Storyline: 2/5Characters: 3/5Writing Style: 4/5World: 5/5The first page of Holy Fire introduces us to a character whose profession is that of a medical economist. It is there, at the third sentence. Already one is prompted stop and ponder what exactly a medical economist would do, what kind of world would require, even permit such a profession. The pages and chapter thereafter are going to reveal those answers. In doing so, Sterling is going to build one of the most comprehensive, tantalizing, a...

Bruce Sterling is an excellent writer, which is why this book, which is not one of his better ones, is still quite good. It is partially an exercise in world-building, but mostly focuses on exploring some of the effects that a certain form of post-humanism could have on the character of certain people.In a lot of ways, it reminds me of William Gibson's Blue Ant trilogy, though set further in the future and with a more decidedly science-fiction plot. Similar to the Blue Ant trilogy, the main char...

Strikingly lovely. A meditation on age and youth, on the cyclical shape of history and culture, on safety and freedom. Stunningly well realized, strong characters, vivid world-building and emotion.

My favorite of Sterling's novels. Holds up well to rereading.A good review: http://www.nytimes.com/books/97/12/07...

I am not sure this book is excellent on its own terms--but after reading nearly everything else he's written, I think this is the most Bruce Sterling book ever. I enjoyed it.

One of my top five favorite books. I crave being able to write a book this unique and startling.

WARNING: Spoilers? maybe kinda/sorta; but the review might not mean much to you if you haven't read it anyway. Thus:----There's a scene--about halfway through the novel--when Paul says to Maya: "I want you to prove to me that you're not human yet still an artist." Right there? That's basically your thematic thesis.It has been my observation that a lot of folks get introduced to Bruce Sterling by way of the Mirrorshades anthology (one of my top 5 favorite collections of all time) and so follo...

One of my favorite Sterling books, Holy Fire is very much a product of Sterling living overseas in Europe for an extended period of time. It details the misadventures of a age-rejuvenated woman (Maia) after a radical life extension procedure disturbs her extended old age. Sterling's post plague future is meticulous and quietly ruthless and the tour of it we see is both utopic and distopic in equal measures. The prose itself is a combination of the plain, expressive writing of early Sterling with...

The longer I read this book, the fewer stars it got. It started off as a strong 5-star speculative fiction winner. Really interesting views on what the next 100 years of humanity will bring. What post-humans will look like, think like. Some of his theories are silly or ridiculous. But a lot of them are within the realm of conceivable possibility, and thus interesting.But it takes more than some interesting concepts to make a novel. You also need a plot. And you need characters who aren't flat, i...

I was intrigued by the premise of this book, the ultimate Boomer Utopia: old people control society and use technology and, er, well, let's not spoil things...to stay young. An old woman gets a new body and then travels to Europe where the book suddenly veers into the world of contemporary fashion and yet another anarchist character is presented as a sham loser (why can't anarchist characters ever be like real anarchists? Why do they always have to be exposed as frauds and valueless wimps?). St

"I have desires which do not accord with the status quo." This book is kind of talky; there are moments when you hit a hard patch of exposition that you need to slog through. Paul the theorist is particularly annoying in this regard. But I love the portrayal of women in this book, especially the main character of Mia/Maya, a 96-year-old woman who undergoes a radical life extension treatment and is driven insane by her schizophrenic hormones. She settles down in the end but not before she causes

I enjoyed this book. I also have the feeling that I will be thinking about it for some time. The themes from my POV are post-humanity and post-cyberpunk. Two things I have always been curious about in my own writing and plot brainstorming. For example what would the world of Neuromancer look like in hundreds of years... well forget Neuromancer... that world is now.The idea of a medical-industrial complex and an entire economy and society geared toward life extension is enticing. I want to live i...

What would you do if you had a second chance at life? If you found the fountain of youth? Apparently the answer is "go apeshit crazy and live like a BoHo, wandering around Europe." Snark aside, I wanted to like this book; I felt like I *should* like this book, but there's just something about his writing style that I just can't get through. It's set far enough in the future that things are supposed to be familiar-yet-foreign, and the author seems to dwell on descriptions of things that are suppo...

94-year-old Mia Ziemann has lived an impeccable existence, avoiding the myriad vices available throughout the 21st century. But even her pure lifestyle cannot prevent the ravages of time, and she suffers from health problems only radical medical procedures can cure. Because she can afford it, and because she has lived such a virtuous life, she is eligible for any number of experimental medical treatments to prolong it. The first risk she has to take, to join the post-human condition, makes Mia r...

Long on ideas, short on narrative. Sterling should be tapped to think up settings and backgrounds on a sci-fi tv series, or an ambitious futuristic film. Case in point: in Holy Fire, he projects the story past decades of plagues to imagine a medical-industrial complex run by "gerontocrats." A fine, not implausible notion. But Sterling's real strength is to extrapolate from this general premise, having Indonesia become the richest, healthiest nation in the world after the plague years (as an isla...

Man, I hate ratings sometimes.The narrative drive in this book is weak; it's basically a picaresque of this posthuman society. The characterization is thin, or at least the characters often came across as inscrutable to me. So as a novel it's kind of a fail. One star.But the interplay of concerns over the meaning of art and humanity is fascinating. Also, there is at least one mind-blowing idea every few pages. I constantly re-checked the pub date because this is so contemporary; it feels hardly

I very rarely put down a book before I finish it, but when I do it’s usually a book that I’ve been reading for more than a month at a rate of just a few pages a day only at times when I have a choice between reading the book or doing absolutely nothing. I put down Holy Fire (about five sevenths of the way through). It’s possible that I didn’t read far enough to see what makes this book something that deserves what appears to be almost universal approval, but I’m going to tell you what I thought

The concept seemed promising (medical technology puts immortality within humanity's grasp), but the execution was slack. Sterling's protagonist, Maya, has lived carefully and compliantly and therefore has access to the best medical care and life-extension treatments. But there's not much life in her life. From his death bed an old lover bequeaths her his "memory palace," a private data haven. I thought perhaps Maya would grapple with the issues of extended life: is boredom inevitable as you surp...

I read this book years ago, but only remembered the general gist of it. Having just finished a second read-through, I think I know why.This is the kind of book that will resonate strongly with people who like the kind, but will leave others lost and bewildered. I'm in that second group. A very high-concept book, it's extremely hard to read, and incredibly difficult to fully grasp. Sterling uses concepts and ideas which he doesn't care to explain, so that only the most technically-minded readers

Holy Fire has some wonderful cyberpunk ideas and a few semi-profound truths on art. I liked that it sided equally with youth and age, showing the beauty and pitfalls of both.But mostly it just felt flat. Sterling has created a weird fascinating world (I would have been ready to read chapters on the new bio city of Stuttgart, or on the plague that caused its destruction) but we are stuck with his cardboard cereal characters, none of whom I empathised with or liked for a single second.