Neal Stephenson





Neal Stephenson

Author profile


born
October 31, 1959 in Fort Meade, Maryland, The United States

gender
male

website

genre

influences
Bruce Sterling, William Gibson


About this author

Neal Town Stephenson is an American writer known primarily for his science fiction works in the postcyberpunk genre with a penchant for explorations of society, mathematics, cryptography, currency, and the history of science. He also writes non-fiction articles about technology in publications such as Wired Magazine, and has worked part-time as an advisor for Blue Origin, a company (funded by Jeff Bezos) developing a manned sub-orbital launch system. He has co-written two books with his uncle George F. Jewsbury under the joint pseudonym Stephen Bury.

Stephenson's books tend to have elaborate, inventive plots drawing on numerous technological and sociological ideas at the same time. This distinguishes him from other mainstream science fiction...more


Average rating: 3.96 · 181,037 ratings · 12,142 reviews · 37 distinct works
Snow Crash
3.8 of 5 stars 3.80 avg rating — 72,006 ratings — published 1992 — 44 editions
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Cryptonomicon
4.21 of 5 stars 4.21 avg rating — 26,128 ratings — published 1999 — 26 editions
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The Diamond Age: Or, a Youn...
4.15 of 5 stars 4.15 avg rating — 20,956 ratings — published 1995 — 37 editions
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Anathem
4.17 of 5 stars 4.17 avg rating — 13,384 ratings — published 2008 — 26 editions
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Quicksilver (Baroque Cycle,...
3.86 of 5 stars 3.86 avg rating — 12,176 ratings — published 2003 — 31 editions
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The Confusion (The Baroque ...
4.17 of 5 stars 4.17 avg rating — 7,175 ratings — published 2004 — 19 editions
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Reamde
3.91 of 5 stars 3.91 avg rating — 6,998 ratings — published 2011 — 16 editions
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The System of the World (Th...
4.25 of 5 stars 4.25 avg rating — 6,301 ratings — published 2004 — 16 editions
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Zodiac
3.64 of 5 stars 3.64 avg rating — 6,155 ratings — published 1988 — 21 editions
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In the Beginning...was the ...
3.78 of 5 stars 3.78 avg rating — 2,783 ratings — published 1999 — 8 editions
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More books by Neal Stephenson…
Quicksilver The Confusion The System of the World
The Baroque Cycle (3 books)
by
4.042638682999142 of 5 stars 4.04 avg rating — 25,634 ratings
Quicksilver King of the Vagabonds Odalisque The Confusion, Part I The Confusion, Part II Solomon's Gold (The Baroque... Currency
The Baroque Cycle (8 volumes) (8 books)
by
3.915814319433517 of 5 stars 3.92 avg rating — 13,981 ratings
Criptonomicón I: El Código ... Criptonomicón II: El Código... Criptonomicón III: El Códig...
Criptonomicón (3 books)
by
4.066666666666666 of 5 stars 4.07 avg rating — 330 ratings
The Mongoliad: Book One
Foreworld (1 book)
by
3.559006211180124 of 5 stars 3.56 avg rating — 161 ratings

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Interviews

September 2008, Neal Stephenson
"I see this as more and more of a social class issue. I'm remembering the advent of late '60s/early '70s drug culture when I was a kid. Authority figures would try to scare us away from drugs, and whether or not we were actually using drugs, we would just laugh at them because their threats and warnings seemed so overwrought." ...More

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“Until a man is twenty-five, he still thinks, every so often, that under the right circumstances he could be the baddest motherfucker in the world. If I moved to a martial-arts monastery in China and studied real hard for ten years. If my family was wiped out by Colombian drug dealers and I swore myself to revenge. If I got a fatal disease, had one year to live, and devoted it to wiping out street crime. If I just dropped out and devoted my life to being bad.”
Neal Stephenson, Snow Crash

“The difference between stupid and intelligent people – and this is true whether or not they are well-educated – is that intelligent people can handle subtlety. ”
Neal Stephenson, The Diamond Age: Or, a Young Lady's Illustrated Primer

“Arguing with anonymous strangers on the Internet is a sucker's game because they almost always turn out to be—or to be indistinguishable from—self-righteous sixteen-year-olds possessing infinite amounts of free time.”
Neal Stephenson, Cryptonomicon

Polls

11738
Who should win the Hugo Award for Best Novel of 2008?

 
  2 votes, 40.0%

 
  1 vote, 20.0%

 
  1 vote, 20.0%

 
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Topics Mentioning This Author

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SciFi and Fantasy...: Anathem 29 268 Dec 14, 2008 06:08am  
The Book Challenge: Meghan's 2008 Challenge - COMPLETED 66 296 Feb 19, 2009 08:31am  
Fantasy Book Club: What are you reading in March? 73 229 Mar 29, 2009 05:36pm  
Beyond Reality: Hugo Awards! 9 78 Apr 05, 2009 07:09pm  
Goodreads Librarians: Librarian Notes are Live 37 136 Apr 21, 2009 11:38pm  
SciFi and Fantasy...: Sequel to Cryptonomicon? 3 100 Apr 26, 2009 07:59pm  
Wild Things: YA G...: What We Are Reading Now 5 49 May 25, 2009 07:48am  
Goodreads Librarians: eBooks 11 83 Jun 05, 2009 12:25am  
SciFi and Fantasy...: What I am also reading in April 41 266 Jun 30, 2009 07:43pm  
Beyond Reality: What are you reading right now? 180 337 Jul 01, 2009 01:34am  


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