false http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1172527979m/185822.jpg 185822 7 A Ken MacLeod book is like a crowded college coffeehouse: noisy, bustling, a little rowdy, and packed with enough wild ideas and competing ideologies to leave you reeling. <I>Star Fraction</I>, MacLeod's 1995 debut, is no exception. As the first installment in the Fall Revolution sequence (followed by <I>The Stone Canal</I> and <I>The Cassini Division</I>), <I>Star Fraction</I> established this Scottish author's formidable talent for mixing complex politics and cyberpunk action into smart, funny stories.<p> MacLeod avoids heady political theorizing by always personifying his ideas in believable, often articulately passionate characters. (Or as one character puts it, "In my experience politics is guys with guns ripping me off at roadblocks.") <I>Star Fraction</I>'s putative protagonists--a Trotskyite mercenary, a fugitive university researcher, and a fundamentalist-turned-atheist programmer--are on the run after a chance combination of marijuana, experimental memory drugs, and a self-aware firearm threatens to awaken a powerful AI on the nets, much to the dismay of the Men In Black and the orbital-laser-wielding U.S./UN. (As with all MacLeod plots, don't bother asking--it's a long story.)<p> With its ultrabalkanized UK and convoluted cast of neo-Stalinists, AI-Abolitionists, Christianarchists, fem<I>in</I>inists, et al., <I>Star Fraction</I> is MacLeod at his best--even at his first. <I>--Paul Hughes</I> 1000451 1995 The Star Fraction (Fall Revolution) total:176|5:42|4:82|3:38|2:12|1:2| 176 678 288 18 1014329 0765300842 9780765300843 4 1 3.85 http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1180244587m/1014329.jpg http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/1014329.The_Star_Fraction 2 0 false Wed Aug 05 00:00:00 -0700 2009 Mon Jul 20 05:34:04 -0700 2009 Fri Aug 07 09:42:06 -0700 2009
1) it replaced science fiction with techno-babble; and
2) it latched onto one, extremely unlikely, world-view and just ran with it.

First, I like science fiction; I do not like techno-babble, whic...more...]]> 185822 0765301563 9780765301567 163 17 3.85 http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1172527979m/185822.jpg http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/185822.The_Star_Fraction 4 1 false Mon Nov 12 00:20:12 -0800 2007 Mon Nov 12 00:22:15 -0800 2007 185822 0765301563 9780765301567 163 17 3.85 http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1172527979m/185822.jpg http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/185822.The_Star_Fraction 3 0 false Wed Sep 16 00:00:00 -0700 2009 Wed Aug 19 10:33:48 -0700 2009 Wed Sep 16 08:49:09 -0700 2009 This was a pretty good book; it is hard to get into because it starts out a bit slow and its in a environment that we are not familiar with because it is different than the age we live in. It took me a good hundred pages to ge...more...]]> 185822 0765301563 9780765301567 163 17 3.85 http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1172527979m/185822.jpg http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/185822.The_Star_Fraction 5 0 false Thu Jan 15 00:00:00 -0800 2009 Thu Mar 12 15:07:55 -0700 2009 Thu Mar 12 15:11:36 -0700 2009
Set in the near future in a Great Britain torn apart by international politics, it combines some great aspects of politics, science fiction and some great character interactions.

The author sought to try and imagine a societ...more...]]> 185822 0765301563 9780765301567 163 17 3.85 http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1172527979m/185822.jpg http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/185822.The_Star_Fraction 2 2 false Wed Aug 13 00:00:00 -0700 2008 Mon Jul 21 16:34:57 -0700 2008 Wed Aug 13 12:36:04 -0700 2008 more...]]> 185822 0765301563 9780765301567 163 17 3.85 http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1172527979m/185822.jpg http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/185822.The_Star_Fraction 2 0 false Sun Nov 01 00:00:00 -0700 2009 Fri Aug 21 14:36:49 -0700 2009 Mon Nov 23 07:34:45 -0800 2009 more...]]> 185822 0765301563 9780765301567 163 17 3.85 http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1172527979m/185822.jpg http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/185822.The_Star_Fraction 0 0 false Tue Dec 01 13:48:06 -0800 2009 Tue Dec 01 13:48:06 -0800 2009 185822 0765301563 9780765301567 163 17 3.85 http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1172527979m/185822.jpg http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/185822.The_Star_Fraction 2 0 false Fri Aug 01 00:00:00 -0700 2008 Sun Jul 27 16:39:13 -0700 2008 Sun Sep 21 05:43:19 -0700 2008 more...]]> 185822 0765301563 9780765301567 163 17 3.85 http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1172527979m/185822.jpg http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/185822.The_Star_Fraction 4 0 false Mon Oct 01 00:00:00 -0700 2007 Wed Oct 10 10:27:09 -0700 2007 Sun Nov 04 06:10:08 -0800 2007 more...]]> 185822 0765301563 9780765301567 163 17 3.85 http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1172527979m/185822.jpg http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/185822.The_Star_Fraction 3 0 false Sat Sep 01 15:18:11 -0700 2007 Sat Sep 01 15:19:41 -0700 2007 more...]]> 185822 0765301563 9780765301567 163 17 3.85 http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1172527979m/185822.jpg http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/185822.The_Star_Fraction 5 0 false Thu Mar 13 13:14:13 -0700 2008 Thu Mar 13 14:21:16 -0700 2008 185822 0765301563 9780765301567 163 17 3.85 http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1172527979m/185822.jpg http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/185822.The_Star_Fraction 4 0 false Sat Jul 05 09:00:10 -0700 2008 Sat Jul 05 09:00:10 -0700 2008 ]]> 185822 0765301563 9780765301567 163 17 3.85 http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1172527979m/185822.jpg http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/185822.The_Star_Fraction 4 0 false Thu Jun 26 00:00:00 -0700 2008 Fri Aug 03 11:00:46 -0700 2007 Thu Jun 26 18:26:08 -0700 2008 185822 0765301563 9780765301567 163 17 3.85 http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1172527979m/185822.jpg http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/185822.The_Star_Fraction 3 0 false Sat Dec 01 00:00:00 -0800 2007 Sun Nov 04 14:05:11 -0800 2007 Sat Dec 29 02:26:49 -0800 2007 185822 0765301563 9780765301567 163 17 3.85 http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1172527979m/185822.jpg http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/185822.The_Star_Fraction 5 0 false Tue May 01 00:00:00 -0700 2007 Mon Apr 07 12:44:35 -0700 2008 Mon Apr 07 12:46:06 -0700 2008
This is the one to read - if you don't like this, you won't like much of his stuff.

And a nice bloke too - met him a few times now.]]> 185822 0765301563 9780765301567 163 17 3.85 http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1172527979m/185822.jpg http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/185822.The_Star_Fraction 3 0 false Sat Dec 01 00:00:00 -0800 2007 Mon Mar 31 13:54:40 -0700 2008 Mon Mar 31 13:57:25 -0700 2008 185822 0765301563 9780765301567 163 17 3.85 http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1172527979m/185822.jpg http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/185822.The_Star_Fraction 2 0 false Mon Mar 31 00:00:00 -0700 2008 Sun Apr 20 14:45:00 -0700 2008 Sun Apr 20 14:47:49 -0700 2008 185822 0765301563 9780765301567 163 17 3.85 http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1172527979m/185822.jpg http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/185822.The_Star_Fraction 5 0 false Sat Dec 08 15:45:17 -0800 2007 Sat Dec 08 15:46:07 -0800 2007 185822 0765301563 9780765301567 163 17 3.85 http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1172527979m/185822.jpg http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/185822.The_Star_Fraction 0 0 false Thu Dec 10 19:21:17 -0800 2009 Thu Dec 10 19:21:17 -0800 2009 185822 0765301563 9780765301567 163 17 3.85 http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1172527979m/185822.jpg http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/185822.The_Star_Fraction 0 0 false Tue Dec 08 09:27:15 -0800 2009 Tue Dec 08 09:27:16 -0800 2009 http://www.goodreads.com/book_link/follow/8?book_id=185822