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The Cobweb ::
I’ve never attempted to write under a pseudonym, but that won’t stop me from speculating about what it must be like to do so. My speculation goes like this: when you’re writing under a pseudonym, you are doing more than disguising your name; you are in fact creating a fictional writer, separate from yourself, who is actually writing the story. Sure, you’re sitting there, penning the words, but really this person, this figment of your imagination is the one who is actually writing the fiction. You are merely his proxy. The story is out of your control.
I bring this up because, as we should all know by now, Stephen Bury is in fact Neal Stephenson. At least, I’m pretty sure he is. Yes, he is. I know he is.
But no matter who Stephen Bury really is, he comes up with some pretty amazing shit in The Cobweb. Like the following: an ex-globe-trotting, surprisingly well-read deputy sheriff; a troublemaking Mormon CIA agent who, at the behest of an FBI shadow agent, stumbles across a potentially serious problem with US national Security; a boat ride with President Bush (the first one) on his cigarette boat up in Kinnebunkport (he is apparently a much nicer guy then he led on when he was on TV); and at the center of all this nonsense? A ventrenary science department at a fictional Iowa university that is manufacturing toxins to be used in bilogocal warfare, which is staffed by Iraqi scientists who are in the US on fake Jordanian visas. I mean, what else could possible bring such a disparate mix of people and events together? The story is raucous, funny, and I think I liked it because of its subtly mocking tone, which seemed to be poking fun at the whole genre of espionage fiction. (I, for one, always thought those espionage writers took themselves waaaaay too seriously).
So who knows -- Maybe Stephen Bury is Neal Stephenson. Then again, maybe he’s actually some surly neoconservative curmudgeon living outside of the Quad Cities (on the Iowa side of the river, of course), and it is there that he is working on his latest novel. No matter what, I hope for something else from this character, because beyond the great story line and the humorous one-liners, The Cobweb showed that if you take seriously the common sense and the conservative morals that have been bread into all of us Midwesterners, and if you let us cut through all that bureaucratic carreerism in Washington and the alterior motives of some high-ranking dimplomats, there isn’t a single terrorist plot that we can’t foil, or maniacal dictatorship we can’t topple. All have to do is give us a chance. The world would be a lot safer for it.
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