Neal Stephenson

Neal Stephenson is the #1 New York Times bestselling author of the novels Termination Shock, Fall; or, Dodge in Hell, Seveneves, Reamde, Anathem, The System of the World, The Confusion, Quicksilver, Cryptonomicon, The Diamond Age, Snow Crash, and Zodiac, and the groundbreaking nonfiction work In the Beginning . . . Was the Command Line. He is also the coauthor, with Nicole Galland, of The Rise and Fall of D.O.D.O. Stephenson’s new book is Polostan, the first book in the new Bomb Light trilogy. His works of speculative fiction have been variously categorized as science fiction, historical fiction, maximalism, cyberpunk, and postcyberpunk. In his fiction, he explores fields such as mathematics, cryptography, philosophy, currency, and the history of science.

Born in Fort Meade, Maryland (home of the NSA and the National Cryptologic Museum), Stephenson comes from a family comprising engineers and hard scientists he dubs “propeller heads.” He holds a degree in geography and physics from Boston University, where he spent a great deal of time on the university mainframe.