Microserfs
- Publisher
- HarperCollins
- Initial publish date
- May 1996
- Category
- General
-
Paperback / softback
- ISBN
- 9780061624261
- Publish Date
- Nov 2008
- List Price
- $19.99
-
eBook
- ISBN
- 9780062105967
- Publish Date
- Jun 2011
- List Price
- $11.99
-
Paperback / softback
- ISBN
- 9780060987046
- Publish Date
- May 1996
- List Price
- $18.00
-
Paperback / softback
- ISBN
- 9781554683666
- Publish Date
- Oct 2009
- List Price
- $19.95
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Description
Narrated in the form of a Powerbook entry by Dan Underwood, a computer programmer for Microsoft, this state-of-the-art novel about life in the '90s follows the adventures of six code-crunching computer whizzes. Known as "microserfs," they spend upward of 16 hours a day "coding" (writing software) as they eat "flat" foods (such as Kraft singles, which can be passed underneath closed doors) and fearfully scan the company email to see what the great Bill might be thinking and whether he is going to "flame" one of them.
Seizing the chance to be innovators instead of cogs in the Microsoft machine, this intrepid bunch strike out on their own to form a high-tech start-up company named Oop! in Silicon Valley. Living together in a sort of digital flophouse --"Our House of Wayward Mobility" -- they desperately try to cultivate well-rounded lives and find love amid the dislocated, subhuman whir and buzz of their computer-driven world.
Funny, illuminating and ultimately touching, Microserfs is the story of one generation's very strange and claustrophobic coming of age.
About the author
"
Douglas Coupland was born on a Canadian NATO base in Germany and raised in Vancouver, where he still resides. Among his best-selling novels are Generation X, Shampoo Planet, Polaroids From The Dead, Microserfs, Miss Wyoming, Hey Nostradamus! and Eleanor Rigby, altogether in print in some 40 countries. Coupland also exhibits his sculpture in galleries around the world, indulging in design experiments that include everything from launching collections of furniture to futurological consulting for Stephen Spielberg.
"
Editorial Reviews
“Coupland continues to register the buzz of his generation with fidelity.”
Jay McInerney, New York Times Book Review
“The novel’s real fun is the frequent and rapidly fired pop-culture references that span the 70s, 80s and 90s...and Coupland uses them with relish.”
<em>Entertainment Weekly</em>
Other titles by Douglas Coupland
Binge
60 stories to make your brain feel different
Bit Rot
Boomerville
Musings on a Generation that Refuses to Go Quietly
Vancouver in the Seventies
Photos from a Decade that Changed the City
Paddle Against the Flow
Lessons on Life from Doers, Creators, and Culture-Shakers
Kitten Clone
Inside Alcatel-Lucent
Worst. Person. Ever.
Shopping in Jail
Ideas, Essays, and Stories for the Increasingly Real Twenty-First Century
Extraordinary Canadians: Marshall McLuhan
Fred Herzog: Photographs
Photographs