Burning Chrome

by William Gibson

Book Overview

"A breath of fresh air . . . the vision is deeply imagined, very complete and controlled . . . Gibson is truly brilliant."--Washington Times magazine From a true master of science fiction comes a... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0441089348
• Release Date: October 1986
• Publisher: Ace
• Length: 208 Pages
• Weight: 0.27 lbs.
• Dimensions: 6.8" x 0.8" x 4.3"

Customer Reviews

Powerful

A lot of people who read Gibson bash his writing because of the superficial nature of his characters. They're missing the point. One of the overarching themes of cyberpunk is the idea that technology, while revolutionizing our world, is also slowly stripping us of many of the things that make us human. Cyberpunk is a dystopia, not a Star Trek style utopia. The people living in the Sprawl, in Gibson's world, are superficial, because that's all that they have. It's professionalism taken to an unhealthy degree, and it mirrors many people that I know. Not everyone in the world has a deep, complex personality. I dare say a significant number of them don't.That being said, Gibson truly shines as a short story writer. As a fan and practicioner of the short story, the sparseness of plot and space in general is one of the strong points in cyberpunk. The genre is about impact and style, and the shorter the story, the stronger the impact has to be to justify the experience. Burning Chrome is a book with ten such impacts. The first story, Johnny Mnemonic, probably has the best chance to be known by the general public, and has the hardest reputation to overcome. It's great scifi, albeit far from the best story in the book. As other reviewers have said, it does introduce Molly and gives a great taste of the Sprawl. The killing floor is also one of the best examples of culture in Gibson's world.The Gernsback Continuum is one of those stories that border on the incredibly bizzare. I didn't care for this story as much as the other (it's probably my least favorite), but ti's still bizzare enough to be entertaining.Fragments of a Hologram Rose if I remember correctly is one of Gibson's first short stories, and it sets the stage beautifully for his style of writing. Short, sweet, and encapturing a moment in life, it may not have the depth of impact of the sprawl stories, but it's still high quality. Gibson deals with emotion, and the avoiding thereof in a painfully human manner. Namely, the characters avoid it at all costs.The Belonging Kind is another story, sci fi in it's premise, but not so much in it's execution. Refreshing in how alien (litterally) socially popular people can be.Hinterlands is my second favorite story in the book. It's what I call "classic" scifi- it's set in space, on a space station, and involves man's exploration of the unknown. But instead of a star trek slant, it plumbs into the desperation of wanting to know, the craving from the tree of knowledge for more. I identified with the desire to Know that which is unknown, even at the cost of your own life. A very strong story.Red Star, Winter Orbit is another "classic" scifi tale, about a decaying russian space station at the end of an era of war. Probably ranks in my 3 least favorite of the book, but that's like saying that cake is a little dry.New Rose Hotel is another personal favorite, about corporate espionage and the art of the double cross. This is linked to the sprawl stories, although

A collection that you must not miss.

This collection contains ten stories, seven of which are solo works by William Gibson and the other three are collaborations. Nine appeared previously between 1977 and 1985 and one was new for this collection.Gibson writes hard, technical cyber-punk SF with the art of a real master of the short story genre. Good SF shorts are of course all about ideas, situations and snappy plot twists but great examples of this genre also pack in characters that you can understand and root for and worlds that come to life in your head. It is hard to do that and only a handful of writers can turn out work of this quality.The opening shot in the book, "Johnny Mnemonic" is one of those rare tales that burns its way into your head. Reading it is almost like being there watching the events unfold. The narrative makes the outlandish grunge-tech future come to life and it is easy to see how this tale inspired the making of a movie.It is a powerful start and the rest of the book does not disappoint. From the anonymous barfly world of "The Belonging Kind", up into the dying orbit of an old Russian space station in "Red Star, Winter Orbit" and back to the seedy hacker world of "Burning Chrome" Gibson delivers a set of tales for which the phrase "assault on the senses" is no exaggeration.The book is a fine introduction to both Gibson and the cyber-punk genre and it is a book that every SF fan should own and re-read regularly. If you like it and to want to explore similar work, I'd suggest "A Good Old Fashioned Future" by Bruce Sterling, or the "Mirrorshades" anthology.

Gibson paints with words.

This is the first book I read by William Gibson, and to date it's my favorite. Gibson's strength is not the spinning of huge tales with hundreds of characters. His strong suit is atmosphere. These stories all have strong settings. His language is poetic as he describes his near-future milieus, and his prose has a beat like a pulse as he makes you feel for his characters, In all these stories, I felt like he had plopped me down right amongst the characters. His feel for words, dialogue, and setting are so strong. Everything he writes in these stories seems to ring true, as if he's describing a world that he himself created long ago."Red Star Winter Orbit" is a fascinating story, and "Dogfight" was perhaps my favorite. There's a quality to his stories that I can't pinpoint well-- they all seem to flesh out what it means to be human in an age of rapidly advancing technology. The technology is exciting, but scary at the same time. I feel for these characters, because they have adapted to this harsh way of life, but at great cost. Gibson imagines a future that is either not far off, or here with us today, and these stories really set the tone for the novels to come later. If you're a fan of his novels like _Neuromancer_ or _All Tomorrow's Parties_, you owe it to yourself to try this group of short stories. Cyperpunk had a sharper edge back when Gibson wrote these, and there's not a bad short story in this collection called _Burning Chrome_.ken32

A Landmark Work of Cyberpunk

Featuring stories by the "father of cyberpunk", William Gibson, as well as collaberations with many other important figures in the genre, BURNING CHROME, is as good a collection of cyberpunk short fiction as can be found (short of Bruce Sterling's MIRRORSHADES, which has been out of print for some time). First and foremost, the first story in the anthology, "Johnny Mnemonic", will, no doubt, garner the most interest. (Readers of Gibson's NEUROMANCER will easily make the correlation between Molly and Johnny.) Gritty and imaginative, "Johnny Mnemonic" is worth the price of admission alone, spinning the story (made into the movie of the same name), of Johnny Mnemonic, a data courier, and his gal Molly Millions. "Burning Chrome" and "Dogfight" are considered to be two of Gibson's best short stories, showing off Gibson's creative powers at their strongest. "Fragments of a Hologram Rose" is a lyrical masterpiece, exquisitely detailed and haunting in delivery. Gibson's work is prophetic and amazing, rounding out his Sprawl series (NEUROMANCER, COUNT ZERO, and MONA LISA OVERDRIVE). Bordering on poetic at times, crystal clear at others, Gibson is truly a versatile author. All in all, fans of Gibson's other works or fans of cyberpunk in general will find this anthology immensely rewarding.

Good and bad, but worth the worst

This collection of stories is anything but even; the tone of each story varies wildly, and it's sort of a mixed bag. But for the best stories in the lot, the book is more than worth it."Johnny Mnemonic", which puts the dreadful movie to shame, is a sort of prequel to Neuromancer, introducing the character of Molly when she was new to her work. "Burning Chrome" is a story about two cowboys, one of them Bobby Quine who later became Case's mentor, who pulled off the ultimate theft from an underworld queen.But what really stand out in this collection are two other stories from different universes that could have come straight out of the Twilight Zone. "The Belonging Kind", one of Gibson's collaborations, is a thought-provoking glimpse at creatures that are neither human nor alien--and a little too much of both. "Hinterlands" is creepy beyond words, a story that plays on our deepest fears: Astronauts volunteer to be taken to a place where they will most likely return with some technological treasure, but at the cost of their own sanity; no one knows what's out there because no one who comes back ever tells--they kill themselves or become vegetables, without exception. These stories illustrate Gibson's versatility like nothing else; these two alone make the book worth owning.Some of the stories just aren't as interesting, but they're so overshadowed by the greatness of the better ones that they're just not worth considering as part of a rating. Read it yourself and decide which stories you like better; it's a mixed bag, with probably a little something wonderful for everyone.