Book description
Distrust That Particular Flavor - an acclaimed nonfiction
collection by William Gibson, author of Neuromancer
'The future's already here: it's just not evenly distributed'
William Gibson was writing fiction when he predicted the internet.
And as his stories bled into reality so he became one of the first to
report on the real-world consequences of cyberspace's growth and development.
Now, with the dust settling on the first internet revolution, comes
Gibson's first collection of non-fiction - essays from the
technological and cultural frontiers of this new world.
Covering a variety of subjects, they include:
Metrophagy - the Art and Science of Digesting Great Cities
An account of obsession in 'the world's attic' - eBay
Reasons why 'The Net is a Waste of Time'
Singapore as 'Disneyland with the Death Penalty'
A primer on Japan, our default setting for the future
These and many other pieces, collected for the first time in
Distrust that Particular Flavour, are studded with revealing
autobiographical fragments and map the development of Gibson's acute
perceptions about modern life. Readers of Neal Stephenson, Ray
Bradbury and Iain M. Banks will love this book.
'Gibson is a prophet and a satirist, a black comedian and an
astounding architect of cool. He's also responsible for much of the
world we live in' Spectator
'Part-detective story, part-cultural snapshot ... all bound by
Gibson's pin-sharp prose' Arena
William Gibson's first novel Neuromancer has sold more than
six million copies worldwide. In an earlier story he had invented the
term 'cyberspace'; a concept he developed in the novel, creating an
iconography for the Information Age long before the invention of the
Internet. The book won three major literary prizes. He has since
written nine further novels including Count Zero; Mona Lisa
Overdrive; The Difference Engine; Virtual Light; Idoru; All
Tomorrow's Parties; Pattern Recognition; Spook Country and most
recently Zero History.
William Gibson's first novel Neuromancer has sold more than
six million copies worldwide. In an earlier story he had invented the
term 'cyberspace'; a concept he developed in the novel, creating an
iconography for the Information Age long before the invention of the
Internet. The book won three major literary prizes. He has since
written nine further novels, most recently Zero History.
William Gibson was born in South Carolina but has lived for many
years in Vancouver.
