Going out on a limb here. Charlie Stross. I'm having a hard time getting through Accelerando. He's obviously a very smart, well-informed guy, but he seems preoccupied with his own cleverness. technical term, technical term, technical term, pop culture reference (psych! Didn't see that one coming, did you!). I can almost hear him giggling to himself as I read. And as I said on another thread, I'm not getting many new ideas from his stuff. He goes into great detail, but most of the big ideas are things I've come across elsewhere. Which would be OK, but The Big Idea is closer to center stage in his stories.