"Postsingular"

(Reviewed by Kirstin Merrihew JAN 4, 2008)

"Wheenk..."

That -- WHEENK -- is the name of the "metanovel" one of the Postsingular characters busies herself creating during the course of the book. It's also a perfect poster word for describing this Rudy Rucker sci-fi extravaganza. This is one wheenkin' ride!

Early in the book, the autistic boy genius, Chu, corrects his joking biotech genius father about a BIG number: " 'Ten to the thirty-ninth is duodecillion' " he chides, " 'Not umptisquiddlyzillion." But umptisquiddlyzillion just about covers the nearly endless gush of ideas that Rucker looses in this novel. What most people wouldn't give to have that many inventive thoughts in ten lifetimes, and he nonchalantly dispenses them in one volume!

Think of Postsingular as "Jack and the Beanstock" on uppers (and downers). Ye olde fairy tale is updated with extrapolations about the latest theoretical physics (such as "branes") and trendy sci-fi speculations about how artificial intelligence, nanotechnology, and virtual reality might revolutionize or even extinguish life as we know it.

The early chapters, entitled "Nant Day," "Orphid Night," and "Chu's Knot," originally appeared as short stories; and in the middle of Postsingular, the tensile strength of those early chapters slumps just a mite...even though it is filled with mind riffs by the vagrant (and randy) technogeeks who climb onstage beginning in Chapter 5. Then, however, the frantic dash for the finish gets the old adrenaline pumping as all the socially awkward heroes try to save earth from devouring nants!

You may be wondering about the sea creature on the cover. Rest assured you'll learn all about it when you jump into this trippin' mind squeeze! Go for it! Wheenck!

• Amazon.com reader rating: from 20 reviews

Read the entire book "POSTSINGULAR by Rudy Rucker, Tor Books, New York. Copyright © 2007 by Rudy Rucker,” online at the author's website

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"The Hacker and the Ants"

(Reviewed by Judi Clark FEB 16, 1998)

Jerzy Rugby spends his days hacking away in cyberspace, to aid the GoMotion Corporation in its noble quest to bring truly intelligent robots into existence. Then an electronic ant gets into the machinery, then more ants. 

This book is just plain fun.  I love his poke at realtors and fashion designers!  Rucker says that having worked inside a Silicon Valley software company heavily influenced this ''transreal" novel. 

• Amazon.com reader rating: from 21 reviews

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Bibliography: (with links to Amazon.com)

• White Light (1980)
• Spacetime Donuts (1981)
• The Sex Sphere (1983)
• Master of Space and Time (1984)
• The Secret Life (1985)
• The Hollow Earth: The Narrative of Mason Algiers Reynolds of Virginia (1990)
• The Hacker and the Ants (1994)
• Saucer Wisdom (1999)
• Seek! Selected Nonfiction (1999)
• Gnarl: Stories (April 2000)
• Spaceland (June 2002)
• As Above, So Below (November 2002)
• Frek and the Elixir (April 2004)
• Mathematicians in Love (November 2006)
• Mad Professor: The Uncollected Short Stories of Rudy Rucker (November 2006)
• Postsingular (October 2007)
• Hylozoic (May 2009)

The WARE Books:

• Software (1982)
• Wetware (1988)
• Freeware (1997)
• Realware (June 2000)
• The Ware Tetraology (June 2010)

Non-fiction:

• Infinity and the Mind (1982)
• Master of Space and Time (1984)
• Mind Tools: The Five Levels of Mathematical Reality (1987)
• Software Engineering and Computer Games (2002)
• Lifebox, the Seashell, and the Soul: What Gnarly Computation Taught Me About Ultimate Reality, the Meaning of Life, and How to Be Happy (October 2005)

 

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Book Marks:

• Official website for Rudy Rucker
• SF Site review of Rucker Trio
• SF Site review of Freeware
• Salon Magazine review of Saucer Wisdom
• Crescent Blues Book Views on Realware
• Rudy Rucker's Spaceland site

 

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About the Author:

Rudy Rucker was born in Louisville, Kentucky in 1946, where he grew up.   In 1963 he went to Swarthmore College where he majored in Mathematics.  He then earned his Master's and Ph.D in Mathematics at Rutgers University. In 1967 he married his college sweetheart, Sylvia, and they soon had three children. His first job was at a State University College in Geneseo, NY where he taught a series of classes on the fourth dimension. From his notes, he published his first book called, Geometry, Relativity and The Fourth Dimension.  Soon after, he wrote his first science fiction novel called Spacetime Donuts. Thus began is dual career as mathematician and writer.  

Rucker is a Math and Computer Science Professor at  San Jose State University and still publishing both non-fiction and fiction.