[LordArioch]

Hurray! Somebody mentioned Vance. Call me a madman, but I find his obscure choice of words very enjoyable. Cugel in particular is a very enjoyable character, even if I never want to meet him personally. The Lyonesse trilogy was good too.

Oh, and PhilD, if you haven't noticed yet, you can find a couple of Egan's short stories on his webpage along with entertaining java applets and background science at varying levels of techicality. I would have to agree that at least some level of understanding of science is necessary. Honestly I'm not really sure what happens during the second half of Schild's Ladder myself. Sometime I'll have to educate myself about spin networks and read it again.