
There's still plenty from the book I do need to look up on the internet, strange (to me) phrases and such like, so if there's any more like goatse that I will need to beware of please let me know before I go looking.
That being said, I did enjoy the book, a nice futurist More...
I'd like to thank Regretsy for introducing me to Goatse so when I got to that point in the book I didn't naively head off and look it up unwarned.
There's still plenty from the book I do need to look up on the internet, strange (to me) phrases and such like, so if there's any more like goatse that I will need to beware of please let me know before I go looking.
That being said, I did enjoy the book, a nice futurist More...
Oct 28, 2011
Maddi
rated it:
Four and a half stars.
While the book jacket never mentions it, this is actually a sequel to Halting State. It's five years later and Liz Kavanaugh's career has been sidelined since the events of the previous book, where CopSpace (a virtual reality site allowing police to share information through their computer-assisted eyeglasses or contact lenses) was compromised. Now she's in charge of the Rule 34 squad, watching for dangerous internet memes before they go viral in meatspace (an More...
While the book jacket never mentions it, this is actually a sequel to Halting State. It's five years later and Liz Kavanaugh's career has been sidelined since the events of the previous book, where CopSpace (a virtual reality site allowing police to share information through their computer-assisted eyeglasses or contact lenses) was compromised. Now she's in charge of the Rule 34 squad, watching for dangerous internet memes before they go viral in meatspace (an More...
Jul 20, 2011
Dan
rated it:
This book is difficult to talk about without spoilers.
What the book is about, broadly speaking: Charles Stross predicts the future. The Internet is a big part of it.
The narrative is improved a little from Halting State. There are fewer protagonist perspective threads (but more from random NPCs); this does make it easier to keep track of who is who. One of the NPC threads is mentally deranged and really quite disturbing. Overall I still don't see the point of the second-pe More...
What the book is about, broadly speaking: Charles Stross predicts the future. The Internet is a big part of it.
The narrative is improved a little from Halting State. There are fewer protagonist perspective threads (but more from random NPCs); this does make it easier to keep track of who is who. One of the NPC threads is mentally deranged and really quite disturbing. Overall I still don't see the point of the second-pe More...
Jan 10, 2012
Roger
rated it:
You’ve never really known what to think of stuff written in second person. Too often it is a distracting gimmick; almost always it fades into the background after a while, not really changing things about the story being told.
Thus, it was with a sense of strained amusement you started Rule 34, the sequel to a book you remember liking quite a lot. A multiple-viewpoint book, all told from second person? You were ready for it to be labored, difficult to read, not as good as you had hoped. More...
Thus, it was with a sense of strained amusement you started Rule 34, the sequel to a book you remember liking quite a lot. A multiple-viewpoint book, all told from second person? You were ready for it to be labored, difficult to read, not as good as you had hoped. More...
Jan 15, 2012
terpkristin
rated it:
I waffled a bit on how many stars to give Rule 34. In the end,I settled on two, since I typically only give 1 star to books I abandon, though it was a close call. I don't think that under normal circumstances I would have read this book. However, one of my new year's resolutions was to read every main Sword and Laser pick this year. Kind of funny that our last two "laser" picks have been disappointing (to me) techno-thrillers.
Looking at Goodreads, a lot of people seem to be More...
Looking at Goodreads, a lot of people seem to be More...
Dec 04, 2011
Chris
rated it:
This being my first foray into Charlie Stross, I just dont know if i entirely understand what i was reading. For some reason i couldnt stop reading it, but on the other hand as i look back i really dont know where those 358 pages went. The not to distant future as a setting was interesting enough, especially with the predicted technologies being where they are. However, there were some aspects to the writing style i was not a fan. And surprisingly i did not mind the second person usage, it w
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Jan 23, 2012
John
rated it:
Fine Near Future Post-Cyberpunk Thriller from Stross
Imagine a near future Scotland, now largely independent of England, where the Edinburgh Police Department contends with internet crime via its “Rule 34” squad headed by Detective Inspector Liz Kavanagh. Charles Stross has adapted Lynda La Plante’s “Prime Suspect” into a near future post-cyberpunk crime thriller, “Rule 34”, resulting in one of the most well-received novels of science fiction and fantasy published last year, earning More...
Imagine a near future Scotland, now largely independent of England, where the Edinburgh Police Department contends with internet crime via its “Rule 34” squad headed by Detective Inspector Liz Kavanagh. Charles Stross has adapted Lynda La Plante’s “Prime Suspect” into a near future post-cyberpunk crime thriller, “Rule 34”, resulting in one of the most well-received novels of science fiction and fantasy published last year, earning More...
Jan 21, 2012
Will
rated it:
This is the latest Sword & Laser pick. It's based around the Internet meme Rule 34 that says if it exists, then there's a porn for it. The book is set in the near future in Scotland and there's a police force set up to make sure people aren't doing anything illegal in this regard. Overall, I thought the book was okay. It's definitely not my favorite S&L pick.
Most of the book is told from the point of view of one of 3 main characters. As you get further into the book, more characte More...
Most of the book is told from the point of view of one of 3 main characters. As you get further into the book, more characte More...
Jan 21, 2012
I looked at the cover of this book a long time, once I'd picked it up off the "new fiction" shelf at the Puyallup Library. I was having cover deja vu—couldn't remember the story when I read the jacket material, but it looked so familiar. I ended up taking it home based mostly on the blurb where the author was praised as a "master of the near-future." Near future sci-fi is very hit-or-miss for me, so I was curious about what mastery in the niche genre read like.
I'm r More...
I'm r More...
Jan 08, 2012
Jonathan
rated it:
This was a very interesting read. A near future tech murder mystery set in Scotland. There are very prominant characters that are homosexual and a atheistic undertone to the book. Fine with me, but some might not like. If you know what the term "Rule 34" actually means the contents and direction of the book won't suprise. To those that don't the main investigater is originally posted to investigate illegal internet sex sites and spammers. The sexual content and direction start fr
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Aug 09, 2011
Artur
rated it:
Regra 34: é um dos clássicos da internet. Se algo existe... alguém usa para pornografia. Apesar desta premissa, Rule 34 não é um romance que nos leve a hipotéticos paraísos tecno-carnais futuros. Antes, é uma convoluta história que serve essencialmente de infodump para as ruminações pós-cyberpunk do autor. Vale é que as ideias de Stross valem a pena ser lidas. O que salva o romance é o interesse das especulações e a capacidade do autor em projectar impactos sociais de visões futuras da tecnologi
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Jan 20, 2012
Zivan
rated it:
Rule 34 isn't exactly a sequel to Halting State , it is in the same universe, there are familiar characters and the world is familiar, but it has a standalone plot. You do not have to read Halting State before Rule 34 to enjoy it.
I'm happy to report that Rule 34 doesn't suffer from stale sequel syndrome. I enjoyed it as much as I enjoyed Halting State.
The third person style of writing takes a bit of getting used to, but I listened to Rule 34 as an audiobook and it didn't disturb More...
I'm happy to report that Rule 34 doesn't suffer from stale sequel syndrome. I enjoyed it as much as I enjoyed Halting State.
The third person style of writing takes a bit of getting used to, but I listened to Rule 34 as an audiobook and it didn't disturb More...
