false <![CDATA[Distraction]]> http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1172796753m/218566.jpg 218566 5 It's the year 2044, and America has gone to hell. A disenfranchised U.S. Air Force base has turned to highway robbery in order to pay the bills. Vast chunks of the population live nomadic lives fueled by cheap transportation and even cheaper computer power. Warfare has shifted from the battlefield to the global networks, and China holds the information edge over all comers. Global warming is raising sea level, which in turn is drowning coastal cities. And the U.S. government has become nearly meaningless. This is the world that Oscar Valparaiso would have been born into, if he'd actually been born instead of being grown in vitro by black market baby dealers. Oscar's bizarre genetic history (even he's not sure how much of him is actually human) hasn't prevented him from running one of the most successful senatorial races in history, getting his man elected by a whopping majority. But Oscar has put himself out of a job, since he'd only be a liability to his boss in Washington due to his problematic background. Instead, Oscar finds himself shuffled off to the Collaboratory, a Big Science pork barrel project that's run half by corruption and half by scientific breakthroughs. At first it seems to be a lose-lose proposition for Oscar, but soon he has his "krewe" whipped into shape and ready to take control of events. Now if only he can straighten out his love life and solve a worldwide crisis that no one else knows exists. <I>--Craig E. Engler</I> 524367 book 1998 Distraction total:256|5:60|4:96|3:78|2:20|1:2| 256 960 405 30 4 1 false false Mon Feb 11 21:03:50 -0800 2008 Mon Feb 11 21:28:52 -0800 2008 artificial intelligence or spandex-clad sex droids here, just a world very much like our own but 8-10 years in the future. A future where things have go...more...]]> 1 1 false false Tue Feb 26 00:00:00 -0800 2008 Wed Jan 23 14:31:07 -0800 2008 Tue Feb 26 20:36:02 -0800 2008 more...]]> 4 0 false false Tue Nov 21 00:00:00 -0800 2006 Tue May 26 18:43:11 -0700 2009 Tue May 26 18:43:11 -0700 2009 more...]]> 4 0 false false Thu Jul 27 00:00:00 -0700 2000 Mon Apr 13 21:51:44 -0700 2009 Mon Apr 13 21:55:33 -0700 2009 2 (I originally wrote this in 2000; this version is adapted from the one on my website.)

Originally seen in a Seattle bookstore when it was brand-new, and put on my to-read list immediately. When I actually got a chance to read it (I'd been distracted, heh), my hopes were confirmed. Bruce S...more...]]> 3 0 false false Sat Aug 02 00:00:00 -0700 2008 Tue Sep 30 12:16:10 -0700 2008 Tue Sep 30 12:40:23 -0700 2008
Oscar Valpraiso is the hyper-motivated adopted child of Hollywood elite who starts the book working as a senatorial campaign manager in a near future where the US economy has collapsed and the governmen...more...]]> 4 0 false false Sun Jun 29 00:00:00 -0700 2008 Tue May 20 10:47:09 -0700 2008 Sat Jun 28 22:58:09 -0700 2008 magical thinking. Published a decade ago in 1998, Sterling gives us a good old fashioned American future in which the government is bankrupt, splintered, and operating through an endless bureaucracy of Emerge...more...]]> 5 0 false false Mon May 19 18:17:25 -0700 2008 Mon May 19 18:33:28 -0700 2008 Boing Boing! and it reminded just why this is in my top ten favorite books list.

It also reminded me why I like Cory Doctorow, the author of the following review as well as several fun works of science fiction, so much:


h...more...]]> 4 0 false false Wed Jan 01 00:00:00 -0800 2003 Thu Sep 27 22:00:20 -0700 2007 Fri Nov 23 08:42:37 -0800 2007
Oscar has always been different. He's a cloned human being using mostly human DNA wioth some amphibian genes to complete the process. He's also political mastermind with a working Krewe that ca...more...]]> 4 0 false false Thu Dec 18 00:00:00 -0800 2008 Mon Dec 15 03:08:47 -0800 2008 Thu Dec 18 06:02:16 -0800 2008
Some of the interesting ideas could have been better explored, and perhaps he could have been a bit more punchy and to-the-point with certain events, but it's r...more...]]> 4 0 false false Mon Nov 01 00:00:00 -0800 2004 Fri Aug 22 18:37:27 -0700 2008 Fri Aug 22 18:37:27 -0700 2008 The Difference Engine that he wrote with William Gibson, another cyberpunk god. Thing is, neither The Difference Engine or this novel are cyb...more...]]> 3 0 false false Sun May 11 00:00:00 -0700 2008 Mon May 05 11:44:13 -0700 2008 Tue May 13 07:52:19 -0700 2008 more...]]> 4 0 true false Sun Jun 29 00:00:00 -0700 2008 Sat Jun 21 17:01:58 -0700 2008 Sun Jun 29 14:13:36 -0700 2008
Mr. Sterling is a brilliant writer, with a great sense of humor and sharp insight into the impact of technology on our ...more...]]> 4 0 false false Mon Aug 24 10:00:35 -0700 2009 Mon Aug 24 10:02:04 -0700 2009 5 0 false false Wed Oct 24 18:52:55 -0700 2007 Wed Feb 25 01:53:40 -0800 2009 more...]]> 2 0 false false Wed May 06 00:00:00 -0700 2009 Wed Apr 22 12:25:13 -0700 2009 Sun May 10 07:23:30 -0700 2009 4 0 false false Tue Jan 01 00:00:00 -0800 2008 Sun Feb 10 07:01:37 -0800 2008 Thu May 29 01:09:29 -0700 2008
Time set: 50 years from now (or less). After the 3rd Cold War and the Infowar.

Place: Texas, Luisiana.

Economy: the US are bankrupted, a caos of political corruption, people are organized in tribes defined by the technology they use, t...more...]]> 5 0 false false Thu Jun 04 08:31:32 -0700 2009 Thu Jun 04 08:32:19 -0700 2009 3 0 false false Fri Jan 01 00:00:00 -0800 1999 Mon Oct 05 05:54:40 -0700 2009 Mon Oct 05 05:54:40 -0700 2009 2 0 false false Fri Aug 01 00:00:00 -0700 2008 Fri Sep 26 18:13:28 -0700 2008 Tue Oct 14 16:04:03 -0700 2008 1 more...]]> 5 0 false false Thu Apr 19 09:59:03 -0700 2007 Fri Feb 20 08:57:47 -0800 2009
Re-read it after the author was kind enough to point me toward a RAND document that was key to inspiring the book.
...more...]]> http://www.goodreads.com/book_link/follow/8?book_id=218566