About the book

Welcome to the fractured future, at the dusk of the twenty-first century.

Earth has a population of roughly a billion hominids. For the most part, they are happy with their lot, living in a preserve at the bottom of a gravity well. Those who are unhappy have emigrated, joining one or another of the swarming densethinker clades that fog the inner solar system with a dust of molecular machinery so thick that it obscures the sun.

The splintery metaconsciousness of the solar-system has largely sworn off its pre-post-human cousins dirtside, but its minds sometimes wander…and when that happens, it casually spams Earth’s networks with plans for cataclysmically disruptive technologies that emulsify whole industries, cultures, and spiritual systems. A sane species would ignore these get-evolved-quick schemes, but there’s always someone who’ll take a bite from the forbidden apple.

So until the overminds bore of stirring Earth’s anthill, there’s Tech Jury Service: random humans, selected arbitrarily, charged with assessing dozens of new inventions and ruling on whether to let them loose. Young Huw, a technophobic, misanthropic Welshman, has been selected for the latest jury, a task he does his best to perform despite an itchy technovirus, the apathy of the proletariat, and a couple of truly awful moments on bathroom floors.

352 pages (hardcover)
Published on September 4, 2012
Published by Tor
Cory Doctorow’s webpage
Charles Stross webpage

This book was sent for me to review by the publisher.

You can purchase a copy of this book by clicking on the following links:  The Rapture of the Nerds: A tale of the singularity, posthumanity, and awkward social situations, The Rapture of the Nerds: A tale of the singularity, posthumanity, and awkward social situations – Kindle
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The Rapture of the Nerds is an odd duck, and that’s probably the reason I’m struggling so much to write this review. On the one hand, there are some deeper themes being toyed with that are absolutely fascinating. On the other, this book feels like a mashup of as many clever curses that the authors can possibly think of, with some odd situations thrown in. Is this good or bad? I can’t even seem to decide that much. There is a place for fun and funny books, but sometimes a person could wish for the substance to be a little less subtle and the humor to be a little less in-your-face. Basically, I think this is one of those books that will fly or sink based on the mood of the person reading it.

Doctorow and Stross are not newcomers to the speculative fiction game. They are well known authors with mass amounts of fans. They’ve played the game before, and the writing shows. In reality, The Rapture of the Nerds is worth reading just to enjoy some of the hilarious, off the wall descriptions and some of the most creative curses I’ve ever been introduced to. I can only imagine how much fun this must have been to write. The humor is thick, and sometimes it does distract from the plot, but that’s not necessarily a bad thing. Readers in the mood for a fun read might have more tolerance for this than readers who want something a bit more serious.

The Rapture of the Nerds can be divided into two parts. The first part is fast moving but can be rather confusing and disjointed. Occasionally I had to re-read parts to understand what was happening. Things move fast, and some of it won’t make sense until later in the book. The second part is where everything starts tying together, the book becomes less frustrating, and less about the humor and more about the plot and characters. As for characters, our protagonist, Huw, reveals more of himself as the book progresses, growing and developing with the plot nicely. By the end of the book you will feel like you know him quite well, whereas at the start he feels a bit like a stranger. It takes time for him to warm up, but he deserves it.

The world the two authors have created is rather fascinating, and it deserves attention. In a future version of earth, most humans have been uploaded into a gigantic cloud and only a billion humans remain on earth. Occasionally technology gets introduced to earth and juries get called up to decide if these contraptions should be allowed into society or not. Huw is averse to technology, and even lives in a house without electricity to prove it. He volunteers for one of these juries to hopefully help minimize the damage from technology on the planet, and all hell breaks loose.

Buried beneath the humor and myriad of awkward, almost unbelievable situations, are some deeper questions that will probably pick at your brain a bit if you let them. One thing I’ve noticed in my science fiction reading, is that the idea of consciousness being downloaded into another system is becoming rather common. Doctorow and Stross toy with this quite a bit, and it’s interesting to see the questions they raise in their technologically rife world. Besides that, there are obvious themes regarding technology, privacy and how the two affect each other in our rapidly advancing world. Despite the fact that some of these ideas can be buried under some levity, I must say that a lot of these science fiction ideas are often toyed with in incredibly serious door stopping books. It was a nice change of pace to be able to read a book that both facilitates deep thought and plenty of laughter along with it.

The Rapture of the Nerds really didn’t take me long to read. It truly is an enjoyable book that is well worth your time, for the humor and descriptions alone. However, the first half can be rather plodding, confusing and lacking in substance. The second half is where the plot and deeper themes really start to hit home and everything starts to tie together nicely (where plenty of “Ah ha!” moments happen). When I finished the book I realized I really only had one complaint. While enjoyable, the humor can, at times, obscure a very fascinating plot. However, at the end of the day, Doctorow and Stross have managed to marry complex and deep science fiction ideas and themes with some incredibly clever writing. This makes The Rapture of the Nerds a very quick, laugh filled read that will stick with you long after you finish the book.

4/5 stars