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Mirrorshades by Bruce Sterling is pretty much the definitive short story anthology, some solid stuff in there. I always think of Ballard as having a pretty cyberpunk vibe, both in some of his sci-fi and even his later literary fiction. Something like High-Rise falls outside the genre in a lot of the specific details but it definitely has a cyberpunk feel to it.
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May 10, 2016 00:38
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I'm a guy who loves Gibson but finds most of the work that came after him pretty derivative. What's more interesting to me is what came before Gibson. I recommend Stars My Destination by Alfred Bester, The Three Stigmata of Palmer Eldritch by PKD, I Have No Mouth and I Must Scream by Harlan Ellison, Coin Locker Babies by Ryu Murakami and Roadside Picnic by the Stragatzky Brothers. I also think Down and Out In The Magic Kingdom by Cory Doctorow, and the Transmetropoliton comic by Warren Ellis are great reads. I also believe the short fiction of Bruce Sterling is worthwhile, especially Our Neural Chernobyl.
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Jun 2, 2016 12:06
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Apart from his fiction, check out Gibson's article on Singapore from the very first issue of WIRED from1993: http://www.wired.com/1993/04/gibson-2/ "You guys have Shonen Knife?" "Sir, this is a music store." 
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Jun 4, 2016 17:19
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God Of Paradise posted:I'm a guy who loves Gibson but finds most of the work that came after him pretty derivative. What's more interesting to me is what came before Gibson. The Shockwave Rider by John Brunner. The protagonist is a hacker on the run in a dystopian future. Published in 1975, the hero's big skill is he can punch a new identity up for himself on a touch-tone phone. And this was holy poo poo when it was written.
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Jun 4, 2016 21:53
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On the subject of "cyberpunk to avoid" absolutely do not ever under any circumstance read Vurt. Holy poo poo.
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Jun 5, 2016 17:13
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precision posted:On the subject of "cyberpunk to avoid" absolutely do not ever under any circumstance read Vurt. Holy poo poo. Okay, I'm curious. Why not?
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Jun 6, 2016 04:59
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Based on the synopsis, it sounds like the usual indecipherable crap-babble that some hack authors mistake for good writing.
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Jun 6, 2016 06:37
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Vurt owns, despite autocorrect trying to turn it into Butt. Read Vurt.
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Jun 6, 2016 08:35
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Rime posted:Based on the synopsis, (USER WAS PUT ON PROBATION FOR THIS POST)
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Jun 6, 2016 11:38
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Telsa Cola posted:Okay, I'm curious. Why not? It's the height of 90s edgelord fiction. It's like Snow Crash with far less of a sense of humor. It fetishizes teenage incest between a brother and sister. It has a tribe of Rastafarian cyberpeople who grow their dreadlocks together when they get married. Etc etc etc. Honestly I'm with the guy who can't really stand any cyberpunk that's post-Gibson/Sterling though so whatever.
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Jun 6, 2016 17:03
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I was around to hop on the "reading cyberpunk and thinking it's way cool" bandwagon before Snow Crash came out and that book sort of ended the genre for me.
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Jun 7, 2016 12:57
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precision posted:On the subject of "cyberpunk to avoid" absolutely do not ever under any circumstance read Vurt. Holy poo poo. I picked up the (a?) sequel Pollen having never read or heard about the series. It was... something. It also had early on sexualisation of a young teen girl. 
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Jun 16, 2016 02:29
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Just finished kill process - it's pretty good if you like more near future hacking heavy sci-fi.
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Jun 26, 2016 22:58
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Mike McQuay, wrote the adaptation of the film escape from new york, also has a future noir detective series, 4 books, Matthew Swain is the lead. They are all fun and full of blade runner-esque cyberpunk. 5 stars.
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Jun 26, 2016 23:28
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Edit wrong thread!
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Jun 29, 2016 03:37
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God Of Paradise posted:I'm a guy who loves Gibson but finds most of the work that came after him pretty derivative. What's more interesting to me is what came before Gibson. I'm seconding the recommendation for The Stars My Destination (also known as Tiger Tiger in Britain) I finished it this morning and its great. It was written in the fifties but most of the big names from the 80's cyberpunk circles cite it as an inspiration, including William Gibson. It has a violent anti hero, who comes from the gutter, a solar system carved up by corporations and brutal police forces have a limitless reach, and its ending is the most anti authoritarian in tone and message I've ever read.
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Aug 2, 2016 04:18
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precision posted:
Whoa, googled and they will be in town next week!
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Oct 6, 2016 07:53
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Is cyberpunk still even a living genre? It's so 80's it hurts.
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Oct 19, 2016 02:21
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yeah but you have to read it in shadowrun source books now
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Oct 19, 2016 02:58
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Danger posted:Is cyberpunk still even a living genre? It's so 80's it hurts. I think to some extent once you remove the 80s veneer and the silliness of stuff like decks, we're pretty much living it. Gibson definitely tries to address this in the Blue Ant trilogy but I'm not really sure he succeeded, they kind of fell flat for me.
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Oct 19, 2016 09:11
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Danger posted:Is cyberpunk still even a living genre? It's so 80's it hurts. Have you watched Person of Interest? It's on Netflix. We're basically living in a cyberpunk world right now.
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Oct 19, 2016 17:10
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Baka-nin posted:I'm seconding the recommendation for The Stars My Destination (also known as Tiger Tiger in Britain) I finished it this morning and its great. It was written in the fifties but most of the big names from the 80's cyberpunk circles cite it as an inspiration, including William Gibson. It has a violent anti hero, who comes from the gutter, a solar system carved up by corporations and brutal police forces have a limitless reach, and its ending is the most anti authoritarian in tone and message I've ever read. My favorite thing about the book is that character is driven solely by spite. He doesn't care about all those conspiracies he accidentally unravels, all he cares about is that a spaceship didn't pick him up when he's marooned in space.
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Oct 19, 2016 18:03
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I've said it before, but for my money Bester's work has aged better than by far the better portion of his contemporaries. The Stars My Destination and The Demolished Man both have better characters and prose and tighter plots than anything put out by Asimov or Clarke.
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Oct 20, 2016 15:13
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An Apple A Gay posted:Mike McQuay, wrote the adaptation of the film escape from new york, also has a future noir detective series, 4 books, Matthew Swain is the lead. They are all fun and full of blade runner-esque cyberpunk. 5 stars. The Matthew Swain books are absolutely solid noir books that just happen to take place in a cyberpunk dystopia. I should re-read those. Everyone else should dig up sued copies of the little-known cyberpunk classics.
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Oct 20, 2016 17:14
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hot date tonight! posted:I think to some extent once you remove the 80s veneer and the silliness of stuff like decks, we're pretty much living it. Eh, a deck is just a cool word for a hacker laptop:  brb, going to start calling my laptop my deck now.
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Oct 20, 2016 18:19
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WarLocke posted:Have you watched Person of Interest? It's on Netflix. Especially when you factor in the rise of VR, we're living in the Cyberpunk future, but with better fashion and less dystopia.
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Oct 20, 2016 18:21
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Dystopia is on the rise, we're almost there!
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Oct 21, 2016 03:25
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Can't wait for my pink mohawk
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Oct 21, 2016 05:10
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Danger posted:Is cyberpunk still even a living genre? It's so 80's it hurts. You see less cyberpunk these days, I believe, because the world caught up to it and we all realized we're not cut out to be the anti-establishment antihero protagonists the genre idolized. It's hard to find the enthusiasm in it when for the most part we are the wage-slaves and salarymen our heroes held in contempt.
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Oct 21, 2016 23:20
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Still waiting for the arcade version of the 'shoot kennedy' game.
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Oct 22, 2016 03:14
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Cyberpunk as a discrete genre might be dead but you see elements taking from it cropping up in many places. It reminds me of thrash metal in that respect.
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Oct 22, 2016 04:51
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The TV show MR ROBOT is pretty cyberpunk. Lots of hacking, and even has a strung out protagonist.
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Oct 23, 2016 18:19
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Rough Lobster posted:The TV show MR ROBOT is pretty cyberpunk. Lots of hacking, and even has a strung out protagonist. Eagerly awaiting season 3 when Elliott loses the ability to hack.
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Oct 24, 2016 18:41
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precision posted:Eagerly awaiting season 3 when Elliott loses the ability to hack. As long as he has a cell phone he can do most of his hacking.
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Oct 26, 2016 04:28
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The Avery Cates series by Jeff Somers certainly starts as cyberpunk. it has the oppressive world government, massive class divide and total corruption. Uploading and the issues it causes are also major plot points. The later books do slide a bit out of the genre as it gradually moves into an apocalyptic and then post-apocalyptic setting. This is certainly a change from other cyberpunk books where the idea of a static society and world that is too monolithic to be moved by anything seem to be the norm.
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Nov 4, 2016 19:12
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Alhazred posted:My favorite thing about the book is that character is driven solely by spite. He doesn't care about all those conspiracies he accidentally unravels, all he cares about is that a spaceship didn't pick him up when he's marooned in space. Revenge is surely one of the most classic themes in all of world literature.
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Nov 7, 2016 13:27
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Groke posted:Revenge is surely one of the most classic themes in all of world literature. Second only to trying to bang your mom. Third is, like, trying to bang someone NOT your mom, a cousin maybe.
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Nov 8, 2016 00:13
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Literature criteria: Banging, mom optional
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Nov 8, 2016 07:34
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Ceighk posted:Mirrorshades by Bruce Sterling is pretty much the definitive short story anthology, some solid stuff in there. Paolo Bacigalupi's The Water Knife is also pretty cyberpunk in a Mad Max sort of style.. It has a lot of resemblence to Heavy Weather by Bruce Sterling, in which it's set in the post-apoc USA and white rural people are seen as an ignorant and disgusting minority group who rove around in mobs breaking and looting and stealing everything in sight. I don't really consider it necessary to have cybernetic implants and laser eyes and skul-guns though, to be true cyberpunk. Cyberpunk is about beating the system by bucking it and hacking it with the tech available at-hand, whether it's a nitrous-huffing hippy environmentalist or a ex gun-runner smuggling abortion drugs for a japanese girl band or a rich old aristocrat who undergoes an experimental rejuvenation process and suddenly breaks with society's norms and laws. coyo7e fucked around with this message at 19:21 on Nov 19, 2016 |
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Nov 19, 2016 19:17
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coyo7e posted:Most of Bruce Sterling's short stories and novels are cyberpunk as gently caress - even the ones which are about a phone phreaker ripping off quarters from COCOTs outside laundromats in the early 90s and hanging out with a gun-toting middle-aged russian emigrant woman who hates him. Some of his prose is really beautiful, I'm especially fond of Taklamakan, and the ending of his novel Holy Fire. Make sure to read A Good, Old-Fashioned Future and GLobalhead before you read Zeitgeist, because Lekhi Starlitz is a great character and you should get his arc in order. I'd say that the retrofuturism of "straight" or "classic" cyberpunk goes beyond the technology involved. Many of the underpinning themes like late capitalism, the end of history, and technological determinism seem dated from a post 80's perspective. Interestingly, while some of cyberpunks goofiest aspects (e.g. organized crime that's an amalgam of 1920's bootleggers and the Yakuza) come from cribbing from directly from film noir, it's also where it gets some of its most enduring. The concept of a world divided between rich and poor, a poor divided among ethnic and factional lines, and a protagonist who does not cleanly fit into any group or ideology is common even in postcyberpunk.
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Nov 22, 2016 07:39
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