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Three Days to Never

3.62 of 5 stars 3.62 · rating details · 1,300 ratings · 162 reviews

When Albert Einstein told Franklin Roosevelt in 1939 that the atomic bomb was possible, he did not tell the president about another discovery he had made, something so extreme and horrific it remained a secret . . . until now. This extraordinary new novel from one of the most brilliant talents in contemporary fiction is a standout literary thriller in which one man stumble...more

Hardcover, 420 pages

Published August 8th 2006 by William Morrow (first published 2006)

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The Time Traveler's Wife by Audrey Niffenegger

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Mar 11, 2010 Sandi rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: california-lit, 2010, cross-genre, fantasy, library-books-read, mystery-thriller

Tim Powers is not an easy author to read. It took me two tries to get through Declare because it was so densely packed action and ideas. It required way too much brain power the first time I tried to read it. The Anubis Gates was convoluted and required a bit of knowledge about English Literature (thank goodness I majored) and Egyptian mythology (limited, at best). Both were very good, but required a lot of work out of the reader.

With Three Days to Never, Powers manages to make his fantastically...more

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May 26, 2008 Kim rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition Recommends it for: fans of thought-provoking science fiction or fantasy

I always find Tim Powers's books brilliant, but I'll confess that I like best the ones concerning time periods or subjects that interest me most. For this reason, his Declare, which immediately preceded Three Days. . .and dealt with Cold War espionage (as well as more arcane matters), interested me less than, for example, The Stress of Her Regard, about the Romantic poets and their muse, not because it was necessarily a worse book. Three Days to Never lacks the mythic resonance of Stress. . ., a...more

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Sep 13, 2008 Coleman rated it 5 of 5 stars

Shelves: tim-powers

***Zero Spoilers***

I picked this up because it promised to have a bit of time travel in it. It ended up having a bit of everything in it.

One and a half acts into this book I had no idea what was going on. I didn't like it. There was just too much happening for me to follow. That, plus with so many supernatural things spinning about, I had a hard time understanding the ground on which the book stood. I considered giving up numerous times but something told me to wait and that it was all about to...more

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Feb 15, 2009 Tim rated it 3 of 5 stars

As Tim Powers novels go, "Three Days to Never" is a lackluster effort. For anyone else, this is a pretty entertaining novel.

For me, here Powers mines what these days has become his usual formula -- twists on souls, espionage, alternate history, people using unusual powers, fantastic explanations for ordinary events -- and, well, finds it pretty much tapped out. In "Three Days to Never" EVERYONE has amazing abilities, not everything is adequately explained, and the competing groups (I won't even...more

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Apr 22, 2008 Guy rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: hebrew, own

This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here.

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Mar 15, 2012 Alan rated it 4 of 5 stars Recommends it for: Time-trippers and people not worried overmuch about the afterlife

Recommended to Alan by: Both previous and subsequent work, superimposed in spacetime

Three Days to Never is about... well, it's complicated. Basically, it starts with Albert Einstein's unacknowledged great-grandchildren, and the time machine in their grandmother's shed. Or something like that. It starts with a rock in the desert that used to bear an inscription, and Charlie Chaplin's handprints in wet concrete. No... it starts with Frank and Daphne Marrity, a widowed father and his daughter living near San Bernardino, and with a VHS copy of Pee-Wee's Big Adventure. No, that's no...more Three Days to Never is about... well, it's complicated. Basically, it starts with Albert Einstein's unacknowledged great-grandchildren, and the time machine in their grandmother's shed. Or something like that. It starts with a rock in the desert that used to bear an inscription, and Charlie Chaplin's handprints in wet concrete. No... it starts with Frank and Daphne Marrity, a widowed father and his daughter living near San Bernardino, and with a VHS copy of Pee-Wee's Big Adventure. No, that's not it either. It starts with a half-dead head in a box, chattering directions to the driver of an anonymous white van, and with an NSA agent who actually works for Israel's Mossad. No, it... well, it's complicated.

Three Days to Never is undoubtedly a challenging book to read and follow. That's what happens when you start messing around with time and space, with spacetime convincingly considered as a single navigable plenum. Things get complicated. The book contains the most realistic and vivid evocation I've yet run across concerning the nature of time, and how one might rise above our mundane experience of duration in order to see the totality of spacetime as a single entity. In that way, and despite other elements, this novel is almost science fiction. But that's only a part of the book's furniture. Other elements flatly contradict its hard-science aspects. It's got ghosts in it, too, and bilocation, and Kabbalah, and a Rubik's Cube with Hebrew letters on the faces of each cube, and... the novel would probably fly away into a dozen different pieces, if it weren't held together by Frank and Daphne, strong central characters whose love for each other binds them more closely than would be possible in a non-magical world.

What Powers has crafted here is an intensely cerebral thriller. While there are plenty of gunshots and car chases, the engine of the plot is a vast and intellectual conspiracy whose ultimate goal is to take control of everything, past, present and future—to retroactively have made its own success inevitable. The players are many, and their methods are exceedingly subtle—does that newspaper, folded just that way and held at that particular angle, mean the coast is clear, or is it a signal to run out the back door?

What Three Days to Never is really about... is complicated.

We're not quite talking perfection here. I wouldn't have noticed it if I hadn't just read Powers' more recent collection The Bible Repairman, but here again Powers indulges in an oddly fervent recitation of tobacco-friendly motifs. Cigarettes—smoked publicly, even in front of children—were still a common sight in this book's primary eras, but apparently they can also repel ghosts. I'm not sure whether Powers himself is directly aware of just how much space he gives to cigarettes, cigarette butts, matches and lighters, pipes and pipe tobacco, throughout the pages of this book. From a 21st-century perspective, though, the constant smog does seem a little excessive.

On the whole, though, this is exactly the sort of brilliant work I look for in a Powers novel. I would love to see this book made into a film, too, if it could be done without compromising the nonlinear canvas and the magical elements that make this book more than just a mundane thriller. It wouldn't be easy to do right, at all—portraying the multiple changes in point of view on film would be an incredible challenge. Christopher Nolan, the guy who directed Memento and Inception, could probably manage it, but I'm not sure that any Hollywood director would have both the clout and the desire to do justice to Three Days to Never.

So I recommend you just incorporate the written work into your worldline. If you're anything like me, you will have been glad you did.(less)

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Jul 15, 2009 Guy rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: science-fiction-and-fantasy

Tim Powers and James Blaylock are a genre of two... no-other authors I've read are as successful at creating the impression that there are strange depths hidden in, and consistent alternate explanations for, history as we know it. I'm a little at a loss as to how to characterize what they do. Their books have elements of the occult, but they are much more scientific and pragmatic than the typically melodramatic exemplars of that genre. They aren't alternate histories because nothing is changed.....more

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Jul 02, 2009 Noah M. marked it as abandoned-for-sucking

My wife's coworker's husband, a chemist and supposed fan of hard science fiction, loaned me this book...for some reason. Unprovoked book loaning. Well, alright, I'll give it the old college try, I guess. I'm between books. May as well.

OK. I gave this book 80 pages, which is close to my standard 100pg cutoff point.

There's stuff about psychics that is sort of interesting, and it's all wound up in a Jewish conspiracy that involves kabbalah and Israeli intelligence agencies...but it just didn't grab...more

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Jun 26, 2009 Kitt rated it 4 of 5 stars

Received this book from Mike Gull, along with a pile of other books (like Thousand Words for Stranger) that he had read and that I just *had* to read. Placing it about 12th in my pile, I finally reached it this past weekend, and started reading.

The first few chapters are difficult to get into, as they jump right into the story, with the characters being as confused about events as the reader is. I'm delighted by this type of storytelling, as I'd much rather the author show us what's going on thr...more

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Jul 29, 2011 Donna rated it 5 of 5 stars

Albert Einstein, A little old lady from Pasadena, Charlie Chaplin, and a time machine...intrigued? You should be. The premise: unknown to the rest of the world Einstein did in fact discover the secret to time travel but was horrified by the potential for misuse. Believing it to be even more dangerous than the hydrogen bomb he never publishes this work and entrusts the secret to only one person, a heretofore unknown daughter living in Southern California under an assumed name, with instructions t...more

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Feb 28, 2010 Lightreads rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: disability, fiction, science-fiction

. First I'm going to rave about how shiny awesome this book is, and then I'm going to have a bit of a screaming rant and kick it repeatedly until it stops whimpering. Okay? Okay.

So this book is awesome! It's a whacky weird skiffy thriller about a father and daughter, and family secrets, and time travel, and Einstein, and ESP, and Israel, and just, stuff. Wildly creative and totally absorbing, with some funny tucked in around the edges. And it's not perfect – the thematic movement about determini...more . First I'm going to rave about how shiny awesome this book is, and then I'm going to have a bit of a screaming rant and kick it repeatedly until it stops whimpering. Okay? Okay.

So this book is awesome! It's a whacky weird skiffy thriller about a father and daughter, and family secrets, and time travel, and Einstein, and ESP, and Israel, and just, stuff. Wildly creative and totally absorbing, with some funny tucked in around the edges. And it's not perfect – the thematic movement about determinism and choice doesn't quite come together in the end – but you know, it was just so much fun.

This book also made me so angry, I'm about to try and tell you but I already know I really can't. See, there's a character who does a series of morally despicable things, and who at one point literally begs to be erased from the timeline so she never would have existed, because, wait for it, she would rather never have existed than be blind.

I am so fucking sick of this, I am choking on it. It's not that this doesn't happen to people who acquire disabilities, it's that this sort of characterization is the default assumption of literature. And this narrative in particular validates her in a number of implicit ways, even while it hands her an abortive sort of redemption story. And I just. I can't even!

It's not that it doesn't happen, like I said. Actually, when I finished this book I went back and read some of my journal entries from three years ago, right after I lost my eye. I wanted to remind myself just how bad it was, and yeah, I was a huddle of feral, shaking black terror for months. But I'm not anymore. And here's the thing that's really lit my fuse.

The dominant narrative construction of acquired disability – in literature as derived from general social life – is of heroism, and I am telling you right now that it is bullshit. The person who acquires a disability and who copes and goes on with life isn't heroic; the person who acquires a disability and fails to cope is a failure. A failure of ingenuity, of thoughtfulness, of curiosity, of adaptability. I get this all the time from random people on the train who are all, "I couldn't live like you do, you're so brave!" And I'm like, okay, first of all, contrary to your lovely implication there, my life is a close relation to fucking awesome. And secondly, yes you could. That's what we do, we deal. And thirdly, stop othering me, because when you turn me into a hero you're making sure you don't ever really have to deal with the fact that I'm just like you, and what happened to me could happen to anyone. I am, and it could, so pull up your big girl pants and deal with it.

This book didn't, at all, and it is a measure of how otherwise crazy cool it is that it's getting three stars out of me.(less)

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May 26, 2012 Theo Logos rated it 4 of 5 stars

Shelves: speculative-fiction, urban-fantasy

Tim Powers is the only living writer of speculative fiction who regularly excites my interest, so I had been eagerly anticipating reading his latest effort, `Three Days To Never'. While I agree with others who have stated that it is not among his strongest work, it still looms far above most of what currently passes for speculative fiction, and did not disappoint me. I consumed the book in a day, and it was a most satisfying experience.

Powers does a couple of things better than anyone else I kno...more Tim Powers is the only living writer of speculative fiction who regularly excites my interest, so I had been eagerly anticipating reading his latest effort, `Three Days To Never'. While I agree with others who have stated that it is not among his strongest work, it still looms far above most of what currently passes for speculative fiction, and did not disappoint me. I consumed the book in a day, and it was a most satisfying experience.

Powers does a couple of things better than anyone else I know of working in his genre. The first is to accurately portray human character across its full range of possibilities. His protagonists are almost always flawed, sometimes deeply, and his villains sometimes show discomforting traces of goodness. While he strongly hints that there are absolutes of good and evil in his universe, his human characters always have a certain amount of moral ambiguity, and you sense that his heroes are never too far from crossing the line and falling to the estate of his most monstrous bad guys. In `Three Days To Never', Powers illustrates this more starkly than ever before by using the possibilities of a time travel plot to double one of his characters and use him as both hero and villain - showing the extremes of both nobility and depravity that can exist in all of us.

The other feat at which Powers excels is in creating a fascinating and consistent universe that encompasses nearly all of his writing. The world he writes of is a world we recognize as our own, yet tilted oddly askew - refocused through an eldritch lens and given an arcane, funhouse feel. It little matters which of his books you first enter through into his universe, whether it be the siege of Vienna in `The Drawing of the Dark', cruising with Caribbean pirates in `On Stranger Tides', playing high stakes poker in Vegas in `Last Call', or navigating the deadly cloak and dagger games of the cold war in `Declare' - the crazy logic of his mystical universe remains remarkably consistent, from the monstrous, inhuman powers that lay just outside the spectrum of our daily lives that are summoned with Kabalistic magicks, to the madhouse, anti-logic of his ghosts who hover near us in an obscene caricature of the living world. It is the aura imparted by this peculiar universe which gives all of his work a unique stamp, much like Keith Richards' guitar work does for Rolling Stones songs. `Three Days To Never' is no exception to this rule. If entering the Powers universe sends chilling thrills through you as it does me, you will not be disappointed by this latest of his works.

This book does have its flaws. The connections to Einstein and Chaplin are more forced than are the historical allusions in his other works, and the details of his arcane science are sometimes, well, too detailed. The ending, also, is not as satisfying as it could have been (though consistent with his style), yet when the journey is as much fun as Powers makes it here, I wont quibble about the destination. This book should not be your introduction to Tim Powers (for that see `Last Call'), but if you are already a fan, it should not disappoint you.
(less)

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Jun 25, 2010 Mike (the Paladin) rated it 1 of 5 stars

Shelves: fantasy

It's got to be an awfully big gold nugget to make trudging through 500 miles of mud, crud, and quick sand worth it. I didn't find this one worth it. The writer seems to find his stride somewhere around the middle of the book. By then I just didn't care. I skimmed my way on. I didn't care how much gold Grammar had left under what bricks or who couldn't see if you didn't look at them.

This is another one where I see high ratings and thrilled reviews, that's why I looked this book up. I found a long...more

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Jun 05, 2010 Sarah Pi rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: time-travel, speculative-fiction

Tim Powers has written some of my very favorite books, but this is not one of them. The last several of his books that I have read feel to me as if he is trying to parody his own better works. All of his hallmarks are here: time travel, proximity to historical characters, places or items imbued with power, strange and useful rituals, and cheap beer. Most of them are used in a clever way, but cleverness for its own sake doesn't really do anything for me. The whole thing feels impersonal and clutt...more

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Feb 05, 2009 Bookmarks Magazine added it

Tim Powers's fiction has consistently defied description for three decades. Three Days to Never is no exception, with its "off-the-wall-yet-vaguely-plausible scenario" (San Francisco Chronicle). Powers, whose previous novels include Declare (2000), The Anubis Gates (1983), and a trilogy exploring the Fisher King myth, combines fantasy, thriller, and historical fiction in a novel that will win new fans for the author, even if Powers disciples will recognize some of the material and tricks from ea

...more

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Jul 23, 2010 Daniel rated it 5 of 5 stars

GREAT BOOK! I am very happy that I stumbled onto this one. It's a fairly quick, easy read at 405 pages (medium/large print) and a page turner.

THREE DAYS TO NEVER is HIGHLY imaginative, like ludicrous amounts of imagination. There are crazy twists and turns, insane happenings that are presented in such a matter of fact manner that you just have to believe them and go on reading. It made for a wonderful story that takes you to places you never imaged: seances, physics, Astral Projection, Mossad ag...more

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Apr 07, 2013 Amaha rated it 4 of 5 stars

I am now a confirmed Tim Powers fan. The concepts of Three Days to Never reminded me at various times of Free Live Free, Doom Patrol,Firestarter, The Marriage of Sticks, and The Crying of Lot 49. Powers lets the fantastic and conspiratorial elements creep into the plot gradually, and weaves them around actual history (I found myself looking up historical characters and events repeatedly, and finding back story that the plot just hinted at).

But Powers isn't just a high concept and plot writer. H...more

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Jan 08, 2013 Daniel Cann rated it 4 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Being a Tim Powers novel means Three Days to Never is hugely ambitious in scope. I cannot reveal too much of the plot without spoiling the fun, but let’s just say that readers will enjoy the many twists and surprises here. Fans of parallel world’s, alternate history, science fiction and the paranormal will really enjoy this.

Powers does have a writing style that may take getting used to. Luckily I had already read two of his previous novels, but sometimes you do have to tread carefully to fully u...more

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Feb 23, 2012 Pat rated it 2 of 5 stars Recommends it for: good beach read for the sci-fi set

2-1/2 stars, actually. I am tiring of books that read as if they were written with the film version in mind. This is certainly one of those. It will lure you in with a great premise and opening scenes: a time machine in someone's tool shed that involves Charlie Chaplin's handprint in concrete, a father-daughter team with telepathic skills and a tendency toward poltergeistism (if that isn't a word, it should be), a dead grandma in too many places at once, Albert Einstein, a blind Garbo type who s...more

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May 18, 2012 Kelly rated it 4 of 5 stars

The book took a long time to build up and it was a little plot-choppy in some parts. However, once it all started to come together, things picked up the pace fast and many things became revealed - in typical Powers style. The complete story takes a long time to formulate, but its worth the wait. Its amazing that Powers can weave in so seemingly distant and disconnected persons and places into a beautiful story. The characters evolve a little more (i felt) than most of his works. It took me a few...more

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Jul 31, 2010 Ryun rated it 4 of 5 stars

A lot of people I know don’t like to read fantasy novels because they’re allergic to whimsy. Characters with names like Garrick Longshoes and the fairies, sprites and assorted fantastic creatures inhabiting these worlds somehow prevent these people from suspending their disbelief, leaving them out in the cold when it comes to Tolkien or the Harry Potter series.

Proof of this whimsy allergy is evident when these same people eat up Neil Gaiman’s AMERICAN GODS and its ilk: stories that are solidly i...more

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Mar 01, 2010 Matthew Herring rated it 4 of 5 stars

Three Days To Never is an excellent book that inserts a few well known historical figures into a wonderful story set in the year 1989. The book was a little hard to get into, mainly because Tim Powers' writing style takes some getting used to. It seems to start off slow, but you gradually realize that it's not that it was a slow start but rather a strange, meandering fantastical start that made no big deal of powers and beings that any other author would use for shock value. Once you're used to...more

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Jan 18, 2013 Chrystal Hays rated it 4 of 5 stars

I selected this book on the strength of a strong short work in an anthology (Itinerary in 999. At first, I feared I would not like it. So many books these days seem ruined by a prologue.
I'm pleased to say it moved right along, and I finished it in less than 48 hours....which means it begged for more time, and more time was gladly granted.
I like any book that can send me, curious, to reference material without the entire plot unraveling. It's complex and only drags a bit in the 2nd chapter, whe...more

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Feb 28, 2012 Harlan rated it 2 of 5 stars · review of another edition

Tim Powers is one of my favorite authors, but this is not one of my favorite of his books. There are a few clever aspects -- he always starts his books well, and the woman who can only see out of other peoples' eyes is a great idea. But the plot gets bogged down by a too-intricate and unpredictable supernatural plot, and he has too many characters and so can't focus enough on the core (as usual, mostly family) relationships. The climactic scene is written as if Powers was trying to get all the i...more

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Apr 14, 2011 Redshirt Knitting rated it 1 of 5 stars

Shelves: fiction

I find myself liking each Tim Powers novel less than the one before. This, his most recent novel, was a completely dispiriting read. The characters go nowhere and do virtually nothing.

Alcoholism is more prominent than in all of his previous novels combined. Worse, it's treated like an inevitable decline - why fight it? Just give up and pour yourself another drink. Worrisome, that.

I felt like the most interesting character was Matt. Pity that the entire plot hinges on him (it) being pushed off-s...more

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Jul 23, 2011 Philippe Lhoste rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: fantastique, roman, sf

Impression mitigée pour ce roman...
L'écrivain a réussi l'aspect polar/livre d'espionnage/thriller : l'histoire d'un père et sa fille poursuivis par une organisation secrète et le Mossad (concurrents) est prenante, et c'est ce qui a fait que j'ai poursuivi le livre jusqu'au bout.
Le fond de l'intrigue suppose que Einstein a fabriqué une étonnante machine mêlant connaissances scientifiques et ésotérisme (Kabbale, entre autres). Machine héritée par la famille et convoitée par les parties citées ci-d...more

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Apr 22, 2012 Jim Mcclanahan rated it 4 of 5 stars

This novel took me back to the enjoyment I had reading the trilogy beginning with Last Call (Faultline series). The characters were engaging although not heroic. The plot was somewhat convoluted, but fun for all that. And the details were wacky and mysterious. Oh, and there were ghosts. I love it when there are ghosts!

As usual, Powers packs lots of detail into the plot; even describing the type of pipe tobacco the main protagonist from 1987 smokes. Sometimes I find that his striving for authenti...more

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Jun 05, 2012 Kemper rated it 3 of 5 stars

Shelves: alt-universes, 2012, blinded-me-with-science, alt-history, magic, fantasy, sci-fi, spooky-powers, spy-vs-spy, time-travel, ghosts

So this is one of those books that I really wanted to love but to my great disappointment ended up being just OK. It’s got Albert Einstein, Charlie Chaplin, time travel, ghosts, psychic links, astral projection, Israeli spies and a secret evil organization. So what’s not to love?

In its defense I’ll admit that I probably wasn’t in a good frame of mind for something like this. I’ve been distracted by a couple of things, and it’s that glorious time of year where for 10 days in the spring and fall I...more

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Jul 01, 2009 Al Billings rated it 4 of 5 stars

I must admit that I am in a huge Tim Powers fan. I've never read a book by him that I did not greatly enjoy.

"Three Days to Never" continues his common practice of setting novels in the contemporary world that contain fantastic or magical elements. Similar to "Declare", the word of "Three Days to Never" has government agencies and secret societies, behind the scenes, working to secure various magical technologies and artifacts. In this work, these are elements of Mossad, from Israel, and a societ...more

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Jul 27, 2009 Jayaprakash Satyamurthy rated it 4 of 5 stars

I hope that the trade vagaries that resulted in his latest novel being reasonably well distributed in India (this is the first of his novels I have bought here first-hand and within a year of publication - that I then waited an additional two years to read it is another matter) continue to hold good for Tim Powers' future novels. They're just that good. While his earlier novels are more diverse, he's been focusing on fast-paced thrillers that take some chunk of recorded recent history, re-interp...more I hope that the trade vagaries that resulted in his latest novel being reasonably well distributed in India (this is the first of his novels I have bought here first-hand and within a year of publication - that I then waited an additional two years to read it is another matter) continue to hold good for Tim Powers' future novels. They're just that good. While his earlier novels are more diverse, he's been focusing on fast-paced thrillers that take some chunk of recorded recent history, re-interpret it in the light of wild occult theories and Powers' own unique approach to practical magic and result in what people call 'secret histories'. All this would be so much dry arcana without Powers' knack for creating flawed, credible and appealing characters and his gift for vivid, relentless narrative and tight plotting.

'3 Days To Never' is based on the concept that the nuclear bomb was not Einstein's most horrific brainchild; that he had delved into kabbalic esoterica and developed a device or technique that could, at different levels of application, allow you to erase an individual from the world's history, to travel through time, and at the highest level, to be mentally aware of all time and space at once; to be like a god. Einstein hid these secrets well. Rival secret societies - an obscure branch of the Mossad and a group of European occultists - are on the lookout for them.

When Frank Marrity and his daughter travel to Frank's grandmother's house in response to a very strange phone call in which the grandmother claims to have burned down a ramshackle old outhouse, they discover a long-lost paving slab with Charlie Chaplin's hand and footprints on it, a box of letters written by Albert Einstein and catch a glimpse of gold buried beneath the floorboards of the shed, which is still intact. Grandmother, however, is not - she was mysteriously found dying quite far from home minutes after she must have made the call to Frank.

Frank and his daughter soon find themselves in the midst of a vastly complicated game of spy vs. spy, as each side tries to get information out of them. The plot is complex - really too complex to keep track of at times. But Powers' narration, always grounded in his main characters' experience and impressions is what kept me locked in for the duration. As did the cast of variously noble, cantankerous, tragic or downright twisted characters - Powers has a particularly good line in villains, as usual. As in any time travel novel, there is at least one time-travelling character present. I won't reveal the time-traveller's identity, but it has startling consequences for one of the main characters, and makes at least part of the novel about who we are, who we might become, and how the choices we make, along with an element of pure chance, could some day make us unrecognisable to ourselves.

There was much more I wanted to touch on about this novel - the use of quotations from 'The Tempest' that make the story sometimes seem to parallel Shakespeare's play and add so much resonance to it all, the business with Charlie Chaplin, the supremely creepy Baphomet head, several other characters, but that would result in one of those reviews that wind up being a needlessly detailed plot-summary with a few appreciative gurgles tacked on. Instead, I'll end by saying that concepts like 'slipstream' tend to be bandied - and practiced - as if they were esoteric, ultra-hip and difficult disciplines. It takes a master like Powers to use the idea of melding together disparate genres to create gripping entertainment with both head and heart. (less)

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About Tim Powers

Timothy Thomas Powers is an American science fiction and fantasy author. Powers has won the World Fantasy Award twice for his critically acclaimed novels Last Call and Declare.

Most of Powers's novels are "secret histories": he uses actual, documented historical events featuring famous people, but shows another view of them in which occult or supernatural factors heavily influence the motivations a...more

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