One of the most off putting things about Neuromancer is the lack of history. While there is a lot of created history and created tech, there doesn’t seem to be a lot of reference to any “current” history. Everything seems to be set in the “now” that Gibson has created. In Chiba City, the old inhabitants are almost entirely ignored and their culture has no impact on how matters are handled. It’s a complete mash of cultures, languages, technologies, and people. To me, it seems rather chaotic.
I halfway expected there to be at least some mention of history once as the characters travel to Istanbul, Paris, and finally Freeside in Switzerland. Instead, there is more of this recently created history. Freeside, which Molly claims is about 30 years old, seems to be a recent construct. This culture that moved into Switzerland originated in Jamaica but seems to have immigrated just as the expatriates of the Sprawl moved to Japan. In fact, two of the “Founders of Zion’ still live there. While there is an understanding that the entire Rasta cult started out in the 1930′s, the idea of it shifting into Zionism makes it difficult to imprint my imagined stereotypes onto the novel, even though most of the characters adhere to my assumptions.
A final comment I have is that while the scenery constantly defies expectations, most of the characters fulfill typical character roles. Molly is the femme fatale, Case is our intrepid detective, Riviera is an untrustworthy addict, etc. A lot of the story’s plot is based on character assumptions, but the twists to their characters in the form of augmentations constantly throws off my stereotype expectations.
How has the story so far lured you in with any expectations and then flipped them?