The Shockwave Rider - Hardcover

John Brunner

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0060105593 ISBN 13: 9780060105594

Publisher: Harper & Row, 1975

Synopsis

Ex-library with some markings (crossed over with red marker) and missing front endpaper, otherwise, straightl tight and clean in Hardcover first edition - New York:: Harper & Row,, (1975). Hardcover first edition -. Ex-library with some markings (crossed over with red marker) and missing front endpaper, otherwise, straightl tight and clean in a very good unmarked dustjacket (original price of 8.95 still present but outer edges of dj flaps are slightly thinned from being pasted to endpapers) . First printing. Classic dystopian novel, the last in his cycle of dystopian fction which began with 'Stand of Zanzibar.' This is set in the 21st century, where a massive computer data-net links all of North America and giving information to anyone with a high enough access code. One man, picked out of a poor and parentless environment and delivered for "training" to an institution dedicated to molding genuises, runs away when he discovers that they are breeding genetically modified children, physically deformed, but brilliant, and he spends 6 years trying to find a safe place. David Langford in the Anatomy of Wonder noted that this novel "anticipated 'cyberpunk' by nearly a decade, and trendier real-world virus programs by longer still." We are just now beginning to live in a real world of overwhelming data collection and destruction of privacy. 246 pp. Dust jacket art by Creston Ely.

About this title

Review

This book has always been popular with the techy-geeky crowd, but, since it was first published in the '70s, it missed out on the cyberpunk revolution of the '80s. It's too bad, because this is a compelling story of a future world tied together by a universal data network, a world that could be our tomorrow. It's a tense place filled with information overload and corporate domination, and nearly everything is known about everybody. Except Nickie Haflinger, a prodigy whose talents allow him to switch identities with a phone call. Nickie plans to change the world, if only he can keep from getting caught.

From the Inside Flap

A Science Fiction Book Club Selection

"When John Brunner first told me of his intention to write this book, I was fascinated -- but I wondered whether he, or anyone, could bring it off. Bring it off he has -- with cool brilliance. A hero with transient personalities, animals with souls, think tanks and survival communities fuse to form a future so plausibly alive it has twitched at me ever since."

-- Alvin Toffler

Author of Future Shock

He Was The Most Dangerous Fugitive Alive, But He Didn't Exist!

Nickie Haflinger had lived a score of lifetimes...but technically he didn't exist. He was a fugitive from Tarnover, the high-powered government think tank that had educated him. First he had broken his identity code -- then he escaped.

Now he had to find a way to restore sanity and personal freedom to the computerized masses and to save a world tottering on the brink of disaster.

He didn't care how he did it...but the government did. That's when his Tarnover teachers got him back in their labs...and Nickie Haflinger was set up for a whole new education!

Edition details

• Publisher: Harper & Row
• Publication date: 1975
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0060105593
• ISBN 13: 9780060105594
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 246