"Schismatrix Plus" gathers the first stories written by Sterling along with the novel inspired by them. These were written during the period when the author was a fan with a day job, not a professional writer (& not hanging with authors). It is simply one of the finest, most original examples of true science fiction to be published since The Golden Age ended. Of course, it's not classic space-opera in the Heinlein/Asimov sense, but "Schismatrix" is what most readers first loved about SF: stories that take place outside of Earth, in deep vacuum. In "Schismatrix Plus" we orbit Luna, attack with space pirates, live in the Rings of Saturn, terraform Mars & much more. We learn about Prigogenic Leaps, meet a geisha turned-banker-turned space habitat (really!) & watch humanity make cosmic choices. This is what science fiction should be, & it's very disappointing that Sterling has turned away from this early promise to deliver such non-thought provokers as "Heavy Weather" & "Holy Fire".

Maybe if enough of us read "Schismatrix Plus" & let Bruce Sterling know how much more we enjoy this type of novel than what he currently turns out, then maybe he'll return to writing them. Life is hope, so buy "Schismatrix Plus" & maybe he'll get the message!


visionary, mystical, sci-fi as it must be   June 2, 1997
 22 out of 33 found this review helpful

I've read hundreds of good books in my life, books that have altered my ideaologies, infused my writing style with subtle energy, reinvented my understanding of character, and reaffirmed my love of life and creation. Then every once in awhile a book comes along that makes me what to give up writing because I'll never be able to write that well. Schismatrix is the second kind of book.

I took the time to write this review in the hopes that others will see its preternaturally bright bonfire in the darkness and come to its call, moth like, fluttering. I'm still reeling from this book, deconstructing it and rereading it again and again. The images contained in its leaves are better then the ones in my own damn head! Its been so influential in my own writing that sometimes I can't think outside of the still drying borders that its constructed in my mind.

Sterling manages to step outside some of the major problems that have plagued sci-fi since its incept date. For one most sci-fi prose is boring, horribly boring, recitlinear prose, laid out as if it were some hypercontroled mathmatical equation. The massive wads of techno-jargon that riddle most sci-fi have a habit of spilling over into the character descriptions and scene desriptions, making them Mars-dry. Asimov is a monster of the imagination but lets face it his prose is dull. It doesn't have to be this way as proved by some of the earlier sci-poets like Bradbury and Le Guin and the early work of A.C. Clark and now as proved by the crammed prose, acid bright style of cyberpunk idoru, Bruce Sterling. Some of his sentances are woven together with such alien majestry that the shock of the word-blasts are still felt pages later. I found myself asking what secret deal had he made with the devil to be allowed to write with such superfluidity.

The second problem of most sci-fi is that it confines itself solely to hard science. While a hard science background is admirable it is utterly limiting. The power of sci-fi to evoke the undiscovered mindscape of the deep brain are what I read sci-fi for, not sure about you. The major problem with basing all of your future book on "known' science is that what we "know" is severly limited and limiting. Look back just 100 years and what was considered state of the art is laughable. "We don't know one millionth of one percent about anything," said Einstein. If a person were fired into the future today (assuming that he could possibly get to 'our' future and not some alternate Sliders-bootstrap like universe) he would probably come back insane due to the unseen technological flourishes and the way they have altered kown space. Sterling knows all this and masterfully threads superstrings of as yet undiscovered science into the tapestry of known science.

And with all this Sterling still manages a nucleus of larger then life characters. Many sci-fi stories such as Ender's Game acheive master character protraits that would make the Greeks weap, but only by sacrificing the science that goes with it. In Schismatrix the characters develop with the technology and change over time together. By the end of the book, a 200 year scope, society, its technology and its characters have changed drastically from the first page, in a way that is so eeriely realistic that you feel as if you have aged with the book. Very few novels can capture the passage of time this beautifully. By the end I found myself wondering about what I would do without the main character in my life, as if he were some how palpable.

I'd need a whole new page to go in depth on the masterful word play he employs. His sense of double entendre rivals Hemingway and at a lower octaves Vriginia Woolfe.

Not one word can be cut from this smoothly bulking word trip. Every character, gadget, development, is essential to the story as a whole. Sadly Sterling has never acheived this kind of mastery again in any of his novels. After closing the book I went out stalking for more Sterling, only to find that he had stripped away his crammed prose style and panoramic scope for small niche futures that seemed to crib heavily from his earlier work. The divine fire of creation that he had once infused his prose seemed to have burnt itself out. I'm deeply sorry to have to say this because I wouldn't want to cause any harm to an author who made me fall in love with reading again. But maybe he'll take this as a challenge and rise to his former height as I have taken the challenge that his book offers me. In the words of one of his characters "Don't be afraid Pilot. Its done you a favor. You've seen the potential. Now you'll have something to aim for." Maybe he is never again meant to acheive something like Schismatrix. Perhaps it is like final dance of a warrior at his death in Carlos Casteneda's Journey to Ixtalan. I hope not. People are always demanding more Shaper/Mechanist work from him. Though sometimes I am tempted to join in the shouting, in my heart I agree with Sterling that this should be all there is. Like a human life it is fleeting and that very transience is what makes it so powerful. That there will never be another Schismatrix is terrible is heart-wrenching just as there will never be another you. But that doesn't mean that he can't go for the potential again, in a new way. Here is to hoping that like his sun dog rebel hero Abelard Lindsey, he'll embrace the ultimate once more, and be back up where he damn well deserves to be, cutting fresh swaths in a field of stars.


Ambitious   September 10, 2000
 9 out of 11 found this review helpful

For me, Ambitious is the very word that describes Schismatrix Plus. It aims very, very high, whether Sterling's aim was accurate, is for everyone to judge individually.

I had very high expectations from this book. I've previously read Sterling's 'The Swarm', the very first Shapers/Mechanist story, in Gardner Dozois's anthology, THE GOOD NEW STUFF, and liked it alot.

Furthermore, the last two books I've read were very different from each other, and both really good - George R. R. Martin's new Fatasy Epic A Storm of Swords, and Stephen Zweig's The Royal Game. In between those two masterworks, I've read the prologue to Schismatrix, and loved it.

What impressed me most about the prologe, about the Swarm and indeed about the novel itself, was the scope and the vividness of Sterling's Future. The Shapers/Mechanist universe is clearly one of the most fascinating and exotic worlds created in Science Fiction.

So I came to Scismatrix with exteremly high expectations, believing I was about to read a classic on par with Isaac Asimov's Foundation series, Frank Herbert's Dune, or Dan Simmons's Hyperion Cantos.

The first 80 pages cured me of that hope. I'm not a passionate Cyber-Punk fan, quite the contrary, and the first 80 pages consist of a Cyber Punk story set in Space. A well written Cyber Punk, no doubt - others have commented on Sterling's prose, and he has a great deal of talent, but a traditional Cyber Punk story nonetheless, and thus somewhat out of date.

However, after those 80 pages, Sterling changes the style fo the novel, and returns to the issue of the introduction - the wide spread political sweeps that take the universe, as Sterling's hero, Lindsay, finds his peaceful life threatens by both his ideology and his long time friend turned bitter enemy, Constantine.

And then, the novel changes again, this time becomes a generational story, of the hero passes through a universe which changes in terrifying speed. Sterling attempts the kind of paradigm shifting SF story telling, as evident in such works as Clarke's Childhood's End, and in the process comes up with some very nice touches - a particularly lovely scene is the final meeting between Lindsay and his long friend/Archi Nemesis Constantine.

All in all the novel, and the stories, portray a wonderfully realised world. But they lack the kind of plot structure and advances necessary to make this kind of work appealing to me, and the ideas, while sometimes fascinating are often reduced to merely new Jargon versions of old clisches.

My own high expectations damaged my enjoyment of the novel, but I have enjoyed it nonetheless, and would recommand it to others. Schismatrix is a seminal work of Cyber Punk, and an immaginative attack on the age old tradition of SF - and for that it deserves to be read.


Bungled Effort by Confused Author   November 15, 2005
 9 out of 18 found this review helpful

Schismatrix (1985) by Bruce Sterling - 236 pages - rating: 2.5/10

All the elements of a brilliant science fiction novel are here. Sadly, the author seems to have enormous problems in presenting them in a form the reader can enjoy.

His thoughts, sentance and paragraph structure are frequently incomprehensible. His writing style is rambling and confused. Then suddenly, 40 pages will go by which are interesting, compelling and straightforward. It is as if the author wrote 80% of the novel while under the influence of a mind altering substance and the other 20% while sober.

Its tragic. I can see the man has skill. Unfortunately, as a reader I am not willing to plow through the muck to get to the few moments of coherency.

If you like weird mind altering experiences you might enjoy this. I can see from the other reviews here that some people did. I have my suspicions that some of the reviews are intentionally misleading perhaps to promote sales or a new publishing.

If you enjoy interesting writing that flows with skill and allows the reader to enjoy the experience and the story without needing to decipher every second sentance then you should stick with authors like Orson Scott Card, Greg Bear, Gregory Benford, or Fred Hoyle.

Claus Kellermann
2005 November 15
Sci_Fi_Researcher@yahoo.com


Powerful and Strange   May 25, 2001
 8 out of 9 found this review helpful

I first read Schismatrix when it was originally published in paperback -- and made the mistake of 'permanently' loaning the book to a friend.

Of the many, many science fiction novels I have read over the years -- my original reading of Schismatrix left one of the most powerfull impressions.

I recently purchased and re-read this expand volume because I wanted to see if the book was as good as I remembered.

The book is quite old and, when compared to recent novels like Ventus and the Nake God trilogy by Peter F. Hamilton, shows its age. Some of the ideas, and especially the visions of technology, haven't held up very well when compared with current novels.

But, once again, I was captivated by the broad vision of the novel, its awe inspiring scope, quirky storyline and its characters. I was also better able to appreciate how influential this novel has been on subsequent authors. Visionary is a strong word, but also appropriate in describing this work when placed in the context of when it was written. Many of the more recent 'cyberpunk' and 'nanotech' novels owe more than a pasing debt to Bruce Sterling and this novel.

The additional short stories, appearing at the end of the book, also add a lot to the story and round out the Shaper/Mechanist universe.

Whether you've already read the novel, and are wondering if the expanded edition is worth it, or are going to read this seminal story for the first time -- this book is well worth your money.