As far as I can tell so far, the online Science Fiction Encyclopedia, launched in 2011, aims to be authoritative in the manner of traditional reference works: broad in its perspective, knowledgeable in its scope of reference (entries are apt to allude to many styles, trends, subcategories, and the like, whether it be historical literary forms such as the picaresque or more SF-oriented groupings such as the Ruined Earth and Steampunk approaches), concise but thorough in its summaries, and evaluative. One will find much the same in traditional works such as the Oxford Companion to English Literature. And as far as I can tell so far, it succeeds.Its entry on Bruce Sterling suggests I might do well to revisit Islands in the Net, which I read during a period of the 90s when I was not paying the utmost attention to the diversions I chose. The SFE proposes that “many of Sterling's novels may be seen as tours conducted around fields of data by protagonists whose main function is to witness them for us. This approach culminates in Islands in the Net (1988), a Near-Future thriller concerned with the increasing growth and complexity of political power in electronic communication networks.” That sounds like a book that could speak to the present day, depending on the details. And the concept of a tour is a good answer to the question “How can one best appreciate the kind of story it is?”I’m not immune to the appeal of that approach. Two of James Cameron’s films, Titanic and Avatar, seem to me best regarded as tours; though they have fully developed stories (something neither I nor, apparently, the SFE are willing to claim for Islands in the Net), I can’t help thinking that Cameron wanted most of all to show us as much as he could of the great ship itself, in the former film, and in the latter as much as he could of the planet and its denizens that he (with collaborators) had imagined. If that’s what Sterling did in Islands in the Net, I might appreciate it for that today.The impressions that I recall most strongly, on the other hand, are of an outlandish plot and a flat set of characters. Even the Wikipedia entry, which by Wikipedia rule should be devoid of any unattributed opinion, can’t help saying, in its predictably tedious plot summary, that at one point the central character “is miraculously freed” from impending doom. What I would have written about it at the time I read it might go something like this, though with descriptive details:As a writer of nonfiction as well as fiction, Bruce Sterling is a kind of thinker, often entertainingly polemical and dogmatic, but also a kind of inventor, whether of verbal constructions, concepts, or entire analytical approaches. He may be most at home when at play in the field of ideas, especially those concerning the social or political impact of technology. His skills of invention are less developed when it comes to the complex interplay of character, action, plot, and theme that literature has customarily expected of novelists. One suspects that he has simply never had time (meaning he has never taken the time) to study and ponder how those things work. Has he ever read E. M. Forster’s Aspects of the Novel, for instance? It’s rudimentary in a way, but in the midst of reading Islands in the Net one feels like recounting some of Forster's points to Sterling. His story isn’t short of conflict, which public-school teachers often pound into the heads of students as the requirement sine qua non of a good story; what it lacks is architecture, which requires a sense of structure and a good choice of materials. Decor isn’t lacking either. The various spaces visited by this novel are pretty clearly distinguishable; one gets the point. But the overall result feels like so many elaborate tableaux.There--that's my quick impression of my mid-90s character. He was somewhat dogmatic himself, without being entertaining. What I'd write today, if I reread the novel, would be different, but maybe not as much as I'd like to think.
This is a pretty highly regarded sf book, althou I am not entirely sure why. I like Sterling's editing (he edited the fine anthology "Mirrorshades") but am not a big fan of his writing. He exemplifies both the strong and weak points of the genre. My main complaint is one that I have about other SF novels: the ideas are engaging, the future world he posits is thought-provoking, but the characters are shallow, and there is very little real insight or feeling. SF too often ignores good prose and characterization in favor of kool zap! pow! action.This book presents an overall vision of the future that is neither utopian nor bleak. There were some interesting notions: special poisons that make people go insane, little robot assassins and weapons, a one-celled protein called scop that people eat. Other ideas already seem obsolete: the Net as portrayed here has already arrived, super expensive video glasses (you can probably get something like it for a reasonable price today), and suitcase enclosed portable computers that are a little bulky in comparison with laptops.The lead character is a tough, aggressive, corporate gal named Laura Webster. She works for a corporation called Rizome that has a democratic power structure and is involved with some pirate data havens in Grenada and Singapore. She is married to a cardboard cutout named David, who also works for Rizome, and they have a baby. She is willing to risk this child's life and abandon it for a long period as she pursue's her and her employer's vague goals in an explosion-filled romp across the globe. Judging by all the violence and swashbuckling characters, as well as the miraculous ability of the lead character to avoid harm, "Islands in the Net" seems aimed at the teen market and Hollywood.
What do You think about Islands In The Net (1989)?
Somehow in catching up on all that cyberpunk reading last year I skipped over Sterling. So I went to him, with the one I'd heard the most about - Islands in the Net. It's an ok book, enjoyable to read. The spin on cyberpunk here is odd, maybe a bit interesting - the politics of the information future, the dominance of terrorist / pirate states. The narrative is basically a tour of three distopias of the future - Grenada, Singapore, and Mali. His take on these futures is basically believable, if a bit pedantic. I didn't care much for his protagonist - too much like Jane Doe. But some of his other characters, in particular his own version of Steppin' Razor, are really nice.
—Nelson Minar
Visionary.Okay, we don't have personal watch-phones. We have personal phone-watches instead. Big deal. The trajectory of this book, the whiff of cynicism, menace, strangeness, and internationalism -- it's basic arguments about the future of power, all of them are still relevant and still have the power to explain parts of the world. You can hear Sterling's prose learning from the textural techniques of William Gibson, and benefitting from them, but the raw intellectual content of this book outstrips any of Gibson's novels. Neuromancer is still a better work of literature, but this novel lights up different parts of the brain entirely.Much of the future-shock of this novel is softened, not because it has aged poorly, but because it has aged so WELL. The rise of terrorism and private warfare around the globe, the ascendancy of a new corporate ethos, the feel of post-industrial buildings, the simple fact of dizzying multiculturalism in commerce and media, the antiquated feel of the 20th century, the rise of automation in industry and warfare -- it's all in this book, written in the late 1980s. Remember, this book came out only a year after the Regan administration had ended. And it STILL feels cutting edge.And I even love the vintage, schlocky, buxom cyber-babe on the cover, even though I can't figure out which character in the book she's supposed to be.
—Evan
This was the second Sterling book I read. Prior to reading 'Islands in the Net', I read 'The Artificial Kid'. I didn't care for it at all. Originally I had this one at three stars and 'TAK' at 2 but I have deducted a point from each.This one is better than 'TAK' but since I basically thought that book sucked, that's not saying a whole lot. It's set in a fairly near future Earth. The lines between corporations and government have almost blurred into nothingness in the US. The protagonist, Laura Webster, is an employee/citizen of an economic democracy/company called Rizome. In this future Earth, Third World nations play host to hacker cabals that pirate data of any and all sorts. Rizome is one of the first companies to start negotiating with the data pirates by hosting a meeting between Rizome and representatives of some of the larger groups. When one of the pirates is assassinated on Rizome soil, Webster is embroiled in a low intensity, Third World War between Grenada, Singapore and Mali.The post-Cold War multipolar world posited and depicted by Sterling is mildly interesting. The characters with the exception of 'Sticky' (Nesta Stubbs) and Jonathan Gresham are fairly bland, including Webster herself. (Stubbs as a one-man guerilla voodoo army is by far the most interesting character.) The plot is convoluted and doesn't really lead to anything resembling a satisfactory resolution. Nothing is really changed in the world as a result of Webster being at the center of what Sterling clearly wants us to think are Momentous Events.After finishing the book, I was surprised to find that this book won the Campbell Award and was nominated for the Hugo. I suppose I would have liked it a lot more if I had read it when it was first published in 1988. However, that being said, it doesn't hold up nearly as well as 'Neuromancer'. I don't think I will be in a hurry to read more Sterling.
—Alain Dewitt
