Within Without You

Done: The Song (Anathem) is Over.

An incredibly long-winded sic-fi (I refuse to use speculative fiction). At least 40-60% of the exposition could have been deleted outright if not compressed severely. He owes a lot to Zelazny, Dick, Asimov, Gibson, and Clarke. The alternate world/reality with a mythic/science spin was entertaining to some degree, but too much time was spent explaining pretty much everything. The long description of the alien spacecrafts wiring system for example.  If I wanted a Socratic dialogue on Plato's Ideals then I would have read Plato. The narrative was engaging but not enough to keep me from yawning during the explanations of alternate co-current narratives.