Atmosphaera Incognita, Neal Stephenson (4.0)
This re-released novella is a short, wild ride – a treat for Stephenson fans that don’t have time for his usual 1000 page tome. Our narrator takes us on a journey to make the tallest building. Being Neal Stephenson, this is not Burj Khalifa type tall, this is a 20 km high behemoth, where near the top you can see the curvature of the earth and have to wear space suits. In just over 100 pages, we follow the design and construction of the building with all its unique challenges (winds, materials, etc.). While there is not a lot of time for character development, we get an Elon Musk type visionary with his childhood friend cum real estate mogul as our narrator. It does work, as the building is really the main character with most of the pages devoted to its description.
No comments:
Post a Comment