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The Atrocity Archives (A Laundry Files Novel) Mass Market Paperback – December 30, 2008

by Charles Stross (Author)

255 customer reviews

Book 1 of 5 in the Laundry Files Series

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The first novel in Hugo Award-winning author Charles Stross's witty Laundry Files series.

Bob Howard is a low-level techie working for a super-secret government agency. While his colleagues are out saving the world, Bob's under a desk restoring lost data. His world was dull and safe - but then he went and got Noticed.

Now, Bob is up to his neck in spycraft, parallel universes, dimension-hopping terrorists, monstrous elder gods and the end of the world. Only one thing is certain: it will take more than a full system reboot to sort this mess out . . .

The Atrocity Archives (A Laundry Files Novel)

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Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Lovecraft's Cthulhu meets Len Deighton's spies in Stross's latest, as the Scottish author explains in his afterword to this offbeat book offering two related long novellas, "The Atrocity Archive" and "The Concrete Jungle" (the latter previously unpublished). With often hilarious results, the author mixes the occult and the mundane, the truly weird and the petty. In "Atrocity," Bob, a low-level computer fix-it guy for the Laundry, a supersecret British agency that defends the world from occult happenings, finds himself promoted to fieldwork after he bravely saves the day during a routine demonstration gone awry. With his Palm, aka his Hand of Glory (a severed hand that, when ignited, renders the holder invisible), and his smarts, he saves the world from a powerful external force seeking to enter our universe to suck it dry. In "Jungle," Bob teams up with a cop, Josephine, to save the Laundry from a powermonger who seeks to stage an internal coup by using zombies as her minions. Amid all the bizarre happenings are the everyday trappings of a British bureaucracy. Bob gets called on the carpet by his bosses because he requested backup during an emergency without first getting his supervisor's okay and filling out the requisite forms. Though the characters all tend to sound the same, and Stross resorts to lengthy summary explanations to dispel confusion, the world he creates is wonderful fun.
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Review

“Like his peer Cory Doctorow, Stross has an ironic Generation X sensibility, conditioned, in his case, by time spent in the simultaneously thrilling and boring world of information technology. In The Atrocity Archives, Stross’s genius lies in devoting fully as much time to the bureaucratic shenanigans of the Laundry as he does to its thaumaturgic mission.” – The Washington Post Book World

“Much of the action is completely nuts, but Stross manages to ground it in believability through his protagonist’s deadpan reactions to both insane office politics and supernatural mayhem.” – San Francisco Chronicle

“If this keeps up, ‘Strossian’ is going to become a sci-fi adjective…Charles Stross writes with intelligence and enjoys lifting the rock to show you what’s crawling underneath…The clever results will bring a smile to your face.” – The Kansas City Star

“It’s science fiction’s most pleasant surprise of the year.” – San Francisco Chronicle

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Product details

Series: A Laundry Files Novel (Book 1)
Mass Market Paperback: 368 pages
Publisher: Ace; Reprint edition (December 30, 2008)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0441016685
ISBN-13: 978-0441016686
Product Dimensions: 4.2 x 1 x 6.8 inches
Shipping Weight: 6.4 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
Average Customer Review: 255 customer reviews
Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #295,796 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #1180 in Books > Science Fiction & Fantasy > Science Fiction > Cyberpunk
- #1467 in Books > Science Fiction & Fantasy > Science Fiction > Hard Science Fiction
- #2780 in Books > Mystery, Thriller & Suspense > Thrillers & Suspense > Spies & Politics > Espionage

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David G. Nichols

Spycraft meets Lovecraft, with mixed results

November 18, 2017

Format: PaperbackVerified Purchase

Combining genres always sounds liek a great idea. Here, we have a combination of cosmic horror and a spy novel. Plotting is sound, but suffers from uneven pacing. It sometimes feels like a very long time between interesting events. Maybe it's meant to build up tension; for me it didn't quite work. ANd there's a lot more office politics than I needed to read about.

There are flashes of brilliance; the investigation of an occult Nazi base is genuinely creepy, to the point of gossebumps in places, and some of the otherwordly horrors are exceptionally horrifying. Some of the combinations of technology and magic are very creative.

It might be relevant that the book was hyped by a friend as amazing before I read it, so I went in with very high expectations. I found it good, without quite reaching the greatness I was expecting.

If memory serves, this was Stross' first novel. It presents some unique concepts, marred a little by mediocre execution. I'll probably be checking out some of the later books in the series to see how the writing (and the story) develop.

.

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Whovian Nut

This series was recommended to me from a friend

November 21, 2017

Format: Kindle EditionVerified Purchase

This series was recommended to me from a friend. I read quite a bit of SF and have seen Stross' books but never dove into them. This books has some really novel ideas, but it executes strangely. I feel like I am missing out on half the jokes because they are heavily IT based or programming based. I can figure out the joke his going for, but I don't get the same enjoyment. A little more explanation on the back-end would go a long way.

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Matt Ranlett

Bond, James Bond, the cyberpunk magician

September 5, 2017

Format: Kindle EditionVerified Purchase

With great stakes and great humor, Bob Dave's the world from his role as a network engineer and active field agent of the hyper-secret agency, The Laundry. Even knowing about it is an act of reason is you're not in the fold.
Fun read! I've done this one as an Audible narration and I've got 4 more books from the library on my table waiting to get devoured.

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William G. Hartwell

Best successor to Lovecraft

December 30, 2017

Format: Kindle EditionVerified Purchase

If you are a fan of the eldritch, and know anything about 90s geek culture, you'll be right at home. I've read some of the stories Mr. Stross has made available featuring Bob, but this really sets up his world in a way that is both entertaining and informative, and makes the later stories better. I alternated between rooting for Bob and feeling sorry for him (bureaucracy sucks, OK?), and enjoyed every minute. Note... Set aside a full evening, because you won't want to put it down.

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Niles Jacobsen

A most unusual spy novel

May 31, 2015

Format: Kindle EditionVerified Purchase

Pratchett states that if the world contains things that even the dark is afraid of, then you can bet that there'll be a secret government agency covering them up for our own good. Such is the premise behind "The Atrocity Archives." The Laundry is the British organization tasked with keeping their country safe from paranormal phenomenon and extra terrestrial uglies.

The Laundry is a rogue intelligence agency battling to prevent infestations of extradimensional horrors. Bob Howard is our hero, a computer geek working in the IT department who is drafted into field duty. However, while Bob is out saving the world from who knows what horrors, his boss in the IT department is constantly on his case for everything from missing meetings to not filling out his time sheet. This struck me as humorous and all to real when considering a government institution. The Laundry brings to mind the spy world of "Get Smart" as the facility itself is accessed through a toilet stall.

"The Atrocity Archives" is the most unusual spy novel I believe I have ever read, and the Laundry the most unusual organization. Guardians of the dark secrets that threaten to drown us in nightmare, the lips of the Laundry employees are sealed as tight as their archives. To get even the vaguest outline of their activities takes a privileged hacker like Bob, nosy enough to worm his way in where he isn't supposed to and smart enough to explain his way out of trouble.

Bob Howard is about as far away from the James Bond stereotype as he can get. He is, at heart, a geek. He is not suave, debonair, or particularly charismatic. He is not a ladies man, and in fact is trying to get rid of his psycho ex-girlfriend. But Bob does have his strengths, most notably his intellect, and is able to handle himself ably enough in the field. If the ultimate grade of a spy is results, then Bob Howard represents his craft well.

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Most recent customer reviews

ECZR

Five Stars

Great read. Lovecraft meets XKCD meets New Public Management. Am looking forward to the rest of the series

Published 1 month ago

Parallax

Love it :-)

This is what happens when your humor is darkly sarcastic, your profession is IT but your lifelong hobby is the details and histories of intelligence agencies.Read more

Published 1 month ago

Bugwar

Four Stars

fun to read

Published 1 month ago

Kindle Customer

To British and too smart for me

The book references too many British people and places without explanation for me to completely follow.Read more

Published 2 months ago

illiandantic

Spy Thriller, Lovecraftian Horror, and Science Fiction. Oh, my!

Charles Stross' "The Atrocity Archives (Laundry Files Book 1)" is the first book in his "Laundry Files" series and is a compendium of two stories: "The...Laundry Files (7 Book Series)Read more

Published 2 months ago

Amazon Customer

fun and we'll

Unique story, fun and we'll written

Published 3 months ago

azurelunatic

Delicious!

Half a pint of spy novel infused with Dilbert-level bureaucracy, a shot of techno-thriller, and a jigger of Lovecraftian horrors. Shaken, not stirred.

Published 3 months ago

G. Nielsen

a feeling of realness of the described (people types and situations are uncanny recognizable) and the language you really enjoy.

A clever book, an ingenious plot, a feeling of realness of the described (people types and situations are uncanny recognizable) and the language you really enjoy.

Published 3 months ago

Lisa V Padol

Solid first book and they only get better

This is the first of the Laundry books, and not as strong as Stross will later get. It is not a bad book by any means, and I do recommend starting here.Read more

Published 3 months ago

jeph jacques

Four Stars

I can't believe the government is this poorly run! Fascinating nonfiction by Charles Stross.

Published 3 months ago

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