Slant is the 4th novel written by Greg Bear in the setting he introduced in the novel Queen of Angels - an Earth which has been transformed by nanotechnology. In Greg Bear's Slant (1997), such self-therapy is a pre-requisite for continued legitimate functioning in the social order: to be "therapied" is to be. Those features, along with the realistic, everyday characters, made me feel like this novel was actually taking place in the future. For me the book works better in the beginning, when we're exploring the society and all the little quirks of it. Bear's levels of conflict rise as high into the sky as his Omphalos, a utopian temple turned sour. The steps to reach the climax seem to take quite a while to get there for no good reason and part of me just wanted him to get on with it and have bodies start dropping.

Slant - Kindle edition by Bear, Greg. Slant ⇐ Back to Complete List of Books. This apparently is a sequel to his previous novel Queen of Angels, which I read so long ago that I don't remember any specifics of the plot other than the bare basics, which didn't help me at all when reading this novel. As for the ending, which other reviewers have complained about, it didn't bother me. But by doing so he gives us a crosssection of this future society, from the rich people railing against what they see as a regression, to the people working in the entertainment industry (where people immerse themselves more and more), to the police keeping it together, to the therapists who have to ensure we all don't go crazy. This is a fascinating book, and I will gladly read it a third time as soon as I have the opportunity. He sprinkles the text with references to newscasts, nonfiction works, and technical excerpts, all of which are inventions of the author. By Greg Bear Original publication date: 1997 . Yes, it's not as dense as Brunner's Stand on Zanzibar but not much is, and Bear sprinkles enough quotes and excerpts in between chapters that we can get a good feel for things without being overwhelmed. There's always room for improvement.

If, instead, you prefer light entertainment, go rent a video of Men in Black. And little by little, he starts to show things falling apart at the seams, as each character gets a tiny piece of the puzzle and are drawn together, as we finally see the extent of the plan and what some people will do to make society more in their own image. I agree completely with those critics who have written of the difficulty of getting involved with this book. Published by Thriftbooks.com User , 19 years ago

Slant is an exploration of a world driven by the twin forces of nanotechnology and mental therapy, and Bear seems uncannily precognisant of the issues that are likely to arise. And the study of the mind has brought about a revolution in both human psychotherapy and artificial intelligence. His heroes are real and the story, after its snail starts, finishes like lightening. His character Schnee has combined the neural nets of bees, wasps, ants and bacteria laden loam to create an ultimate biological computer capable of spreading prions of infectious RNA material throughout the globe-an ultimate biological weapon. The comparison of the human brain to colonies of bacteria was stunning-how the mind operates by using molecular language. In the sixth decade of the 21st century, the world has been transformed. All in all, enough new ideas to make Bear a trailblazer for future writers.

And as man creates self aware AI computers man's own personality is subject to fragmentation. In this particular book, Bear postulates a world where most problems have been solved and people have turned to improving their minds, undergoing therapy to smooth over all disorders and so on, making society a not too unpleasant place to live. Have patience, or else Bear will bore you to death with the first two thirds of this book. Conservatism is not about tradition and morality, hasn't been for many decades...It is about money and the putative biological and spiritual superiority of the wealthy." He turned what appeared to be headed for another dystopia on its head and managed to salvage a rather happy ending. But it feels like SF with some thought actually put into the science while managing to tell an entertaining story without having the book sit there and lecture us about stuff that we may or may not care about all that m This is the sequel to Greg Bear's popular Queen of Angels, and, like most of this award-winning author's works, it's a stunner.

That the story takes completely unexpected paths repeatedly was one of its delights for me--I can honestly say that it was totally unpredictable and convincing nonetheless. It's a sane and perfect world. As the various plots start to come together and the mysteries stand revealed, the characterization starts to take a backseat to rapidly cutting back and forth between what's going on and people reacting to what's going on and thus things paradoxically start to lose a little bit of steam. Greg Bear outdid himself with this one. We've heard of the quantum computer, the molecular computer, the DNA computer but who has even thought of a bacterial computer? Almost. Plus, after starting out with a whole slew of characters, toward the end we're only focusing on a few and the rest are just bystanders, which was a little disapointing. John W Campbell Memorial Award Best Novel nominee (1998) Description. Published by Thriftbooks.com User , 20 years ago Some of the plots are left to come to their own conclusions, or for the reader to decide.

One noticeable strength is that Bear is never didactic: he certainly has his own point of view, but he lets his characters, even the snobbish neo-Luddites, argue their beliefs and defend their actions, without casting judgment from above. (Although Slant is technically a sequel to Queen of Angels, one need not have read the previous book to understand Slant, although there are a few references to prior events, and certain characters return.)

However, it doesn't really matter because while I think they share the same future and some of the characters, everything else is different and I imagine both works can easily stand alone.


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