Neuromancer

My book selections were very limited growing up – mostly mystery and thriller books borrowed from the collections of other people’s parents with a spattering of Isaac Asimov and Orson Scott Card when I could find them. 

I read a quote from Neuromancer in an email signature on a BBS in the early 1990s which led to me picking up a copy at a used bookstore. I was blown away by the completely new genre and came back to it several times through my 20s. I filed it away mentally as YA fiction before finding it this year during a… show more.

Without a doubt, Neuromancer is the most recognizable, well-known, and highly regarded cyberpunk novel—and rightfully so. 

Published in 1984, Neuromancer was directly inspired by City Come A-Walkin’ and then surpassed it, deepening the technical elements, exploring the ever-more-important aspects of computer networks and hacking (Gibson having coined the phrase, “cyberspace”), and solidifying the literary style of cyberpunk. 

For me, though, the fact that Gibson was responding to Shirley enriches both novels. I love the concept of one artist responding to another’s work; from Horace to Shakespeare, to Dryden to Pope, to Hammett to Chandler, the best art is inspired by… show more.

This novel kicked off the Cyberpunk revolution in SF in the 1980s. Though most of it takes place in a crowded and dystopian future Earth, the final section is set aboard a space colony, the Villa Straylight, controlled by a creepy inbred family of billionaires and a rogue artificial intelligence. The basic plot is a "caper story" about a team of professionals putting together a plan to get into Straylight—but then they discover that getting out is a bigger problem.

“The sky above the port was the color of television, tuned to a dead channel.” One of the seminal cyberpunk novels, Neuromancer is as lean, mean, and dazzling as ever. Gibson creates a world that you can smell, and explores the concept that better tech doesn’t make better people (and the future may be just as seedy and violent as any other time in history). Biomodifications, mirror-shade anti-heroines, computer hacking, artificial intelligence, mega-corporations, and a world perched on the cusp of a self-made hell, Neuromancer set the standard for all who followed.

This book is dear to my heart and led me towards Cyberpunk literature. Neuromancer is the first book I’d suggest to anyone approaching the genre for the first time. Hackers, ruthless organised crime and corporations, low-life in a dystopian high-tech society, a tormented protagonist, cyborgs, and AI. This book features them all and Gibson is an outstanding storyteller. Bonus points for the badass razor-girl Molly Millions, a deadly cyborg I often mention as one of my favourite characters of all time.

I came very late to the party on this book, and was still staggered by it. It’s the primary source for the grimy near-future aesthetic I’ve loved and employed for years, and even decades after publication, it still does cyberpunk better than any of its countless descendants. Each page is packed neutron-star tight with branding and slang. The prose is razorous and attentive. The ending’s a bit bleak, but the truly crushing thing is that I’ll never write something this cool.

“The sky above the port was the color of television, tuned to a dead channel.” The best opening line. Gibson’s style is so minimalist, it cuts to the bone. The implant technologies he envisions are as fascinating as his world-weary characters, but it is the post-apocalyptic Sprawl that gives life to both. Gibson doesn’t condescend to describe this world, he sets his characters in motion within it. Case, the underdog, is up against a powerful cartel—you don’t want to be him, but you do want him to get what he’s after. What that is, or whether he does, I won’t… show more.

Okay, so Gibson is one of the reasons I became a writer and Neuromancer is one of the books that influenced me as a writer, so it’s no surprise that it also inspired my love of action in SFF books. A hacker who tried skimming from the top and paid for it is given a second chance by undertaking a dangerous heist.

As one of the seminal cyberpunk novels, this one has it all, covert operations, cybernetic showdowns, hacking duels, and a vision of a future world so outstanding that it has become a trope in the decades since it… show more.