Termination Shock

· HarperCollins UK
17 reviews
Ebook
720
Pages
Eligible

About this ebook

The #1 New York Times bestselling author returns with a visionary technothriller about climate change

‘Stephenson’s reputation as a sci-fi titan is deserved’ Sunday Times

‘His most visionary, and timely, book yet’ Chicago Review of Books

‘Absorbing speculative fiction’ Guardian

‘Brilliantly entertaining... at science fiction’s cutting edge’ SFX

‘Ingenious and sometimes prophetic’ Telegraph

Neal Stephenson’s sweeping, prescient new novel transports readers to a near-future world where the greenhouse effect has inexorably resulted in a whirling-dervish troposphere of superstorms, rising sea levels, global flooding, merciless heat waves, and virulent, deadly pandemics.

One man has a Big Idea for reversing global warming, a master plan perhaps best described as “elemental.” But will it work? And just as important, what are the consequences for the planet and all of humanity should it be applied?

As only Stephenson can, Termination Shock sounds a clarion alarm, ponders potential solutions and dire risks, and wraps it all together in an exhilarating, witty, mind-expanding speculative adventure.

The #1 New York Times bestselling author returns with a visionary technothriller about climate change ‘Stephenson’s reputation as a sci-fi titan is deserved’ Sunday Times ‘His most visionary, and timely, book yet’ Chicago Review of Books ‘Absorbing speculative fiction’ Guardian ‘Brilliantly e...

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Ratings and reviews

17 reviews
Daniel Rudewig
November 30, 2025
A good enough read, but having a bit of difficulty matching up the near future with present day tech in a way that makes it obvious that the book is dated. I suppose that's a risk you run in authoring an account just a few years ahead but selling the book once most of the real world tech has overtaken the storyline.
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James McFadyen
July 26, 2024
Neal does it again, with Wit and verve, and blended in with the fabulous humour so obviously on show with the high jinx of a certain syphilitic adventurer in one of his other literary epics. Bloody good read. Hope sometimes to see a TV/Film version of some of these; best Neal be intimately involved to prevent disaster in translation.
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Tim Vvv
June 5, 2026
as always enjoyed the way, the author wrote it, also the level of technical experience.
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About the author

NEAL STEPHENSON is the author of: Fall or, Dodge in Hell; The Rise and Fall of D.O.D.O. (with Nicole Galland); Seveneves, Reamde, Anathem; the three-volume historical epic The Baroque Cycle (Quicksilver, The Confusion, and The System of the World); Cryptonomicon, The Diamond Age, Snow Crash and Zodiac, and the groundbreaking nonfiction work In the Beginning . . . Was the Command Line.

NEAL STEPHENSON is the author of: Fall or, Dodge in Hell; The Rise and Fall of D.O.D.O. (with Nicole Galland); Seveneves, Reamde, Anathem; the three-volume historical epic The Baroque Cycle (Quicksilver, The Confusion, and The System of the World); Cryptonomicon, The Diamond Age, Snow Crash and Z...

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