William Gibson: The Peripheral (2014, Penguin Books)
English language
Published Oct. 28, 2014 by Penguin Books.
The Peripheral is a 2014 science fiction mystery-thriller novel by William Gibson. The story involves multiple futures. Amazon is currently working on a television series adaptation of the book.
A really outstanding world, if you happened to watch the 'inspired-by' adaptation on tv, definitely read this for the full depth of the ideas.
A novel set in two different timelines; main characters being Flynne and her brother Burton some unspecified time in our future where things are falling apart even further, and Netherton and Rainey 70 years into the future, after some kind of serious societal collapse that has resulted in a huge population drop and essentially only the very rich or very lucky surviving.
Flynne's brother and his friend Connor, former army vets, now run a company called Haptic Recon where they perform surveillance via drone and similar security tasks. They get a surveillance job they think is beta testing a game using similar drone surveillance systems, but when Flynne fills in for one of her brother's shifts, she witnesses (via drone) an event that turns out to be a real murder. This puts her and her brother in danger as well as in demand.
Things become more complicated when it turns …
A novel set in two different timelines; main characters being Flynne and her brother Burton some unspecified time in our future where things are falling apart even further, and Netherton and Rainey 70 years into the future, after some kind of serious societal collapse that has resulted in a huge population drop and essentially only the very rich or very lucky surviving.
Flynne's brother and his friend Connor, former army vets, now run a company called Haptic Recon where they perform surveillance via drone and similar security tasks. They get a surveillance job they think is beta testing a game using similar drone surveillance systems, but when Flynne fills in for one of her brother's shifts, she witnesses (via drone) an event that turns out to be a real murder. This puts her and her brother in danger as well as in demand.
Things become more complicated when it turns out the murder happened in Netherton and Rainey's timeline, and that they have a way of communicating with Flynne and Burton in the past, and allowing them to interact in the future timeline via VR controlled "peripherals". They bring Flynne into a peripheral (essentially a humanoid android she controls remotely) in their future, wanting her to virtually attend a party in hopes she'll be able to identify the killer. Meanwhile, the killer's allies want to try and kill her and her family back in the past, before she can do this. As Netherton and Rainey manipulate the past to try and protect Flynne and her family, the race is on to try and identify the killer before it's too late.
It's an interesting premise, an interesting view of the way the future might turn out, and an interesting speculation about where technology may go. I found the first half of the book much stronger than the second however. As the plot progresses, Netherton et al's ability to manipulate the past seemed somewhat inexplicable - both in how, as well as why it's worth so much effort. The resolution of the final conflict seemed very deus ex machina, and did not feel satisfying to me. And where the value is in maintaining a cross-time business relationship never seemed satisfactorily explained to me either. Overall an interesting set up and some intriguing ideas, but it didn't feel to me as if the actual story was very internally consistent and I was often puzzled about why a character was doing any particular thing.
I re-read the beginning--which really was more solid than I thought originally. The animated tattoos are a very futuristic-but-plausible idea from this one. Gibson continues the idea of video games being a very substantial part of the future economy.
Still not sure why Peripherals themselves were supposed to be interesting?
I liked the character of Ash--she was just steampunk enough for me without going too far. The birdsong double-encoded language was cool.
Thin characters and plotting. Repetitive info-dumps to keep you up to speed when the story failed to provide enough juice. However, the point is in the what-if conceit and that is fun. Could have used a little more work but it wasn't bad.
started and abandoned this book at least 3 times. Super tough to get into, and then part way through something clicks and you're in. And to be honest, I kind of like that about this book.
I think it will probably take another read or so before I'm ready to pass judgement...
Part whodunit, part dystopian, part time travel, part thriller, and all Gibson. Very nice.
An astonishingly plausible look at a future that seems inevitable, and another future that seems undreamable. Gibson's prose is tight, at times claustrophobically so, but it evokes so powerfully that even the most outlandish events take on a realism that most writers struggle for in the most mundane descriptions.
There is much here beyond the story. It deserves rereading, and examining, and enjoying.
A triumphant return to SF, in fact far more extreme SF than Gibson has ever written before. Time travel, strange loops, and vaguely ominous corporations all make for an intense, slightly dreamy read that reminds me more of New Wave SF in the late 60s, early 70s than the cyberpunk that Gibson will forever be associated with. No one writes prose like Gibson; captivating, hypnotic, and hard-edged at the same time.
William Gibson expertly crafts a highly entertaining and believable dose of futurism.
Frolicking thriller with a clever timeline and commentary on mass surveillance and post-scarcity. Perhaps too pat, but fun.
Nobody writes like William Gibson.
Another incredible book from Gibson. Great big ideas made manageable with his gentle touch. Prose as pretty as ever. Goddamn, I love this.
Probably some of Gibson's most lyrical writing ever, which is really saying something.
Throughout much of the book, I was reading it with the possibility in mind that the two futures were not in alternate continua, but that one might be a post-singularity simulation running inside the second. This seems to not be the case, although I wasn't sure until an offhand reference in the author's end note.
I wonder why Gibson didn't embrace that ambiguity. Maybe because it would weaken the characters -- at least I often find books that go that direction to have characters who are too cold and inhuman underneath, while here the main two characters are very warmly human in their different ways. Maybe he just generally wanted to avoid the Singularity rabbit-hole (can't blame him).
The mysterious Chinese server -- that neither side seemed to investigate or attack the other side's connection with in any way, seems like the biggest plot oversight in retrospect.
Anyway, very poetical …
Throughout much of the book, I was reading it with the possibility in mind that the two futures were not in alternate continua, but that one might be a post-singularity simulation running inside the second. This seems to not be the case, although I wasn't sure until an offhand reference in the author's end note.
I wonder why Gibson didn't embrace that ambiguity. Maybe because it would weaken the characters -- at least I often find books that go that direction to have characters who are too cold and inhuman underneath, while here the main two characters are very warmly human in their different ways. Maybe he just generally wanted to avoid the Singularity rabbit-hole (can't blame him).
The mysterious Chinese server -- that neither side seemed to investigate or attack the other side's connection with in any way, seems like the biggest plot oversight in retrospect.
Anyway, very poetical read, in a sawed off shotgun at McD's kind of way.
