Seveneves

by Neal Stephenson, Neal Stephenson

Paperback, 872 pages

English language

Published May 16, 2016 by The Borough Press.

ISBN:: 978-0-00-813254-5
OCLC Number:: 951120433

(307 reviews)

When a catastrophic event renders the earth a ticking time bomb, it triggers a feverish race against the inevitable. An ambitious plan is devised to ensure the survival of humanity far beyond our atmosphere...

Five thousand years later, the survivors' progeny embark on another audacious journey into the unknown, to an alien world utterly transformed by cataclysm and time: Earth.

5 editions

CuriousLibrarian reviewed Seveneves: A Novel by Neal Stephenson

Review of 'Seveneves: A Novel' on 'Goodreads'

3 stars

I wouldn't have finished this if I hadn't promised a friend, but that I said I really enjoyed the last part of the book. It just took a very long time to get there. I didn't really like the central them of the 7 Eves and how their one-dimensional characteristics persisted for generations. But I did really like the plot especially the reintroduction of humans to a changed Earth. I skipped over a lot of the orbital mechanics descriptions.

Justin Younger reviewed Seveneves by Neal Stephenson

Review of 'Seveneves' on 'Goodreads'

3 stars

I hated less than I enjoyed. Could have been great if it were under half as long.

ratfactor reviewed Seveneves by Neal Stephenson

Review of 'Seveneves' on 'Goodreads'

4 stars

All of the positive raving for this book is true! All of the criticisms are also true! Stephenson is his own thing and he breaks all the rules of fiction. He breaks them in a couple different ways in this book. When it's great it's REALLY GREAT. When it's not so great, it kinda sucks. At different moments, I wanted to give this five stars. It's a hell of a book and I absolutely recommend it to any "hard" SF fans. Know that the exposition can really be a brick wall in the storytelling and it's not artfully done at all. But Stephenson has certainly earned himself a place on the hard-core SF shelf with this one (if he hadn't already).

Mollarom reviewed Seveneves by Neal Stephenson

Review of 'Seveneves' on 'Goodreads'

5 stars

Best book I've read all year. If you like Andy Weir (The Martian, Hail Mary), you'll love this. I'll never look at the moon the same way again. I only wish the book didn't lose its sense of urgency in Act 3, but there was a lot of ground to cover.

adelaide reviewed Seveneves by Neal Stephenson

Review of 'Seveneves' on 'Goodreads'

5 stars

Outstanding, marvelous, fascinating and utterly awesome worldbuilding, perhaps the best I’ve seen in a science fiction novel.
Character development is occasionally lacking, yet I feel like Stephenson’s ramblings about technological details make up for it (even though some might be annoyed by such excursions.)
Seveneves is one of my favourite sci-fi books of all time.

btuftin reviewed Seveneves by Neal Stephenson

Review of 'Seveneves' on 'Goodreads'

2 stars

My main problem with this book is that it tries too hard to be realistic, when it is anything but. Stephenson spends so much time on detailed physics and technology, but I didn't trust it to be correct and there was way too much of it, presented too much like "this is real science!1!", for me to suspend my disbelief and accept it as "in-fiction true".

And when Stephenson got to the biology, which he goes much less into detail on, I felt vindicated. This is Science Fantasy trying very hard to be Science Fiction and it ends up being unsatisfying to me as either.

Is it worse than his early books? I don't know, maybe I've just become pickier as I get older. But I can't recommend this one unless you really like long descriptions of orbital mechanics and you don't know enough orbital mechanics to think it's impossible …

heavyboots reviewed Seveneves by Neal Stephenson

Seveneves

4 stars

The scope of this is amazing, but at times I felt the execution was a little bit off. And the thing where he switches to an entirely different story with different characters for a little while near the end was quite confusing/irritating. OTOH, I still enjoy Stephenson's stuff a lot more than most authors, so I found myself enjoying the heck out of it, while thinking of things he could have improved it so overall I am calling it a win.

lijadora reviewed Seveneves by Neal Stephenson

Review of 'Seveneves' on 'Goodreads'

4 stars

This is a "hard sf" story on how the human race survives an epic disaster by escaping into space (and, as it turns out, below the sea and under the ground in Alaska). The story is told through the eyes of individual people, but it remains a story about the human race. And I loved almost every page of it.

wzhkevin reviewed Seveneves by Neal Stephenson

Review of 'Seveneves' on 'Goodreads'

5 stars

First two-thirds were relentlessly harrowing. Final third less so, but classic Neal Stephenson.

wzhkevin reviewed Seveneves by Neal Stephenson

Review of 'Seveneves' on 'Goodreads'

5 stars

First two-thirds were relentlessly harrowing. Final third less so, but classic Neal Stephenson.

mikewilson reviewed Seveneves by Neal Stephenson

Review of 'Seveneves' on 'Goodreads'

3 stars

Terrific writing, great ideas, great first line, but starting over with new characters on page 569 defeated me.

brunosan reviewed Seveneves by Neal Stephenson

Review of 'Seveneves' on 'Goodreads'

5 stars

I just like anything space and science fiction, specially in lockdown times... :)

Ikwezi reviewed Seveneves by Neal Stephenson

Review of 'Seveneves' on 'Goodreads'

5 stars

I could not finish Cryptonomicon (the bro-y elements here were very minimal, in contrast), but I was entranced by this hard science fiction apocalypse and (spoiler alert) humanity's survival by the barest of threads. I was less taken with the final third of the story, which jumped thousands of years forward and turned into a less-enlightened Culture book, but I still can't stop thinking about the first part.

Strakul reviewed Seveneves by Neal Stephenson

Review of 'Seveneves' on 'Goodreads'

4 stars

This was quite a good book, with lots of grand topics and epic feats as ordinary people struggle against the forces of nature. It has a decent set characters, though it changes part way, and there is no single main character across the whole story. In typical hard-scifi fashion, a lot of time is spent describing scientific concepts, such as orbital mechanics or genetics. I was OK with this, but your mileage may vary.

For a more in-depth review, check out my blog: strakul.blogspot.com/2019/07/book-review-seveneves-by-neal-stephenson.html

Paul J reviewed Seveneves by Neal Stephenson

Review of 'Seveneves' on 'Goodreads'

4 stars

Epic devastation of the Human race, and what follows

This book is about the devastation of the Human race, and what follows. The book takes some time to build momentum, and once it does, it continues to fascinate.