Here’s a link to a not-so-short preview of Neal Stephenson’s new book Termination Shock, coming out next month.

The preview is full of all the wonderful stuff that I’ve always loved about Neal Stephenson’s writing—characters that are weirdly oddball yet completely relatable, and the sort of details that speak to both keen insight and deep obsession. Just in the first few pages we learn more than a little about how royalty think, how to fly a jet, the ecology of feral hogs, and the madness that comes from the death of a young child. And I think the very next bit is going to be about the martial arts of northern India.

I have already pre-ordered it, and can’t imagine any Neal Stephenson fan who starts reading the preview doing anything else.