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midnight's simulacra
Code stoned. Debug sober. Document drunk. And never trust the Nuclear Regulatory Commission.
Michael Luis Bolaño is the scion of Mexican oil wealth gone to rut in Texas. Sherman Spartacus Katz is the hyperliterate son of evangelical eccentrics from the North Georgia mountains. One hopes to restore what's been lost, the other to attain what never was. Together at an elite Institute of Technology they train as engineers. Together in the dark they study forbidden teachings. By graduation, they're formidably competent, audacious to a fault, and wholly ungovernable.
Need LSD precursors? Biosynthesize them in yeast. Need souped-up wheelchairs? Disarm the governors. Need enriched uranium? CO₂ TEA lasers in the garage. Where there's a black market, they disrupt it. Where there's no black market, they create one.
midnight's simulacra is a hysterical, scientifically rigorous, and fastpaced thriller, a modern picaresque, a portrait of autists as young men, and unlike any other novel you've read.
Michael Luis Bolaño is the scion of Mexican oil wealth gone to rut in Texas. Sherman Spartacus Katz is the hyperliterate son of evangelical eccentrics from the North Georgia mountains. One hopes to restore what's been lost, the other to attain what never was. Together at an elite Institute of Technology they train as engineers. Together in the dark they study forbidden teachings. By graduation, they're formidably competent, audacious to a fault, and wholly ungovernable.
Need LSD precursors? Biosynthesize them in yeast. Need souped-up wheelchairs? Disarm the governors. Need enriched uranium? CO₂ TEA lasers in the garage. Where there's a black market, they disrupt it. Where there's no black market, they create one.
midnight's simulacra is a hysterical, scientifically rigorous, and fastpaced thriller, a modern picaresque, a portrait of autists as young men, and unlike any other novel you've read.
- GenresFiction
485 pages, Hardcover
Published January 2, 2024
About the author
Nick Black
2 books923 followersAn outpost of literacy from the southeast, putting Atlanta on the Goodreads map.
I dig exposure to a broad swath of new material, and add pretty much anyone who seems interesting. What's in it for you? Prolixness? Old-school Southern charm? More blindingly-obscure scientific esoterica puked into your mailbox than you can shake a pointed stick at? Irregular bursts of punchy reviews by the dozen, marked by general irreverence and oft-breathtaking ignorance? Yes, Faithful Reader, all this and more can be had within.
I am lettered in Latin of the rhetorical era, and can fumble my way through Ancient Greek; I also try to mangle some Spanish, German and Russian whenever I can. Expect the abuse of UTF-8.
I'm a senior systems engineer at Google NYC following work at Georgia Tech's College of Computing (focusing on high-performance computing architectures, automata theory, compiler design, and the foundations of computing) with side interests in the School of Nuclear Engineering (toroidal hydromagnetic and inertial confinement fusion, stockpile stewardship and fourth-generation reactors). I lived in Atlanta most of my life, and intend to run for mayor there one day. Resurgens!
I dig exposure to a broad swath of new material, and add pretty much anyone who seems interesting. What's in it for you? Prolixness? Old-school Southern charm? More blindingly-obscure scientific esoterica puked into your mailbox than you can shake a pointed stick at? Irregular bursts of punchy reviews by the dozen, marked by general irreverence and oft-breathtaking ignorance? Yes, Faithful Reader, all this and more can be had within.
I am lettered in Latin of the rhetorical era, and can fumble my way through Ancient Greek; I also try to mangle some Spanish, German and Russian whenever I can. Expect the abuse of UTF-8.
I'm a senior systems engineer at Google NYC following work at Georgia Tech's College of Computing (focusing on high-performance computing architectures, automata theory, compiler design, and the foundations of computing) with side interests in the School of Nuclear Engineering (toroidal hydromagnetic and inertial confinement fusion, stockpile stewardship and fourth-generation reactors). I lived in Atlanta most of my life, and intend to run for mayor there one day. Resurgens!
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Displaying 1 - 10 of 10 reviews
October 12, 2024
midnight's simulacra is both utterly unique and explicitly derivative. It wears it's (inspirations|antecedents) proudly and without reservation playing off Pynchon, RAW, the better parts of Infinite Jest, Joyce, Burroughs, and likely a host of authors on my to-read shelf and beyond but it does stand separate from them all in tone and setting. It is somehow both a coming of age novel and a series of technical treatises condensed to near criticality. It contains multitudes.
The maxim "Write what you know" is here in full force. Although most typically interpret it as the inverse "Don't write what you don't know" and take it proscriptively it seems here to be taken almost as an imperative. Lengthy dives into computing, chemistry, nuclear physics, and more loaded with denser jargon than your typical textbook but they go beyond being merely descriptive. The sections of these I know like the back of my hand delight and the parts that stretch beyond my knowledge I allow to wash over me and impart what they will of both fact and style. Not everyone is going to be able to bring that mindset and since few folks will bring the exact same set of scientific and literary passions as the author it is a necessary pretext to engage with the work. It brings to mind my first few attempts to dive into Gravity's Rainbow, scribbling notes so frequently and spending so much time trying to fully grok every piece in totality that it was destroying the experience of reading it. Only in acceptance that you aren't the author and there may be things present that you don't take away can you be in the right mindset to actually appreciate it. That may be easier for many in works that are more poetry than technical treatise but these distinctions are of our own making.
Earlier parts of the novel truly capture the experience of being a high powered nerd at an elite university, the joie de vivre arising from the process of discovery, the camaraderie of those around you, and the brutality, contempt, and despair from a collective struggle against/for the university that a surprisingly high percentage won't prevail in. If you know you know. There is a tinge of Hesse-style Bildungsroman captured here that remains an undercurrent through the rest of the book.
Certainly not for everyone, definitely for me.
The maxim "Write what you know" is here in full force. Although most typically interpret it as the inverse "Don't write what you don't know" and take it proscriptively it seems here to be taken almost as an imperative. Lengthy dives into computing, chemistry, nuclear physics, and more loaded with denser jargon than your typical textbook but they go beyond being merely descriptive. The sections of these I know like the back of my hand delight and the parts that stretch beyond my knowledge I allow to wash over me and impart what they will of both fact and style. Not everyone is going to be able to bring that mindset and since few folks will bring the exact same set of scientific and literary passions as the author it is a necessary pretext to engage with the work. It brings to mind my first few attempts to dive into Gravity's Rainbow, scribbling notes so frequently and spending so much time trying to fully grok every piece in totality that it was destroying the experience of reading it. Only in acceptance that you aren't the author and there may be things present that you don't take away can you be in the right mindset to actually appreciate it. That may be easier for many in works that are more poetry than technical treatise but these distinctions are of our own making.
Earlier parts of the novel truly capture the experience of being a high powered nerd at an elite university, the joie de vivre arising from the process of discovery, the camaraderie of those around you, and the brutality, contempt, and despair from a collective struggle against/for the university that a surprisingly high percentage won't prevail in. If you know you know. There is a tinge of Hesse-style Bildungsroman captured here that remains an undercurrent through the rest of the book.
Certainly not for everyone, definitely for me.
February 18, 2025
Very modernist and interesting, the kind of ambitious fiction I like to read. Here is my longer review: http://www.rawillumination.net/2025/0...
March 19, 2026
This book is a hidden gem.
If I had to describe it in the simplest way possible, it would be a Breaking Bad spin of the Computer Science variety with a strong mix of autistic obsessions in the form of long and dense technical rants about everything, from LSD manufacturing to uranium enrichment using lasers, at a college level, including the formulas.
The author and his characters are hyper-intellectual, you are going to need the internet to read this book, because the amount of obscure words, topics and references is deliberately overwhelming to create the very cool impression of riding along in the mind of an extremely smart and unusual guy. The hyperlinks to the translations at the back of the book, for the endless quotes in multiple languages, were extremely useful.
This was a fun ride, but it's not for everybody. Technically minded readers with a love for books will feel right at home.
If I had to describe it in the simplest way possible, it would be a Breaking Bad spin of the Computer Science variety with a strong mix of autistic obsessions in the form of long and dense technical rants about everything, from LSD manufacturing to uranium enrichment using lasers, at a college level, including the formulas.
The author and his characters are hyper-intellectual, you are going to need the internet to read this book, because the amount of obscure words, topics and references is deliberately overwhelming to create the very cool impression of riding along in the mind of an extremely smart and unusual guy. The hyperlinks to the translations at the back of the book, for the endless quotes in multiple languages, were extremely useful.
This was a fun ride, but it's not for everybody. Technically minded readers with a love for books will feel right at home.
January 2, 2024
disclosure: i am the author.
the finest tale of rogue engineering of which i am aware.
is it truly five stars? i wish i had had more time to work on it. i approached my employers in May 2023, and said, "i am a forty-three year old divorced hax0r. i have no children, no family, and no longer expect to have them. meanwhile, i watch younger engineers take endless paternity leaves every time they drop a child. my thoughts will be my only legacy. i want a six month sabbatical to write a novel." bless microsoft for being cool and me for being badass--they let me have it. so i had six months to write this, and used every day and night (git logs can confirm this). i finished today, New Years Day 2024.
what's there is there, and every time i read it, i get chills. there's some fantastic shit in this book. there's hardcore engineering, probably the most hardcore i've seen outside of Greg Egan, and he's scifi. i'm working under the constraints of human technology circa 2010, and it's all there--i can almost guarantee you'll know more about computer science, physics, math, chemistry, and biology after reading this than you did before. are there equations? fuck yes there are. couldn't properly tell a story of engineers otherwise. we watch the deuteragonists grow from precocious children to firehosed engineering students to masters of their craft. their craft is pretty much anything illegal they can get away with.
i don't want to spoil things, but be prepared for supercharging wheelchairs, four different ways to manufacture LSD, at-home uranium enrichment, CRISPR, software defined radio, and other current science. unlike Crichton or Clancy, i believe i've succeeded in developing real characters in addition to plots+tech. you are likely to cry at the end.
is it as good as Ulysses? Naked Lunch? Gravity's Rainbow? from an artistic perspective, no. is it a potboiler you'll tear through while learning lots? it absolutely is that. is it the book i've waited all my life to read, and finally had to write? it is that more than anything else.
also, it contains the results of my reverse engineering of the classified SILEX procedure for isotope enrichment via laser. i think i got most everything right. looking forward to a charge under the Atomic Energy Act. come at me, NRC.
i enjoyed writing it, and enjoyed reading it. i think it's something special, and unlike any other novel i've ever come across. i hope you do, too. if not, tell me to fuck off. i'll be cool either way.
ps: this book is page-oriented, and made to be read that way. the EPUB makes some tradeoffs in terms of layout etc. that i did not like, but that's what's required to sell on Kindle. i strongly recommend a print version, or the PDF (not autoconverted, shudder), which will be made freely available on my website 2024-01-09, when the print versions drop.
the finest tale of rogue engineering of which i am aware.
is it truly five stars? i wish i had had more time to work on it. i approached my employers in May 2023, and said, "i am a forty-three year old divorced hax0r. i have no children, no family, and no longer expect to have them. meanwhile, i watch younger engineers take endless paternity leaves every time they drop a child. my thoughts will be my only legacy. i want a six month sabbatical to write a novel." bless microsoft for being cool and me for being badass--they let me have it. so i had six months to write this, and used every day and night (git logs can confirm this). i finished today, New Years Day 2024.
what's there is there, and every time i read it, i get chills. there's some fantastic shit in this book. there's hardcore engineering, probably the most hardcore i've seen outside of Greg Egan, and he's scifi. i'm working under the constraints of human technology circa 2010, and it's all there--i can almost guarantee you'll know more about computer science, physics, math, chemistry, and biology after reading this than you did before. are there equations? fuck yes there are. couldn't properly tell a story of engineers otherwise. we watch the deuteragonists grow from precocious children to firehosed engineering students to masters of their craft. their craft is pretty much anything illegal they can get away with.
i don't want to spoil things, but be prepared for supercharging wheelchairs, four different ways to manufacture LSD, at-home uranium enrichment, CRISPR, software defined radio, and other current science. unlike Crichton or Clancy, i believe i've succeeded in developing real characters in addition to plots+tech. you are likely to cry at the end.
is it as good as Ulysses? Naked Lunch? Gravity's Rainbow? from an artistic perspective, no. is it a potboiler you'll tear through while learning lots? it absolutely is that. is it the book i've waited all my life to read, and finally had to write? it is that more than anything else.
also, it contains the results of my reverse engineering of the classified SILEX procedure for isotope enrichment via laser. i think i got most everything right. looking forward to a charge under the Atomic Energy Act. come at me, NRC.
i enjoyed writing it, and enjoyed reading it. i think it's something special, and unlike any other novel i've ever come across. i hope you do, too. if not, tell me to fuck off. i'll be cool either way.
ps: this book is page-oriented, and made to be read that way. the EPUB makes some tradeoffs in terms of layout etc. that i did not like, but that's what's required to sell on Kindle. i strongly recommend a print version, or the PDF (not autoconverted, shudder), which will be made freely available on my website 2024-01-09, when the print versions drop.
April 7, 2025
In my view, Midnight’s Simulacra is a wild, brainy, genre-defying ride through science, counterculture, and subversive brilliance. Think Breaking Bad meets Infinite Jest, with a heavy dose of hacker ethos and underground chemistry.
I liked the story very much since Nick Black’s novel is equal parts technothriller, picaresque, and philosophical memoir of two wildly gifted outcasts: Michael Luis Bolaño, heir to oil wealth, and Sherman Spartacus Katz, the messianic savant from Georgia’s backwoods. Together they forge a path through Georgia Tech’s engineering crucible, hell-bent on mastering not just academia but the alchemy of modern power—chemical, nuclear, and intellectual.
I felt the writing was sharp, polyglot, and gloriously indulgent. In particular, I thought the footnotes spiral into strange ingenious brilliance. Scientific details are never window dressing — they are central to the plot, the humor, and the danger. I also felt this novel captures the heady rush of being young, brilliant, and untethered in late '90s Atlanta, where ambition, obsession, and the law collide at midnight in makeshift labs and neon-lit clubs.
I believe this isn’t just a novel — it’s a manifesto for the irrepressibly curious, a love letter to autodidacts, and a warning wrapped in wit: knowledge is power, and power is never neutral.
If you’ve ever yearned to jailbreak the world itself, Midnight’s Simulacra is your kind of dangerous gospel.
All in all, I believe this is an amazing book written by a highly-intelligent author who’s exceptionally entertaining, innovative, and unique. Highly recommended!
It was my pleasure to receive a copy of this book, and it does not in any way affect my opinion of this extraordinary and exceptional book.
I liked the story very much since Nick Black’s novel is equal parts technothriller, picaresque, and philosophical memoir of two wildly gifted outcasts: Michael Luis Bolaño, heir to oil wealth, and Sherman Spartacus Katz, the messianic savant from Georgia’s backwoods. Together they forge a path through Georgia Tech’s engineering crucible, hell-bent on mastering not just academia but the alchemy of modern power—chemical, nuclear, and intellectual.
I felt the writing was sharp, polyglot, and gloriously indulgent. In particular, I thought the footnotes spiral into strange ingenious brilliance. Scientific details are never window dressing — they are central to the plot, the humor, and the danger. I also felt this novel captures the heady rush of being young, brilliant, and untethered in late '90s Atlanta, where ambition, obsession, and the law collide at midnight in makeshift labs and neon-lit clubs.
I believe this isn’t just a novel — it’s a manifesto for the irrepressibly curious, a love letter to autodidacts, and a warning wrapped in wit: knowledge is power, and power is never neutral.
If you’ve ever yearned to jailbreak the world itself, Midnight’s Simulacra is your kind of dangerous gospel.
All in all, I believe this is an amazing book written by a highly-intelligent author who’s exceptionally entertaining, innovative, and unique. Highly recommended!
It was my pleasure to receive a copy of this book, and it does not in any way affect my opinion of this extraordinary and exceptional book.
February 9, 2025
A ridiculously erudite novel about two young STEM brainiacs who decide to go into the drug trade, and then onto darker materials. RIYL Mark Leyner and the gnarlier scientific parts of Gravity’s Rainbow and Infinite Jest. The science is daunting, but like those three, Black has a flair for language that helps it go down smooth. Lots of catch-’em-if-you-can literary allusions, amusing puns and slang, niche subculture references, explanatory footnotes, and multilingual maximalist prose that is by turns elegant and snarky—meaning it’s fun to read even if you can’t grok the tech talk. My kind of novel, and likely to become a cult classic.
April 29, 2025
an exciting and funny tale, but dragged on a bit with the breadth/depth of technical content. the ones i understood easily (math and cs bits) were enjoyable, but even those i felt detracted from the story. seemed more like filler when the author wasn't sure of what to write and left me wanting more exposition on the characters and story. i shifted between absolutely needing to continue the next chapter and slogging through a section on chemistry or nuclear physics. nonetheless, still worth a read imo.
hi nick!
hi nick!
November 12, 2024
garbage from start to where you give up and wonder why you even tried. Words from an angry person who has no talent worth sharing.
September 11, 2025
this book is perfect. it reignited my love of reading. will tell everyone I know about this book.
August 6, 2024
Dope!
Displaying 1 - 10 of 10 reviews