Reamde, like many of Stephenson’s books, was a Goliath-sized techno thriller, mixing info-dumps and action in a sometimes uneasy novelistic emulsion. The info-dumping is still there – fans of Stephenson expect nothing less – but mixed with an old-school fantasy novel

Soon enough, virtual reality provides him with just such a second chance. His will instructs that his body be cryonically preserved and his brain scanned neuron by neuron in the hope that technology will eventually be developed that can bring him back to life. But something goes wrong in the clinic and he dies under anaesthetic. We get a leisurely account of his morning, and of the routine medical procedure he has scheduled. Luckily you don’t need to know all the ins and outs of the former novel to enjoy Fall, which starts with Forthrast, now a middle-aged billionaire, waking in his luxurious Seattle apartment. It made him rich, and provoked a kidnap/terrorism Russian-mafia storyline too intricate to summarise here.

In Reamde, games developer Richard “Dodge” Forthrast developed an immersive virtual reality MMORPG – a massively multiplayer online role-playing game – called T’Rain. And the bonus here: Fall is the best thing he’s written in ages. A typical Stephenson novel will contain enough plot for two or three regular-sized books, and enough thought-provoking ideas for four or five. You certainly can’t fault him when it comes to giving readers value for money, and not just in terms of pages. Reamde, from 2011, to which Fall is a sequel, is 1,044 pages long, and his multi-award-winning three-part Baroque Cycle (2003-04) runs to 2,671 pages. A particularly dashing young man skidded up to her on his knees (he was wearing hard-shell knee pads) and, in an attitude recalling the prince on the final page of Cinderella, fit a pair of used flip-flops onto her feet.A t a paltry 883 pages, Fall or, Dodge in Hell is short by Neal Stephenson’s standards. Three different first aid kits were broken open at her feet older and wiser men began to lodge objections at the profligate use of supplies, darkly suggesting that it was all because she was a pretty girl.

What would have been designated, in a Western office, as a hostile environment was soon in full swing as numerous rough strong hands were all over her, easing her to a comfortable perch on a chair that was produced as if by magic, feeling through her hair to find bumps and lacerations. Two of them were already running toward her with hands reaching out in a manner that, in normal circumstances, would have seemed just plain ungentlemanly. “There was no way that these guys were going to let a bleeding, barefoot woman simply wander off alone into the streets.

Reamde by neal stephenson