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Jun 17, 2008

Judith rated it:

Oh my, I think I am cursed. Today at least I am under a spell. The day starts normally: waking up, checking the alarmclock, seeing the stack of books next to my bed. One book especially grabs my attention. I decide to read one more chapter, as I still have plenty of time before work.

I read and read, one chapter, two chapter, three chapters...
- I can start later, I will work longer -
...Words, letters, paragraphs...
- I am ill, I need to stay in bed, I will work over t More...

0 comments like (31 people liked it)

Dec 17, 2009

Krissa rated it:

Holy #&*#*$!@ Christ, Scarlett Thomas has taken the top of my head off. I thought PopCo was an awesome mindf!ck, but Mr. Y makes it look like so much People magazine.

I'm really not sure what to say about this novel. I think people that like House of Leaves would probably like it for similar reasons though it's not nearly so hard to follow. Her female lead, as in PopCo, is almost frighteningly intelligent, as I'm beginning to suspect Thomas is herself. It's not the intelligence that' More...

2 comments like (15 people liked it)

Dec 16, 2009

Trin rated it:

Like Thomas' PopCo, I found this both fascinating and frustrating. Thomas definitely achieves something really special with her ability to make her writing intensely cerebral (some of my favorite parts of Mr. Y were the digressions into quantum physics and other brain-stretching topics) while at the same time creating very human, flawed characters. Still, there's a quality of...coldness that prevents me from becoming emotionally involved. Perhaps the whole thing seems too clever, too orchestrat More...

1 comment like (12 people liked it)

Dec 16, 2009

neil rated it:

This is perhaps the worst book I ever finished. I don't really recommend it. The thought experiment aspect of the book could have been interesting, but was unfortunately written for people who haven't read Baudrillard and don't understand particle physics. Which I don't, but I got it much faster than the people in the book. Plus, the story was absurd, and poorly thought out. The main character was smarter than the writer, and seemed to resent that. Plus, it seemed that the sex scenes were More...

0 comments like (11 people liked it)

Sep 29, 2011

Charles rated it:

Note to authors: Merely mentioning "Husserl" or "Derrida" does not make a book intellectual or philosophical. Similarly, uttering the name -- much less quoting -- "Einstein," "Heisenberg," or "Schrodinger" does not make a book scientific, or lend credibility to the writing.

To those who have positively reviewed this book noting its intellectualism or creativity or surprise ending, I am glad that you enjoyed it.

I thought the bo More...

5 comments like (6 people liked it)

Feb 05, 2010

Batsap rated it:

I couldn't wait to finish this book... but not because I was hooked, perched on the edge of my seat as I desperately waited to see how everything turned out, I just wanted the tedium to end.

It wasn't even the constant drip-feed of Philosophy and Quantum Physics that had me yawning and searching for the nearest caffiene source. In fact, that was the most interesting part of the book. (If you can overlook the obsessive name-dropping and reference to Derrida on almost every single page. More...

0 comments like (9 people liked it)

Oct 26, 2007

Allycks rated it:

I know it's a cop-out but my real rating of this book is 4 and a half.

The plot is simple-- a grad student stumbles across an extremely rare and purportedly cursed book, reads it, and discovers another world, a world 'made up of thought' which she calls the Troposphere.

The protagonist Ariel is characterized by her disdain of luxury, taste for hard sex, and above all an insatiable desire to know everything. Ariel's curiosity drives the book and leads the reader through More...

0 comments like (2 people liked it)

Nov 22, 2010

Lauren rated it:

This is an adventure in thought experiments. This is idea porn. It's the most cerebral fun I’ve ever had. The End of Mr Y is a cocktail of postmodern philosophy, quantum physics, metafiction, science fiction and adventure. If any of that sounds intimidating, rest assured that this isn’t like reading Derrida, Heidegger, Baudrillard or any of the convoluted philosophies that Ariel Manto likes to immerse herself in. Early on she says that she “quite like[s] the way you can talk about science withou More...

1 comment like (2 people liked it)

Oct 29, 2008

Aaron rated it:

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0 comments like (7 people liked it)

Jun 11, 2011

Hirondelle rated it:

I tried to write paragraphs about what precisely I hated on this book and that just made me even more annoyed than the reading experience was. But some details: special relativity and homeopathy both "work" and got equal footing and are treated the same way by our main character, which btw is a lit PhD student who needs several days full time to read a book of about 150 pages. No, she is not taking notes, she does that later. Ah, and I can´t figure out when the book is supposed to be More...

2 comments like (2 people liked it)

Aug 13, 2008

Nick rated it:

I bought this book purely because it was offer of the week on Waterstones.com and the customer reviews of it sounded intriguing. I’m definitely going to try such tactics again in the future as The End of Mr Y turned out to be better than even those reviews suggested.

A bold and imaginative concept brings together elements of theoretical physics with the thinking of late 19th and early 20th century philosophers, in particular Derrida and Heidegger. I think the very point of the book is More...

0 comments like (2 people liked it)

Sep 16, 2011

Yvonne rated it:

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0 comments like (1 person liked it)

Dec 16, 2007

Mary-Beth rated it:

I don't know what it is about the life of the graduate student being a popular topic for novelists these days, but it seems to be the case. This novel tends not to glamourize the lifestyle much anyway, as the protagonist spends most of her time finding ways to stretch her money.

The premise is that a graduate student discovers the last copy of an extremely rare book in the world. This book tells the tale of Mr. Y, a gentleman who one night in a seedy fairground discovers the Troposphe More...

0 comments like (1 person liked it)

May 02, 2007

Sam rated it:

This book is the best book I have ever read, and I do not give this title away lightly. Franny and Zooey has held that spot since I was 12 so in it took 11 years for me to find a book to supplant its spot, but this book has to.
The ideas that float in and out of the plot line are amazing, taking the reader for a ride through the idea of ideas.
The main character is believable with her flaws and determination. She has a strong voice that you just want to root for, even though you someti More...

0 comments like (1 person liked it)

Oct 14, 2010

Jade rated it:

One of the best books I have read in a long time. Intelligent, witty and absolutely charming. Thomas has really pushed the boat out here with a book of such depth, mixed in with religious, philosophical and scientific concepts beautifully interwoven and challenging.

This is the story of Ariel who on getting hold of a copy of The End of My Y in a book shop decides to try a potion mentioned in the book, despite it's supposidly 'cursed' qualities. From this point forward Ariel enters the More...

0 comments like (1 person liked it)

Jul 08, 2008

Laura rated it:

My first impression: "Quotations from Baudrillard and Heidegger to start a book - oh, no."

By page 29 I was hooked. Very, very rare are the books that can deal with thought experiments, old books, and the nature of thought and reality without being utterly pretentious or just bad in other ways. The End of Mr. Y is not. It's philosophical, erotic, mind-boggling, exciting, enchanting and great fun.

I haven't loved a book this much since David Mitchell's Cloud Atlas More...

0 comments like (1 person liked it)

Jan 15, 2008

Doogyjim rated it:

Undoubtedly exciting and brimming with ideas about identity and philosophy, the novel is a little slow to start but then takes off into Matrix territory as Ariel Manto is pursued by sinister agents trying to stop her using the knowledge she has discovered by finding a cursed book

Ultimately it did leave me a little cold and addmittedly a lot of the specualtion went over my head. But it's that rare thing, a book full of ideas that also keeps you gripped as a thriller. It's light years More...

0 comments like (2 people liked it)

Sep 25, 2007

Anica rated it:

there's so much I don't know about quantum physics -- but this book makes me really want to know. it starts off about a slightly salty british PhD student, but quickly becomes about using an acid-like substance to bend the space-time continuum (which happens to be a favorite subject of mine.) there's just enough racy sex and true romance (that is to say, the bare minimum) to weave all the quarks together. it moves at an exciting pace, but you want to stop reading every few pages and just thin More...

0 comments like (1 person liked it)

Aug 04, 2011

Orr added it

The blurbs on the back cover of The End of Mr. Y have all the right names praising it, including Phillip Pullman (His Dark Materials) and Douglas Copland. The novel itself could be described as a rough integration of Pullman's philosophico-theological trilogy with Borges's Ficciones scholastic thought experiments with an added dash, or even more than a dash, of Gibson's Neuromancer. Indeed in many ways Thomas succeeds in creating a well written and realistic day-to-day life for her young scholar More...

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Dec 25, 2008

Michael rated it:

The End of Mr. Y is hard to describe. It's part mystery, part chase thriller, part metaphysical puzzle. Ariel Manto is a graduate student in Britain. Part of her study concerns an obscure 19th Century author who wrote an allegedly cursed book. When a copy falls into her hands, Ariel life begins to change as she discovers a way into an entirely new world of thought. Unfortunately for her, this is a world that others are more than willing to kill to keep to themselves. Ariel has to figure ou More...

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Dec 03, 2008

Shawne rated it:

Have you ever read a book or watched a movie and gone, "Wow, that was some mindfuck!" - well, The End Of Mr Y takes that just about as literally as one can go. Thomas has created a complex book within a book, a universe within a universe, teeming with ideas and theorems, hope and life and well... sheer mindfuckery. As her lead character Ariel Manto doggedly discovers the secrets of a purportedly cursed tome (also named The End Of Mr Y), Thomas' fictional world explodes outwards: a meta More...

0 comments like (1 person liked it)

Aug 28, 2011

NerdyKid rated it:

Like Mr Y, the hero of a Victorian mystery story who dies in intriguing circumstances, the reader of Thomas's novel is drawn in by a fascinating illusion. A breathlessly exciting romp that starts with a quest for Mr Y's alluring and dangerous secret, promises briefly to become a love story, then turns into a protracted chase, successfully distracts you while Science in Literature PhD student Ariel explains what she's learned from the great thinkers and finds out a bit about homeopathy.
Li More...

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Aug 01, 2011

Janet rated it:

It’s fair to say that Ariel is a little obsessed with the novel The End of Mr Y, She is doing a PhD, sharing an office with Professor Burlem who shares her obsession, although he has gone missing and nobody knows where he’s gone and whether or when he’ll be back. When she finds the novel in a second-hand book store she has to read it even though it is allegedly cursed. After reading it, she embarks on a strange adventure and her life will never been the same again.

Ariel has no self-respect. More...

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Jun 14, 2011

Lauren rated it:

Have you ever been at a party and cornered by that special breed of person who thinks they are the, best read, most highly evolved intellect on the plant and their one goal in life is to convince you and anyone else who will listen of this (in their mind) indisputable fact.This book is the literary equivalent of that party goer. Cue the incessant and often needless name dropping. Any interesting thoughts or ideas on theoretical physics and philosophy are drowned out by the authors constant waff More...

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Mar 19, 2011

Simonetta rated it:

Way too much information: what happened to the editor of the book? That is what I think.
It starts out as a thriller/mistery and it is pretty captivating at the beginning (first 200 pages or so), but then it degenerates into a philosophical-religious-physic "who knows what" book with heavy references to Derrida and Heidegger that now make you think you are reading a text book on all the above subjects and you are trying hard to memorize all the facts. It is not pleasent as reading More...

0 comments like (2 people liked it)

Feb 27, 2011

Tony rated it:

This book came highly recommended by my former bookshop employer, and it looked fascinating indeed. It begins as a sort of arcane "biblio-mystery," akin to Zafón's "Shadow of the Wind": a gradate student encounters a copy of a book thought to be at best extremely rare but more likely non-existent. To add to the intrigue, a single page has been removed from it. But the story careens off into far-reaching adventures with deep thoughts on phenomenology, epistemology, quantum ph More...

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Feb 24, 2011

Vegantrav rated it:

Scarlett Thomas is brilliant. She spins literary gold from her wonderfully imaginative mind. But her fiction is more than mere storytelling: it is also well reasoned though highly speculative philosophy and contemporary science.

On the cover of my copy of The End of Mr. Y is a quote from the English novelist Jonathan Coe that perfectly captures the experience of reading The End of Mr. Y: “Not only will you have a great time reading this book, but you will finish it a cleverer pers More...

1 comment like

Feb 16, 2011

Katy rated it:

[[MIXED THOUGHTS, unsure if I love it or just really unsure of it. in some places it was yay, in others it was nay]]
When I was reading this (Boxing Day 2010 - The New Year's), I did find this a good read. I think I tried to take it as a really interesting book - dispite the kind of horrific sex parts. Although reading the book through Areil, even with vulgar parts and such, gives it that rawness which humanity would be able to have, the desires / the despiration / the thrill which people c More...

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Feb 05, 2011

Karen rated it:

There's a slightly odd feeling about sitting down to read a book that if somebody asked you why you were reading it - the best explanation you could come up with was ... well ... "it sort of sounded slightly mad - and besides the central character wants to become part of a book.... ". You've got to be intrigued by that premise.

THE END OF MR Y doesn't telegraph what sort of a book it is from the cover blurb - it sounds a bit like a mystery, it could be fantasy, there's even More...

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Jan 25, 2011

Elsje rated it:

Het verhaal
Op een koude winterdag moet promovendus Ariel Manto, die onderzoek doet naar gedachtenexperimenten, plotseling de universiteit verlaten omdat het gebouw op instorten staat. Op zoek naar warmte komt ze in een tweedehands boekwinkeltje terecht waar ze tot haar grote blijdschap een zeer zeldzaam boek aantreft van één van de schrijvers waarop ze wil promoveren: The end of Mr Y. van Thomas Lumas. Over dit boek doen rare geruchten de ronde: het boek zou vervloekt zijn. Iedereen die het More...

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