I find myself with a whole bunch of things to say about the new Charlie Stross novel, Halting State.

Firstly it is quite a while since I sat down and devoured a novel the way I did with this one. It took me less than 48 hours to finish. I’m not sure it will make my Hugo list. It is, after all, competing with the likes of Spook Country and Ysabel. But it was a lot of fun.

Secondly there was this:

Which is why you find yourself, about two hours later, standing on a street outside the conference centre, miles from anything (except for a couple of high-rise hotels, a preserved dockyard crane the size of the Eiffel Tower, and a Foster Associates’ mothership that looks to have suffered a wee navigation mishap on final approach to London’s docklands)…

Yes, our heroes have been to a convention at the SECC. On behalf of Captain Standlee and the entire crew of the WSFS Armadillo, I would like to thank Mr. Stross for his kindness in Tuckerizing our spaceship. We owe you a beer or two, Charlie.

Finally, and this will probably go right by most readers, Stross makes a very important point about the perniciousness of the UK’s Sex Offenders’ Register. Much kudos to him for doing so.

Update: And I forgot to mention the first time round that, unlike many SF&F authors, Charlie has a reasonable understanding of economics and financial markets.