It's not that I don't like Neuromancer, it might be in my top 10 favorite books (but more towards the bottom of that list), but every time I see it mentioned as the "seminal cyberpunk epic", I roll my eyes, because I know these people have never read another cyberpunk book, there were others before Neuromancer and long after.
So educate yourself, make yourself less eye-rolling to me. Here's a little tiny reading list. When you're done with that, hit the KUOI archive on the right, find my Cyberpunk page, work through that. Or maybe I'll pull it out of archive and update it by then? There's a lot in the last 10-15 years since I touched the page.
First:
- Pat Cadigan: Synners, Mindplayers, and Tea from an Empty Cup — easily my favorite.
- Rudy Rucker: Software/Wetware/Freeware/Realware — free ebooks!
- Bruce Sterling: Schismatrix and Mirrorshades: The Cyberpunk Anthology — the latter is expensive and out of print, but get it if you can.
- John Shirley: Eclipse/A Song Called Youth — survival handbook for the 21st C.
Then:
- Bruce Bethke: Headcrash — the guy who invented the term "Cyberpunk".
- Neal Stephenson: Snow Crash and Diamond Age — a little campy/parody, but great books.
- Walter Jon Williams: Hardwired — creepy-ass post-human soldiers and assassins.
- Vernor Vinge: True Names and Other Dangers — origin of cyberspace.