This is an exciting start to Neal Stephenson's Bomb Light trilogy. We get to learn about Aurora/Dawn, the protagonist, from childhood to young adulthood as she experiences life in America and the Soviet Union. The descriptions of the 1939 Chicago World's Fair made me able to feel what it was like.

Post ww1 communists, fascists, bank robbers, the 1933 Chicago World's Fair (in explicit detail), subatomic particles, balloons, torture... and polo.

It's exactly what you get with a Neal Stephenson book -- slick, smug, grossly information, and insanely entertaining. The first part of a trilogy, it ends on a shameless cliffhanger (at 300-some pages, it's really more like the first third of a typical Neal Stephenson book). If you're a fan, there's absolutely no reason not to read it, if you hate him you should stay away, and if you've never read him before this is as good a place to start as any.

A rollicking picaresque that takes an American-born young woman from the American west, to the encampment of the Bonus Army that gathered the hungry, homeless, and angry poor in the shadow of the White House and Capitol in 1932, to a massive construction project in the Stalin's Russia, where an ironworks to rival any in the industrial US is being built east of the Ural mountains. Dawn (or Avrora in Russia) is fluent in Russian because her anarchist father took her there to be part of the new Communist society, and in polo, which plays a role when foreign visitors to the Soviet Union are introduced to the first women's team, organized by Dawn. It's not quite what I expected from Stephenson - it moves quickly, shoots from place to place (and out of chronological order) with dizzying rapidity, and has somewhat of a comic book feel as events unfold and our heroine gets in and out of peril. But it's engaging, fun, and very inventive. Anarchist cowboys, weird murderous cults, creepy Russian intelligence officers, hungry and disaffected citizens participating in a long occupation in an indifferent Washington DC mall... and polo.

It's the first in a cycle and sets up the next entry with a promise that there will be some spying ahead.

really great read, thanks for the ARC, publisher. The plot tracks Aurora/Dawn, a Soviet/American girl, bouncing between the Bonus Army March, Stalin's USSR, and wild and harrowing adventures in Montana. She is a fantastic character, I am very attached to her. I did not see the meaning of the title until it was specifically called out, so I won't explain here, it's kind of a treat.

In some ways, it seems the whole point of this book was to get to the last chapter and set up the second in the series. That I was sufficiently sucked in by this time to want to read the next installment, and think I might enjoy it more than the first, says something. As a Neal Stephenson fan, I enjoy his writing and was expecting a futurist, dystopian story. I was surprised to be plunged into Stalin's Russia and Communists hiding out in Chicago and the American heartland. At some point, I gave up what kind of novel I thought this was going to be and decided to go along for the ride. That said, this could do with serious editing and better pacing. The moving back and forth between the present and past was initially confusing, and not quite the best device for allowing Dawn/Aurora's story to unfold. She is a wonderful, engaging, and incredibly self-aware character. A true heroine warrior and I look forward to the rest of the series.

Polostan is really intriguing, weaving a complex tale of revolution and espionage. It could use some work in the pacing department, but overall, it sets a solid foundation. I'm curious to see where the second installment goes.