Road Side Picnic.
If you like the idea of the game STALKER you will enjoy the book. If you don't like the idea of the game you probably wont. If you don't know what the game is you should probably have a look at it. It's easy to read, though I am "reading" the audiobook which is about 7-8 hours long, so pretty digestible as most books go.
Before that I "read" Alphabet Squadron (which is a post-return-of-the-jedi starwars book). It was pretty good. I liked the protagonist, has some characters flaws which I always enjoy. Again I used the audiobook which has the classic starwars audio book style where it's got sporadic music and effects, IMO not overly so though, just enough to be atmospheric. Only one reader, not "fully cast".
XMPP is a "public protocol" too, google came in, "supported it", then defederated from it and took all their users. Big companies have technical sway, hell, just look at how chrome can push and block w3c standards because its the big voice in the room and you either conform to them or slowly die.