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by theGeatZhopa 879 days ago
"Altered Carbon" by Richard K. Morgan: primarily takes place in a futuristic Bay Area, including San Francisco. explores a world of technology, body swapping, and cyber intrigues.

"The Diamond Age" by Neal Stephenson: a setting in a future San Francisco, handle topic nanotechnology

"Counting Heads" by David Marusek: futuristic vision of San Francisco, focus on technology and AI.

"Autonomous" by Annalee Newitz: not exclusively in San Francisco, handles AI, piracy, and corporate control.

Why explicit San Francisco? :) Taking the possibilities into account, there's might be no San Francisco anymore in some near distant future. Watch San Andreas for that. We'll need Dwayne Johnson in the future, as he's experienced being that one role player. Hahahaha

4 comments

Diamond Age was great, but isn’t that mostly set in/offshore of Shanghai?
It does. I just re-read it over the Christmas holiday.

There’s a brief segment where one of the characters travels to Vancouver. But nothing happens in San Francisco.

Don’t let this fact dissuade you. It’s great post-scarcity sci fi.

Depends on the map your looking onto :)

I remember, but, may have forgotten. Time to take another approach.. thx

I didn't know Altered Carbon was a book. I loved the show on Netflix!
As somebody who often likes books more than movies/shows, this one was unfortunately the exception. Somehow it didn’t click with me, even though I loved the first season of the show.

I think I went into reading the book with the expectation of learning much more about the background of the world, and I did, but unfortunately that left me with more plot holes that the show managed to navigate around better.

The show also converted somebody we only hear from in the form of quotes about a past rebellion to a present figure and main character which I then missed in the book.

I think you're thinking of "Cryptonomicon" instead of "The Diamond Age." Cryptonomicon takes place almost entirely in the Bay Area, IIRC.
It has been a while since I read it, but I recall Cryptonomicon taking place mostly in south-east Asia. Are you thinking of Snow Crash? It's set on the west coast of the US (if I remember correctly). Both books are great.
Thank you for a great list :)