The Sanctuary

Art => Printed Matter => Topic started by: Rizzo in a box on September 06, 2014, 12:06:35 am

Title: Greg Egan - hard sci-fi for hard people
Post by: Rizzo in a box on September 06, 2014, 12:06:35 am

Anybody else here a fan? I've only recently gotten into him the past couple months and holy crap where have you been all my life? I'm a huge science fiction nerd, as a kid I read Asimov and stuff and later got into Philip K Dick who is always a fun ride. But damn, Egan really scratches a certain itch that I've never had satisfied before - really far out there scifi using real science.

So far I've only read a couple of his short stories and Permutation City (which I've got in pdf if you want) but man it feels good to have a new author to read the fuck out of.

Title: Re: Greg Egan - hard sci-fi for hard people
Post by: Slave of the Beast on September 08, 2014, 05:08:23 pm

"Egan does not attend science fiction conventions, does not sign books, and appears in no photographs on the Web" (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greg_Egan)

I get the impression he's a  'You don't like my books? Well fuck off and read Dan Dare then' type. I'll check him out. Transhumanism interests me greatly and serious sci-fi material on the subject is generally shite.

Title: Re: Greg Egan - hard sci-fi for hard people
Post by: Prometheus on October 09, 2014, 10:43:01 pm

Been a huge fan since I came across his short story Crystal Nights in a collection. Zendigi gave me the creeps bad, because it was just all too realistic.

Schild's Ladder about melted my brain, because I couldn't get it out of my head that the last third or so was a virtual construct written in the fabric of clashing universes. Also, I just can not buy that humanity as a whole would adopt puzzle-peice genitals.

That said, he is amazing, and if you want to read Schild's Ladder, his short story Singleton should probably be read first, as it helps set the framework for what the hell is up with Quisps. Hey, here's a link!

http://gregegan.customer.netspace.net.au/MISC/SINGLETON/Singleton.html

Egan is probably about on par with Neal Stephenson for having books that can double as IQ tests.

Title: Re: Greg Egan - hard sci-fi for hard people
Post by: LiquidIce on October 18, 2014, 10:48:15 am

You got me interested enough to search around for his books and add them to my list. Thanks.

Title: Re: Greg Egan - hard sci-fi for hard people
Post by: Ninja on October 18, 2014, 12:44:06 pm

I'm a huge fan of Stephenson.  I'll take the pdf if you don't mind and give it a read.  Need to find some new books anyway and it's always nice to find new authors. 

Title: Re: Greg Egan - hard sci-fi for hard people
Post by: Jakos on November 11, 2014, 03:01:18 pm

 I finished reading the Revelation Space series not too long ago and been looking for something similar. Thanks m8.