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In Universes
Raffi works in an observational cosmology lab, searching for dark matter and trying to hide how little they understand their own research. Every chance they get, they escape to see Britt, a queer sculptor who fascinates them for reasons they also don’t—or won’t—understand. As Raffi’s carefully constructed life begins to collapse, they become increasingly fixated on the multiverse and the idea that somewhere, there might be a universe where they mean as much to Britt as she does to them…and just like that, Raffi and Britt are thirteen years old, best friends and maybe something more.
In Universes is a mind-bending tour across parallel worlds, each an answer to the question of what life would be like if events had played out just a little differently. The universes grow increasingly strange: women fracture into hordes of animals, alien-infested bears prowl apocalyptic landscapes. But across them all, Raffi—alongside their sometimes-friends, sometimes-lovers Britt, Kay, and Graham—reaches for a life that feels authentically their own.
Blending realism with science fiction, In Universes explores the thirst for genius, the fluidity of gender and identity, and the pull of the past against the desire to lead a meaningful life. Part Ted Chiang, part Carmen Maria Machado, part Everything Everywhere All At Once, In Universes insists on the transgressive power of hope even in the darkest of times.
In Universes is a mind-bending tour across parallel worlds, each an answer to the question of what life would be like if events had played out just a little differently. The universes grow increasingly strange: women fracture into hordes of animals, alien-infested bears prowl apocalyptic landscapes. But across them all, Raffi—alongside their sometimes-friends, sometimes-lovers Britt, Kay, and Graham—reaches for a life that feels authentically their own.
Blending realism with science fiction, In Universes explores the thirst for genius, the fluidity of gender and identity, and the pull of the past against the desire to lead a meaningful life. Part Ted Chiang, part Carmen Maria Machado, part Everything Everywhere All At Once, In Universes insists on the transgressive power of hope even in the darkest of times.
240 pages, Paperback
First published April 30, 2024
160 people are currently reading
10482 people want to read
About the author
Emet North
1 book106 followersEmet North has lived in a dozen states over the past decade and has no fixed residence, though they feel most at home in the mountains. In previous lives, they worked in an observational cosmology lab on a grant from NASA, taught snowboarding in Montana, researched Lie algebras, led wine tastings, waited tables, trained horses, and wrote a thesis on the many-worlds interpretation of quantum mechanics. They translate from Spanish to English with a particular focus on queer and trans voices and are always looking for new projects.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 387 reviews
February 9, 2024
An absorbing exploration of a kaleidoscopic set of parallel worlds – delving into trauma, grief, and the complexities of healing from our fractures.
North’s writing is engaging and imaginative in the ways it plumbs the depths of Raffi’s psyche and their search for belonging. As the kaleidoscope turns, each subsequent world spins off its axis. Details change, relationships flip, and roles reverse, but some version of Raffi remains a constant amidst the swirling chaos.
I really enjoyed my time immersed in the pages of In Universes. It’s a compelling and vivid read bound to pull you into its multiversal web.
My thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for an advanced reader copy in exchange for an honest review.
See this review and others at The Speculative Shelf and follow @specshelf on Twitter and @thespeculativeshelf on Instagram.
North’s writing is engaging and imaginative in the ways it plumbs the depths of Raffi’s psyche and their search for belonging. As the kaleidoscope turns, each subsequent world spins off its axis. Details change, relationships flip, and roles reverse, but some version of Raffi remains a constant amidst the swirling chaos.
I really enjoyed my time immersed in the pages of In Universes. It’s a compelling and vivid read bound to pull you into its multiversal web.
My thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for an advanced reader copy in exchange for an honest review.
See this review and others at The Speculative Shelf and follow @specshelf on Twitter and @thespeculativeshelf on Instagram.
July 10, 2024
An incredibly imaginative and compelling tale across parallel universes, as we follow various versions of our main character, Raffi, as they search for identity, belonging, love and redemption.
The book can be seen as a set of 11 short stories involving Raffi and a loosely common set of people and situations. These are tied together by a single thread of regret about an incident with one of Raffi’s friends, Britt, when they were teenagers. The other characters - Kay, Graham, Alice - have different roles in each story: sometimes friends, sometimes lovers, sometimes just acquaintances.
Raffi is a cosmologist, with an interest and expertise in the many-worlds interpretation of quantum mechanics - the theory that the randomness of quantum mechanics is resolved by all possible outcomes occurring in alternate, newly created worlds. But that’s where the science stops - this is not really a sci-fi book, and there is no attempt to explain any mechanisms for people to travel to, or even be aware of, the alternate worlds. Rather, each story is set in an alternate universe, and any brief mention of the science just serves to guide the reader’s understanding about the loose relationship between each story. And that’s not a criticism - I actually found it a subtle but effective way to relieve what might otherwise be jarring switches of context between each story.
In most of the worlds, Raffi is dealing with feelings of loss, regret, or detachment. By the end of each story, Raffi tends to come to a conclusion that that these feelings are unresolved, and wonders what life would be like in different circumstances. Each following story then takes on some of these different characteristics, but often with other significant changes - sometimes fantastical rather than realistic. And sometimes these are as a consequence of what Raffi wishes for (Monkey’s Paw style), and sometimes they are a vehicle to explore other issues (like the world in which women fracture into hordes of animals).
In one respect this is a difficult read, because each of the stories is a further exploration of these feelings of loss and regret, which remain unresolved for a majority of the book. However, this was lifted enormously by the range and breadth of imagination that the author has poured into each story. Each chapter could stand alone as a short story in its own right, with its own unique sense of character and place. Even (or especially) those with a fantastical element, where the world building was concise and compelling.
I found Raffi’s search for identity, for an authentic self, and for a sense of redemption or resolution, to be engaging and compelling. And that’s testament to the author, as I have found these themes in other books to be off-putting when they come across as the minor dissatisfactions of someone in an otherwise privileged situation. But I found Raffi’s character to be sympathetic, and these struggles of identity and authenticity to be meaningful rather than trite.
And I found the final story, with its fantastical elements, to be a fitting conclusion to Raffi’s struggles.
So why not 5 stars? Only because I found the book so difficult to pick up from time to time. And by three-quarters of the way through the book, I was finding it affecting my mood - but perhaps that in itself is an indication of the quality of the writing and emotional engagement.
This book isn’t for everyone, and I definitely need something lighter for my next read. But it is an incredibly accomplished debut work.
Thank you #NetGalley and Random House UK Cornerstone for the free review copy of #InUniverses in exchange for an honest review. All opinions are my own.
The book can be seen as a set of 11 short stories involving Raffi and a loosely common set of people and situations. These are tied together by a single thread of regret about an incident with one of Raffi’s friends, Britt, when they were teenagers. The other characters - Kay, Graham, Alice - have different roles in each story: sometimes friends, sometimes lovers, sometimes just acquaintances.
Raffi is a cosmologist, with an interest and expertise in the many-worlds interpretation of quantum mechanics - the theory that the randomness of quantum mechanics is resolved by all possible outcomes occurring in alternate, newly created worlds. But that’s where the science stops - this is not really a sci-fi book, and there is no attempt to explain any mechanisms for people to travel to, or even be aware of, the alternate worlds. Rather, each story is set in an alternate universe, and any brief mention of the science just serves to guide the reader’s understanding about the loose relationship between each story. And that’s not a criticism - I actually found it a subtle but effective way to relieve what might otherwise be jarring switches of context between each story.
In most of the worlds, Raffi is dealing with feelings of loss, regret, or detachment. By the end of each story, Raffi tends to come to a conclusion that that these feelings are unresolved, and wonders what life would be like in different circumstances. Each following story then takes on some of these different characteristics, but often with other significant changes - sometimes fantastical rather than realistic. And sometimes these are as a consequence of what Raffi wishes for (Monkey’s Paw style), and sometimes they are a vehicle to explore other issues (like the world in which women fracture into hordes of animals).
In one respect this is a difficult read, because each of the stories is a further exploration of these feelings of loss and regret, which remain unresolved for a majority of the book. However, this was lifted enormously by the range and breadth of imagination that the author has poured into each story. Each chapter could stand alone as a short story in its own right, with its own unique sense of character and place. Even (or especially) those with a fantastical element, where the world building was concise and compelling.
I found Raffi’s search for identity, for an authentic self, and for a sense of redemption or resolution, to be engaging and compelling. And that’s testament to the author, as I have found these themes in other books to be off-putting when they come across as the minor dissatisfactions of someone in an otherwise privileged situation. But I found Raffi’s character to be sympathetic, and these struggles of identity and authenticity to be meaningful rather than trite.
And I found the final story, with its fantastical elements, to be a fitting conclusion to Raffi’s struggles.
So why not 5 stars? Only because I found the book so difficult to pick up from time to time. And by three-quarters of the way through the book, I was finding it affecting my mood - but perhaps that in itself is an indication of the quality of the writing and emotional engagement.
This book isn’t for everyone, and I definitely need something lighter for my next read. But it is an incredibly accomplished debut work.
Thank you #NetGalley and Random House UK Cornerstone for the free review copy of #InUniverses in exchange for an honest review. All opinions are my own.
May 8, 2024
Calling it now: this will be in my top 10 of 2024. What a gift to have been gifted this (thank you, Harper). Will write a review when my brain can think coherently again.
(OKAY, BRAIN IS WORKING. REVIEW BELOW!)
Have you ever felt like a book was written just for you? That it found you when you needed it the most?
That’s how I felt about IN UNIVERSES.
IN UNIVERSES is a kaleidoscope of lives, of universes, all centered around a character named Raphaela, or Raffi. In each iteration of Raffi’s life, we see them survive the gravity of existence: trauma and grief, love and loss, choice and regret.
In one, Raffi studies the elusive black matter and reconnects with a childhood friend. In another, the world has ended and Raffi finds themself in a home of taxidermied humans. Another chapter sees Raffi at the shoreline, building elaborate sandcastles and walking into the waves, wondering if Ophelia meant to die.
I love seeing how the worlds branch off from one another. Choices leading to possibilities, to universes. Each chapter bleeds into the other. In each, there is a persisting loneliness, though. A longing for another life, another world.
The author uses reoccurring characters, themes, and motifs to show how each version of Raffi isn’t so different from the other. I also love their use of objects to echo the multiverse: a mother fracturing into a horde of bees; a house with rooms for each emotion; a portrait painted over a portrait painted over a portrait; the intricate architecture of dozens of sandcastles washed away.
This book is truly working its way into my favorites, perhaps of all time. It reminds me of Sequoia Nagamatsu’s HOW HIGH WE GO IN THE DARK. I saw it compared to THE MIDNIGHT LIBRARY, but… it’s like if THE MIDNIGHT LIBRARY *didn’t* suck. The writing is straightforward in a way that leaves you breathless. The creativity is seemingly endless. Read this, please.
(OKAY, BRAIN IS WORKING. REVIEW BELOW!)
Have you ever felt like a book was written just for you? That it found you when you needed it the most?
That’s how I felt about IN UNIVERSES.
IN UNIVERSES is a kaleidoscope of lives, of universes, all centered around a character named Raphaela, or Raffi. In each iteration of Raffi’s life, we see them survive the gravity of existence: trauma and grief, love and loss, choice and regret.
In one, Raffi studies the elusive black matter and reconnects with a childhood friend. In another, the world has ended and Raffi finds themself in a home of taxidermied humans. Another chapter sees Raffi at the shoreline, building elaborate sandcastles and walking into the waves, wondering if Ophelia meant to die.
I love seeing how the worlds branch off from one another. Choices leading to possibilities, to universes. Each chapter bleeds into the other. In each, there is a persisting loneliness, though. A longing for another life, another world.
The author uses reoccurring characters, themes, and motifs to show how each version of Raffi isn’t so different from the other. I also love their use of objects to echo the multiverse: a mother fracturing into a horde of bees; a house with rooms for each emotion; a portrait painted over a portrait painted over a portrait; the intricate architecture of dozens of sandcastles washed away.
This book is truly working its way into my favorites, perhaps of all time. It reminds me of Sequoia Nagamatsu’s HOW HIGH WE GO IN THE DARK. I saw it compared to THE MIDNIGHT LIBRARY, but… it’s like if THE MIDNIGHT LIBRARY *didn’t* suck. The writing is straightforward in a way that leaves you breathless. The creativity is seemingly endless. Read this, please.
did-not-finish
May 3, 2024Some novels center around a person who hasn't been through an extraordinary tragedy but is experiencing a crisis of meaning. Arguably, it's happening precisely because they have been fortunate enough to spend most of their life in the high-level section of the Maslow hierarchy of needs, away from concerns for their survival. The character ends up sounding like they think they've been dealt the world's worst hand when that clearly isn't the case. There are readers who enjoy reading that genre, maybe because it makes them feel seen. But I'm not part of that target audience.
This has been a melancholy read - I have been longing for some sunshine in the story the entire time. Not sure if the main character has anything positive they're hoping for. I get the feeling that the absence of hope is driving the protagonist's thoughts.
DNF at 40%, during the second chapter in a row that's really painful to read for me personally. Too personal to go into in a public review, too. I'm going to look for a more lighthearted story antidote now.
I got an ARC of In Universes from Netgalley.
This has been a melancholy read - I have been longing for some sunshine in the story the entire time. Not sure if the main character has anything positive they're hoping for. I get the feeling that the absence of hope is driving the protagonist's thoughts.
DNF at 40%, during the second chapter in a row that's really painful to read for me personally. Too personal to go into in a public review, too. I'm going to look for a more lighthearted story antidote now.
I got an ARC of In Universes from Netgalley.
June 21, 2024
The sort of cosmic self-indulgence that I am VERY into
February 10, 2024
Is it fair to call a book boring because you thought it was going to be something it isn’t? Can I call this a bad book when I have a sneaking suspicion that I Just Don’t Get It?
I think I can.
As a science fiction novel, this is fucking terrible. It’s slow and dreary and the scifi elements are relegated to the background when they appear at all – and they often don’t; every ‘chapter’ is functionally a standalone short story, featuring different versions of the same character/s, and the majority of them contain no scifi stuff at all, nor do they explore or play with scifi themes and tropes. There are so many ways to play with gender and sexuality in SFF – The Unraveling by Benjamin Rosenbaum comes immediately to mind – and none of that is happening here. The blurb is phrased in such a way that I took it to mean we were going to be following one character moving through different universes, something in a similar vein to Nathan Tavares’ Fractured Infinity. That is not what this is! We, the reader, are taking peeks at different realities, at different versions of Raffi in different timelines, but they are all entirely separate; this isn’t a scifi adventure, it’s a collection of short stories about the same characters. Instead of a queer physicist hopping from world to world, we’re reading about professors who are unhappy in their academic success, kids who bow under to peer-pressure, women too cowardly to confess their true feelings to a partner; blah, blah, blah. It’s the kind of Lit Fic nonsense we mock Lit Fic for being, for crying out loud; if it were entertaining, I might even consider whether North intended this book as some kind of satire or spoof on that genre. But I think not: it takes itself too seriously, and is just so mind-numbingly boring, to be (successfully) doing something sneaky and clever.
As a literary fiction novel… Look, I’m not qualified to make that judgement. I hate Literary Fiction with a passion and think it’s all pretentious drivel by default. It is genuinely possible that I Just Don’t Get what North was doing here. But speaking as a nonbinary person, I didn’t see anything being said about gender or sexuality at all, never mind something smart or interesting being said, never mind it being done well or poorly. In some of the vignettes the main character was queer, or sapphic, or nonbinary, and in some they weren’t, or at least did not appear to be: being married to a man doesn’t make a woman straight, of course, but if that’s all I see in that particular vignette, I have nothing else to go on. Using she/her pronouns (as the MC does for at least the first half of the book) doesn’t make you a woman, for that matter – I use she/her pronouns, and am decidedly not a girl – but when a character uses she/her and spends her time obsessing over sandcastles and Shakespeare’s Ophelia, I have no evidence suggesting she’s not cis. It sucks that our society defaults to cishet, that I need evidence of obvious queerness to recognise a character as queer, but the fact is that I do. It’s not like that in real life – in real life, you can call yourself queer and I need no more evidence than that to consider you queer. But when we’re talking about a fictional character, I need to be shown, and in many of the chapters I read, I was not.
On the other hand, sometimes we did get that; in several chapters/universes Raffi is a woman attracted to women, or men and women; sometimes Raffi is nonbinary. But that in and of itself isn’t saying anything. So, not all versions of us across the multiverse will have the same sexuality and/or gender identity: I mean, le duh??? Is that the Big Deal that’s supposed to be blowing my mind? I took that as read long before I even heard of this book. Hells, I would argue that Orphan Black did a better job of showing how wildly different different versions of us could potentially be – including Tony, the trans clone we barely met, who I wish we’d seen more of – and that all took place in one universe!
Insert me banging my head against the desk here.
Push comes to shove, In Universe is a series of vignettes about a person who has depression of varying levels in a lot of the various versions of their life, a person who is not interesting and does nothing interesting, who is sometimes self-destructive in eye-rollingly obvious, even clichéd, ways. I skipped ahead to part 3 and that was no more promising than the first half of the book. It’s mundane and dull and banal, and yes all those words mean the same thing but I had to read dozens of boring versions of the same person’s boring life so you can deal with three synonyms.
Please let me go back to the sci fi that goes pew pew, thanks.
I think I can.
As a science fiction novel, this is fucking terrible. It’s slow and dreary and the scifi elements are relegated to the background when they appear at all – and they often don’t; every ‘chapter’ is functionally a standalone short story, featuring different versions of the same character/s, and the majority of them contain no scifi stuff at all, nor do they explore or play with scifi themes and tropes. There are so many ways to play with gender and sexuality in SFF – The Unraveling by Benjamin Rosenbaum comes immediately to mind – and none of that is happening here. The blurb is phrased in such a way that I took it to mean we were going to be following one character moving through different universes, something in a similar vein to Nathan Tavares’ Fractured Infinity. That is not what this is! We, the reader, are taking peeks at different realities, at different versions of Raffi in different timelines, but they are all entirely separate; this isn’t a scifi adventure, it’s a collection of short stories about the same characters. Instead of a queer physicist hopping from world to world, we’re reading about professors who are unhappy in their academic success, kids who bow under to peer-pressure, women too cowardly to confess their true feelings to a partner; blah, blah, blah. It’s the kind of Lit Fic nonsense we mock Lit Fic for being, for crying out loud; if it were entertaining, I might even consider whether North intended this book as some kind of satire or spoof on that genre. But I think not: it takes itself too seriously, and is just so mind-numbingly boring, to be (successfully) doing something sneaky and clever.
As a literary fiction novel… Look, I’m not qualified to make that judgement. I hate Literary Fiction with a passion and think it’s all pretentious drivel by default. It is genuinely possible that I Just Don’t Get what North was doing here. But speaking as a nonbinary person, I didn’t see anything being said about gender or sexuality at all, never mind something smart or interesting being said, never mind it being done well or poorly. In some of the vignettes the main character was queer, or sapphic, or nonbinary, and in some they weren’t, or at least did not appear to be: being married to a man doesn’t make a woman straight, of course, but if that’s all I see in that particular vignette, I have nothing else to go on. Using she/her pronouns (as the MC does for at least the first half of the book) doesn’t make you a woman, for that matter – I use she/her pronouns, and am decidedly not a girl – but when a character uses she/her and spends her time obsessing over sandcastles and Shakespeare’s Ophelia, I have no evidence suggesting she’s not cis. It sucks that our society defaults to cishet, that I need evidence of obvious queerness to recognise a character as queer, but the fact is that I do. It’s not like that in real life – in real life, you can call yourself queer and I need no more evidence than that to consider you queer. But when we’re talking about a fictional character, I need to be shown, and in many of the chapters I read, I was not.
On the other hand, sometimes we did get that; in several chapters/universes Raffi is a woman attracted to women, or men and women; sometimes Raffi is nonbinary. But that in and of itself isn’t saying anything. So, not all versions of us across the multiverse will have the same sexuality and/or gender identity: I mean, le duh??? Is that the Big Deal that’s supposed to be blowing my mind? I took that as read long before I even heard of this book. Hells, I would argue that Orphan Black did a better job of showing how wildly different different versions of us could potentially be – including Tony, the trans clone we barely met, who I wish we’d seen more of – and that all took place in one universe!
Insert me banging my head against the desk here.
Push comes to shove, In Universe is a series of vignettes about a person who has depression of varying levels in a lot of the various versions of their life, a person who is not interesting and does nothing interesting, who is sometimes self-destructive in eye-rollingly obvious, even clichéd, ways. I skipped ahead to part 3 and that was no more promising than the first half of the book. It’s mundane and dull and banal, and yes all those words mean the same thing but I had to read dozens of boring versions of the same person’s boring life so you can deal with three synonyms.
Please let me go back to the sci fi that goes pew pew, thanks.
October 2, 2025
A DNF - I read to p. 98 + the last chapter. I gotta start checking these authors for MFAs before I buy their books bc that degree practically guarantees a hateread at this point, and hatereads are a waste of time. In other words this book’s writing is steady, it’s consistent, it’s like you took a interesting rock and stuck it in one of those rock polishing kits that were super cool in elementary school, and the kit smoothed out all of the imperfections and peculiarities and now you’ve just got a rock that’s identical to all the other rocks you’ve used the kit on! I imagine this book might have been interesting if not for the many other books out there which have already done the exact same thing, usually at about the exact same quality level and focusing the exact same themes.
The concept of this book is alternate universes, which should be an interesting SF-y idea - and yet it’s so monotonous. The plot+prose version of driving on a Midwestern freeway. The “I’m definitely in Iowa Manitoba Kansas Montana one of the Dakotas Saskatchewan or Wyoming” of fiction. Yes, the book’s conceit is that each chapter is another alternate universe, with roughly the same characters, same tone, and same emotional conflicts. This chapter is Wyoming, that chapter is North Dakota, this one is Iowa. Oops, they look pretty much the same, turns out alternate universes with the same boring characters who have the same boring issues are pretty much identical! I for one would have loved to pull into an exit ramp when the MC hit the first of her banal “I was insecure and homophobic in middle school but now I’ve realized I’m queer” depression spirals, but much like a Midwestern freeway the exit ramp would not have helped me much. You can check out any time you like, but you can never leave (the prairie).
The charitable interpretation here is that the writing & the alternate universes were *intentionally* bland in order to demonstrate the depressing, flattening monotony of grief. That sort of implies that by the end of the book (which was blurbed on my edition as “hopeful” and “[a]n explosion of creative beauty and heart”) there would be some big shift in tone, style - something! Was there? Well, the very last page had a few lines that purposefully ended without punctuation, to show that the MC is living in the moment, finding human connection, no longer hemmed in by her grief……. florals for spring, in other words. Groundbreaking.
Yeah, look, at p. 98 I decided the book wasn’t going to be worth sticking with it, so I flipped to the end and read the last chapter. It was marginally better! Still not great, but there was a LITTLE something there that there wasn’t before. I guess the nicest thing I can say is that maybe now that this book is written North might have the time to put effort into writing something better? But the “autofiction” of it all has me doubting whether that’s going to happen anytime soon. (Autofiction? More like auto-DNF, badum ching.) By which I mean, the Venn diagram between the protagonist and North’s GoodReads bio is very close to a circle. Idk - if all you can write is a very thinly veiled version of your own life (or, in fact, many thinly veiled alternate versions of your own life), where do you go once you’ve done that? What does that lead to, creatively speaking? It just feels so lacking in imagination, empathy, a fundamental curiosity about the world around you…
Sidenote: What I’m also saying here is I’m sick of people for whom the worst thing* that’s happened to them in their life is grad school not working out. Get real problems! I acknowledge I have no sympathy for people whose big idea they want to share with the world through fiction is “academia was stressful and toxic for me.” In a time in which the value of education, science, knowledge, truth etc. are under attack, it’s wild to me that people are writing (& getting that writing published) with so little self-awareness or reflection. I guess what I’m saying is it’s infuriating to read about this protagonist who gets a NASA grant to do research and dislikes the actual work so much she purposefully does undergrad-level busywork rather than anything meaningful, and then to read the author’s bio and see “In previous lives, they worked in an observational cosmology lab on a grant from NASA.” So that real life grant money was just fully wasted, huh. Academia sucks? Sounds like it’s the environment you perpetuated.
Ultimately this character’s journey, from a bleak, boring life to a slightly better life with a small sliver of purpose & meaning, did not need to take up 224 pages. It’s hard for me to imagine a reader who is willing to put up with this level of predictable banality for the full book unless they’re (a) the author’s MFA professor/classmate, and therefore it’s kinda their job, or (b) the kind of reader who likes to read boring litfic about depressed people whose lives are going nowhere so they feel better about how great their own life is in comparison. For any other kind of audience, this could have been (or should have stayed) a short story.
I also have a second sidenote, which is: Far be it from me to recommend people “get religion,” but I did joke to myself at a certain point that the MC should consider dabbling - just the fun bits, for something to do instead of sitting around being depressed - and therefore laughed out loud when I read the final chapter and she’s talking about the Torah and referencing Maimonides. Even there, though, the treatment of religion is at such a shallow level - the protagonist is just looking for a panacea. As long as you can slap a band-aid on it so you can get through the day, there’s no need to do the work to actually learn or grow or change, and religion is just the newest version of that. In that sense this book is the opposite of “hopeful” - the opposite of “[a]n explosion of creative beauty and heart.” It’s bland and a little bleak if you think about it for too long, and that’s more or less where it ends, too.
[*Yes, okay, there’s a little more than that. There’s grief & associated guilt, and there’s also the protagonist’s obvious depression. Everything I’ve said above about how the book handles grief is equally applicable to how it handles the rest of it.]
The concept of this book is alternate universes, which should be an interesting SF-y idea - and yet it’s so monotonous. The plot+prose version of driving on a Midwestern freeway. The “I’m definitely in Iowa Manitoba Kansas Montana one of the Dakotas Saskatchewan or Wyoming” of fiction. Yes, the book’s conceit is that each chapter is another alternate universe, with roughly the same characters, same tone, and same emotional conflicts. This chapter is Wyoming, that chapter is North Dakota, this one is Iowa. Oops, they look pretty much the same, turns out alternate universes with the same boring characters who have the same boring issues are pretty much identical! I for one would have loved to pull into an exit ramp when the MC hit the first of her banal “I was insecure and homophobic in middle school but now I’ve realized I’m queer” depression spirals, but much like a Midwestern freeway the exit ramp would not have helped me much. You can check out any time you like, but you can never leave (the prairie).
The charitable interpretation here is that the writing & the alternate universes were *intentionally* bland in order to demonstrate the depressing, flattening monotony of grief. That sort of implies that by the end of the book (which was blurbed on my edition as “hopeful” and “[a]n explosion of creative beauty and heart”) there would be some big shift in tone, style - something! Was there? Well, the very last page had a few lines that purposefully ended without punctuation, to show that the MC is living in the moment, finding human connection, no longer hemmed in by her grief……. florals for spring, in other words. Groundbreaking.
Yeah, look, at p. 98 I decided the book wasn’t going to be worth sticking with it, so I flipped to the end and read the last chapter. It was marginally better! Still not great, but there was a LITTLE something there that there wasn’t before. I guess the nicest thing I can say is that maybe now that this book is written North might have the time to put effort into writing something better? But the “autofiction” of it all has me doubting whether that’s going to happen anytime soon. (Autofiction? More like auto-DNF, badum ching.) By which I mean, the Venn diagram between the protagonist and North’s GoodReads bio is very close to a circle. Idk - if all you can write is a very thinly veiled version of your own life (or, in fact, many thinly veiled alternate versions of your own life), where do you go once you’ve done that? What does that lead to, creatively speaking? It just feels so lacking in imagination, empathy, a fundamental curiosity about the world around you…
Sidenote: What I’m also saying here is I’m sick of people for whom the worst thing* that’s happened to them in their life is grad school not working out. Get real problems! I acknowledge I have no sympathy for people whose big idea they want to share with the world through fiction is “academia was stressful and toxic for me.” In a time in which the value of education, science, knowledge, truth etc. are under attack, it’s wild to me that people are writing (& getting that writing published) with so little self-awareness or reflection. I guess what I’m saying is it’s infuriating to read about this protagonist who gets a NASA grant to do research and dislikes the actual work so much she purposefully does undergrad-level busywork rather than anything meaningful, and then to read the author’s bio and see “In previous lives, they worked in an observational cosmology lab on a grant from NASA.” So that real life grant money was just fully wasted, huh. Academia sucks? Sounds like it’s the environment you perpetuated.
Ultimately this character’s journey, from a bleak, boring life to a slightly better life with a small sliver of purpose & meaning, did not need to take up 224 pages. It’s hard for me to imagine a reader who is willing to put up with this level of predictable banality for the full book unless they’re (a) the author’s MFA professor/classmate, and therefore it’s kinda their job, or (b) the kind of reader who likes to read boring litfic about depressed people whose lives are going nowhere so they feel better about how great their own life is in comparison. For any other kind of audience, this could have been (or should have stayed) a short story.
I also have a second sidenote, which is: Far be it from me to recommend people “get religion,” but I did joke to myself at a certain point that the MC should consider dabbling - just the fun bits, for something to do instead of sitting around being depressed - and therefore laughed out loud when I read the final chapter and she’s talking about the Torah and referencing Maimonides. Even there, though, the treatment of religion is at such a shallow level - the protagonist is just looking for a panacea. As long as you can slap a band-aid on it so you can get through the day, there’s no need to do the work to actually learn or grow or change, and religion is just the newest version of that. In that sense this book is the opposite of “hopeful” - the opposite of “[a]n explosion of creative beauty and heart.” It’s bland and a little bleak if you think about it for too long, and that’s more or less where it ends, too.
[*Yes, okay, there’s a little more than that. There’s grief & associated guilt, and there’s also the protagonist’s obvious depression. Everything I’ve said above about how the book handles grief is equally applicable to how it handles the rest of it.]
January 7, 2025
A gorgeous novel. Being connected to the multiverse is kind of a chronic illness here, and also the key to exploring our identity? Quite queer, deeply emotional.
July 3, 2025
E se quel giorno avessi risposto a quella telefonata? E se avessi chiesto a quella persona di rimanere a casa, invece di uscire? E se esistesse un universo in cui un'altra versione di te ha compiuto scelte diverse, che ha avuto una vita diversa, e che comunque soffre per qualcos'altro?
Negli Universi di questo libro, Britt è sempre/sempre stata/sarà presente nella vita di Raffi, sempre in modi diversi. A volte è accanto a lei, a volte non si sono mai parlate, a volte Britt non c'è più. Eppure Raffi pensa sempre a Britt. Raffi che in universo ha tredici anni, poi quaranta, poi ha una madre orda di api, una zia che le insegna il perdono, una casa fatta di stanze dedicate alle emozioni più brutte, una compagna incinta di un polpo.
Ogni capitolo è una finestra su uno degli universi in cui Raphaela vive e. alla fine di ognuno, esprimerà un desiderio, un auspicio che da qualche altra parte del multiverso un'altra versione di lei abbia compiuto una scelta diversa, e noi ci ritroveremo nel capitolo successivo nell'universo del suo desiderio. Eppure nulla va mai liscio e basta.
Con una scrittura ricca di allegorie più o meno esplicite, metafore più o meno surreali, Emet North mi ha fatto sentire capita per le emozioni che ho provato anch'io, e mi ha anche dato la possibilità di immaginare cosa significhi vivere sentimenti e situazioni che non ho mai vissuto. Le parti più speculative sono state ovviamente le mie preferite, perché sono le più strane e quelle più sperimentali a livello di immagini verbali. Amici tassidermizzati, madri orde di animali, alieni zoofili, polpi sottopelle. Tutto fighissimo, al contempo figurato e estremamente letterale.
Si parla di identità, di perdono, di rimorsi e di rimpianti, di elaborazione del lutto e di legame con gli animali, di queerness, di desideri, di ambizioni, di scelte da fare in momenti difficili della vita. Soprattutto si parla di amore, in tante forme diverse, e di quel legame unico e speciale che si sente solo con alcune persone nella propria vita e che porta a chiedersi se non si sia forse in grado di leggersi nel pensiero a vicenda.
La parte finale, senza fare spoiler, non mi ha soddisfatta troppo; diciamo che l'introduzione del libero arbitrio mi è sembrato un po' in contrasto con il resto del libro, però non mi è dispiaciuto.
Se vi è piaciuto Così si perde la guerra del tempo, potrebbe piacervi anche Negli universi.
Negli Universi di questo libro, Britt è sempre/sempre stata/sarà presente nella vita di Raffi, sempre in modi diversi. A volte è accanto a lei, a volte non si sono mai parlate, a volte Britt non c'è più. Eppure Raffi pensa sempre a Britt. Raffi che in universo ha tredici anni, poi quaranta, poi ha una madre orda di api, una zia che le insegna il perdono, una casa fatta di stanze dedicate alle emozioni più brutte, una compagna incinta di un polpo.
Ogni capitolo è una finestra su uno degli universi in cui Raphaela vive e. alla fine di ognuno, esprimerà un desiderio, un auspicio che da qualche altra parte del multiverso un'altra versione di lei abbia compiuto una scelta diversa, e noi ci ritroveremo nel capitolo successivo nell'universo del suo desiderio. Eppure nulla va mai liscio e basta.
Con una scrittura ricca di allegorie più o meno esplicite, metafore più o meno surreali, Emet North mi ha fatto sentire capita per le emozioni che ho provato anch'io, e mi ha anche dato la possibilità di immaginare cosa significhi vivere sentimenti e situazioni che non ho mai vissuto. Le parti più speculative sono state ovviamente le mie preferite, perché sono le più strane e quelle più sperimentali a livello di immagini verbali. Amici tassidermizzati, madri orde di animali, alieni zoofili, polpi sottopelle. Tutto fighissimo, al contempo figurato e estremamente letterale.
Si parla di identità, di perdono, di rimorsi e di rimpianti, di elaborazione del lutto e di legame con gli animali, di queerness, di desideri, di ambizioni, di scelte da fare in momenti difficili della vita. Soprattutto si parla di amore, in tante forme diverse, e di quel legame unico e speciale che si sente solo con alcune persone nella propria vita e che porta a chiedersi se non si sia forse in grado di leggersi nel pensiero a vicenda.
La parte finale, senza fare spoiler, non mi ha soddisfatta troppo; diciamo che l'introduzione del libero arbitrio mi è sembrato un po' in contrasto con il resto del libro, però non mi è dispiaciuto.
Se vi è piaciuto Così si perde la guerra del tempo, potrebbe piacervi anche Negli universi.
April 22, 2024
While I originally picked this because I expected it to be smart and worldly and an exploration of gender and sexuality, I just… didn’t get it? Maybe it all went over my head, but each chapter read like a separate story entirely with no cohesive plot. The writing is STUNNING and there are little nuggets of beauty, but it just didn’t DO or SAY anything overall.
Read
May 18, 2024Won this book through Goodreads giveaway. Thank you! Gave me a chance to read a book I'd otherwise not know existed. (Like all the millions of other uiverses which might be out there.)
However, and wow! Outlier here. Again. And my background is in science. I actually taught some of this stuff years ago, but here goes...
Story of Raffi, female, studying physics. The beginning was great! She's helping in the search for dark matter - what it is, where it is, if it even IS. I loved it! Thought I'd love this book to pieces! Great back story for Raffi: friends, the people she lives with, boyfriend, the whole shebang and then...
I fell out of love with it. What happens is that Raffi is shown/or experiences other universes - some very realistic, others far-out weird or fantastical and that's where Mr. North lost me...
I grew distracted and put up a new universe all around me...
One in search of a better book.
DNF, no rating, didn't get far enough.
However, and wow! Outlier here. Again. And my background is in science. I actually taught some of this stuff years ago, but here goes...
Story of Raffi, female, studying physics. The beginning was great! She's helping in the search for dark matter - what it is, where it is, if it even IS. I loved it! Thought I'd love this book to pieces! Great back story for Raffi: friends, the people she lives with, boyfriend, the whole shebang and then...
I fell out of love with it. What happens is that Raffi is shown/or experiences other universes - some very realistic, others far-out weird or fantastical and that's where Mr. North lost me...
I grew distracted and put up a new universe all around me...
One in search of a better book.
DNF, no rating, didn't get far enough.
May 1, 2024
This is a really intriguing, undefinable novel. Each chapter presents an alternate universe where Raffi, the protagonist, experiences love and despair in a variety of circumstances. In each an event in Raffi's childhood—where their best friend Britt loses a horse—becomes central to their life in various ways. Raffi is queer in all the stories and has relationships with a small group regardless of the alternate universe. There's an apocalyptic universe where aliens inhabit animals, a universe where women fracture into animals, a universe where there's a city of regrets. In most chapters, Raffi is a physicist studying alternate universes.
It's a really intriguing collection that grapples with mental health, queerness, Judaism, forgiveness, and regrets. I wasn't sure how I was going to rate it, but the very last chapter made me tear up.
It's a really intriguing collection that grapples with mental health, queerness, Judaism, forgiveness, and regrets. I wasn't sure how I was going to rate it, but the very last chapter made me tear up.
May 15, 2024
4.75 stars? 5 Stars? An almost favorite for sure that I immediately want to reread already.
"...have you ever felt one dream shiver straight through the center of another? Gone to sleep in a familiar universe and woken up somewhere new?"
Gah, what a wonderful mind fuck, and what an amazing way to have a character explorer their queerness and gender, deal with their grief.
ALL the points for uniqueness and delivering exactly the right amount of mind fuckery I would expect from a book about parallel universes with the nice bonus of some more absurd versions that I definitely did not see coming.
Absolutely amazing, loved it, despite of how heavy and sad it was. (gave me Butterfly Effect vibes)
"...maybe if I understand dark matter and the night sky, I will also understand how to get out of bed in the morning."
"...have you ever felt one dream shiver straight through the center of another? Gone to sleep in a familiar universe and woken up somewhere new?"
Gah, what a wonderful mind fuck, and what an amazing way to have a character explorer their queerness and gender, deal with their grief.
ALL the points for uniqueness and delivering exactly the right amount of mind fuckery I would expect from a book about parallel universes with the nice bonus of some more absurd versions that I definitely did not see coming.
Absolutely amazing, loved it, despite of how heavy and sad it was. (gave me Butterfly Effect vibes)
"...maybe if I understand dark matter and the night sky, I will also understand how to get out of bed in the morning."
September 6, 2025
I had to sit and stare at the wall for a bit after finishing this. With such impeccable prose, all eleven stories were hard hitting and I was enraptured. I really liked the journey of Raffi's self discovery through multiple universes and these stories being connected by similar yet unique feelings and depictions of grief, love, loss and friendship. I did not want it to end...
This truly is a book you think about for a long time after.
This truly is a book you think about for a long time after.
dnf
September 20, 2025DNF at 56%
Beautiful writing and thought-provoking turn through multiple universes via our queer physicist MC but I have to tap out after the "pregnant with an octopus" light body horror chapter. There shall be no recovering from that!
Characters: Raffi (she/they) is a Jewish observational cosmology research assistant. Britt is a queer sculptor.
Content notes: suicidal ideation, suicide attempts, depression, anxiety, intimate partner violence, past sexual harassment, past child physical abuse, toxic mother, murder, corpses, body horror, pregnant with octopus, stress fracture, toenail falls off, homophobia, slut-shaming, infidelity, parental divorce, past parental infidelity, past and present death of loved ones (lug and brain cancer, heart attack, overdose, bear attack, tickborne illness, concentration camps), animal death, past animal neglect, bear attack, butchering, taxidermy, bees, aliens, poverty, classism, sports-related injuries (secondary character), off page sex, alcohol, inebriation, marijuana, gendered pejorative, ableist language
Beautiful writing and thought-provoking turn through multiple universes via our queer physicist MC but I have to tap out after the "pregnant with an octopus" light body horror chapter. There shall be no recovering from that!
Characters: Raffi (she/they) is a Jewish observational cosmology research assistant. Britt is a queer sculptor.
Content notes: suicidal ideation, suicide attempts, depression, anxiety, intimate partner violence, past sexual harassment, past child physical abuse, toxic mother, murder, corpses, body horror, pregnant with octopus, stress fracture, toenail falls off, homophobia, slut-shaming, infidelity, parental divorce, past parental infidelity, past and present death of loved ones (lug and brain cancer, heart attack, overdose, bear attack, tickborne illness, concentration camps), animal death, past animal neglect, bear attack, butchering, taxidermy, bees, aliens, poverty, classism, sports-related injuries (secondary character), off page sex, alcohol, inebriation, marijuana, gendered pejorative, ableist language
July 1, 2024
Hmm. Not sure about this one, even though on paper it's everything I like in a book.
This follows Raffi across the multiverse in which the world is slightly different and they make different decisions at certain points in their life. The book is essentially short stories following the same cast of characters, who seem to be malleable in gender and sexuality. I wished they were more interconnected, and that some ideas were explored further. I also found it relentlessly depressing.
Also, after reading the author's bio, large parts of this book feel autobiographical in a way I don't really jive with. Oh well. The writing was good, many of the ideas were creative, but this book just didn't knock it out of the park, especially when I compare it to other queer interconnected stories that I have loved in the past (How High We Go in the Dark, This is How You Lose the Time War).
This follows Raffi across the multiverse in which the world is slightly different and they make different decisions at certain points in their life. The book is essentially short stories following the same cast of characters, who seem to be malleable in gender and sexuality. I wished they were more interconnected, and that some ideas were explored further. I also found it relentlessly depressing.
Also, after reading the author's bio, large parts of this book feel autobiographical in a way I don't really jive with. Oh well. The writing was good, many of the ideas were creative, but this book just didn't knock it out of the park, especially when I compare it to other queer interconnected stories that I have loved in the past (How High We Go in the Dark, This is How You Lose the Time War).
March 9, 2024
This is a novel of multitudes! The Universes is plural because in this beautiful novel you will meet Raffi in a variety of scenarios where she interacts with several characters but in many, many different ways. As we meet Raffi as a young girl, a teenager and an adult, Britt, Graham and Kay reappear as friends, enemies and lovers and we travel with her through the universes as she discovers what is truly important.
North has created a masterpiece for anyone who wonders what life could be in another time or place. Sliding Doors, Michael Cunningham and many other favorites come to mind and I highly recommend this beautiful work.
#harper #inuniverses #emetnorth
North has created a masterpiece for anyone who wonders what life could be in another time or place. Sliding Doors, Michael Cunningham and many other favorites come to mind and I highly recommend this beautiful work.
#harper #inuniverses #emetnorth
August 22, 2024
Just a collection of plotless short stories with non-endings. Yes it was a multiverse of the same people with nuanced lives and criss-crossings but the stories weren't related with one another. Though there were a few good one liners, it wasn't saying or doing anything as a whole. Even through the fabric of space and time, Raffi felt one-dimensional and flat. She bored me after her whole "oh agony is me" overstayed its welcome.
August 1, 2025
All the love to authors who write multiverse stories and are not afraid to get really, really weird with it.
July 31, 2025
Wow, this book! Weird and beautiful. Queer speculative linked short stories. I’m so grateful my friend recommended it to me because I haven’t seen it mentioned anywhere else.
March 27, 2025
oh wow the writing was stunning
March 8, 2024
(This review is based on an advanced reader’s copy provided by NetGalley.)
Parts I and II were about 3.5 stars; Part III (and especially the last chapter) made it 4 stars.
I enjoyed this, though it wasn’t quite what I expected. I thought this book would be literary sci-fi, like Sea of Tranquility or How High We Go in the Dark. But most of it reads like contemporary literary fiction that just barely has a speculative premise on a technicality. There are a few chapters with a magical realism feel, and one chapter with an alien invasion, but a lot of the chapters are basically just realistic fiction. Luckily, I like realistic fiction, but this was more realistic-adjacent than the marketing (the cover, the title, the comps) implied. That said, the Carmen Maria Machado comp feels reasonably accurate.
The book is somewhere between a novel and a short story collection. Much of the book feels lacking in plot and direction—I enjoyed each chapter/story individually, but for a while they didn’t really seem to add up to anything when put together. For much of the book, I felt like the book had set up an interesting, complicated relationship with and then never really did anything with it, but eventually the setup does pay off. The last chapter made me feel like the book was sticking the landing, but the last scene was a bit of a wobble: it wasn’t entirely narratively satisfying, because it didn’t feel like the main character had a truly meaningful choice to make, since . But, overall, the last chapter was beautiful and made me cry.
The sentence-level prose is good, and the book has a lovely dreamlike quality. It feels a bit like a Charlie Kaufman film.
I would recommend this book for character-driven readers of slice-of-life literary fiction (who are okay with their fiction getting weird sometimes). I would not recommend it for plot-driven readers or for readers who only like sci-fi.
Rep: I would describe the main character as bisexual and nonbinary, although those words do not appear in the text. The main character has dated men and women, is referred to as “she” in some chapters and “they” in other chapters, and describes themself as “not one of the boys, but not exactly a girl either.” They are an Ashkenazi Jewish atheist who I would describe as middle-class. They have depression (though it could be bipolar instead: at least one chapter portrays something that could be read as a manic episode). Multiple side characters use they/them pronouns (again, no identity labels besides pronouns are used). Multiple side characters are queer/sapphic women.
Content notes: Death of a loved one, from various causes, including suicide. Animal death / pet death. Pregnancy. Moderately explicit sex scenes. Emotionally abusive parent. Homophobia, including slurs (but nothing physically violent). Depression. Discussion of Jewish generational trauma and family history involving the Holocaust. In one chapter, the main character has an (unspecified, and probably fictional) progressive/degenerative illness or disability.
Parts I and II were about 3.5 stars; Part III (and especially the last chapter) made it 4 stars.
I enjoyed this, though it wasn’t quite what I expected. I thought this book would be literary sci-fi, like Sea of Tranquility or How High We Go in the Dark. But most of it reads like contemporary literary fiction that just barely has a speculative premise on a technicality. There are a few chapters with a magical realism feel, and one chapter with an alien invasion, but a lot of the chapters are basically just realistic fiction. Luckily, I like realistic fiction, but this was more realistic-adjacent than the marketing (the cover, the title, the comps) implied. That said, the Carmen Maria Machado comp feels reasonably accurate.
The book is somewhere between a novel and a short story collection. Much of the book feels lacking in plot and direction—I enjoyed each chapter/story individually, but for a while they didn’t really seem to add up to anything when put together. For much of the book, I felt like the book had set up an interesting, complicated relationship with and then never really did anything with it, but eventually the setup does pay off. The last chapter made me feel like the book was sticking the landing, but the last scene was a bit of a wobble: it wasn’t entirely narratively satisfying, because it didn’t feel like the main character had a truly meaningful choice to make, since . But, overall, the last chapter was beautiful and made me cry.
The sentence-level prose is good, and the book has a lovely dreamlike quality. It feels a bit like a Charlie Kaufman film.
I would recommend this book for character-driven readers of slice-of-life literary fiction (who are okay with their fiction getting weird sometimes). I would not recommend it for plot-driven readers or for readers who only like sci-fi.
Rep: I would describe the main character as bisexual and nonbinary, although those words do not appear in the text. The main character has dated men and women, is referred to as “she” in some chapters and “they” in other chapters, and describes themself as “not one of the boys, but not exactly a girl either.” They are an Ashkenazi Jewish atheist who I would describe as middle-class. They have depression (though it could be bipolar instead: at least one chapter portrays something that could be read as a manic episode). Multiple side characters use they/them pronouns (again, no identity labels besides pronouns are used). Multiple side characters are queer/sapphic women.
Content notes: Death of a loved one, from various causes, including suicide. Animal death / pet death. Pregnancy. Moderately explicit sex scenes. Emotionally abusive parent. Homophobia, including slurs (but nothing physically violent). Depression. Discussion of Jewish generational trauma and family history involving the Holocaust. In one chapter, the main character has an (unspecified, and probably fictional) progressive/degenerative illness or disability.
June 1, 2024
A truly interesting debut, In Universes features what, in essentials, feels like a series of deeply connected short stories. These episodic pieces are deeply entrenched in and intertwined with one another and their core story, set at the beginning almost like a prologue, covering themes about identity, relationships, and agency.
Raffi doesn't really understand their job at an observational cosmology lab where they search for evidence of dark matter. They're a little rudderless, and the heart of the book is in the constructing of stories that are Raffi's imaginings of another existence, another way they've met Britt...or other friends and lovers that come into their life.
Where it worked really well lies in the beauty of North’s words. Their style and thoughtful meanderings perfectly matched the stories, no matter the setting, characters, situations, or tone — aliens and zombies included. All the stories and editions of Raffi are very melancholic, as if they counter the very idea of the hopefulness of the multi-verse. The yeah-but of it all was fairly balanced by the reticent Raffi against the more positive influences in their life, no matter which version. North captures this moodiness with some great writing.
But taking into account each snippet as part of a larger picture, North holds back too far for my tastes. Without a plot pulling the stories forward, Raffi needed to show more growth, self-actualization, and centering. But that didn’t happen. Aside from the absolutely gorgeous second chapter (the first branch in the Raffi-verse), each subsequent one felt very akin to a montage of scenes, rather than individual imaginings, complete in and of themselves, and this got very repetitive. Many of the chapters simply ended with a fade-to-black idea, and lacked a good deal of intention. I actually abandoned this one at 55% only to change my mind and pick it back up, but that’s more a testament to North’s writing style than to what I found in the last half. Nevertheless, I’ll be checking out what North gives us next.
Raffi doesn't really understand their job at an observational cosmology lab where they search for evidence of dark matter. They're a little rudderless, and the heart of the book is in the constructing of stories that are Raffi's imaginings of another existence, another way they've met Britt...or other friends and lovers that come into their life.
Where it worked really well lies in the beauty of North’s words. Their style and thoughtful meanderings perfectly matched the stories, no matter the setting, characters, situations, or tone — aliens and zombies included. All the stories and editions of Raffi are very melancholic, as if they counter the very idea of the hopefulness of the multi-verse. The yeah-but of it all was fairly balanced by the reticent Raffi against the more positive influences in their life, no matter which version. North captures this moodiness with some great writing.
But taking into account each snippet as part of a larger picture, North holds back too far for my tastes. Without a plot pulling the stories forward, Raffi needed to show more growth, self-actualization, and centering. But that didn’t happen. Aside from the absolutely gorgeous second chapter (the first branch in the Raffi-verse), each subsequent one felt very akin to a montage of scenes, rather than individual imaginings, complete in and of themselves, and this got very repetitive. Many of the chapters simply ended with a fade-to-black idea, and lacked a good deal of intention. I actually abandoned this one at 55% only to change my mind and pick it back up, but that’s more a testament to North’s writing style than to what I found in the last half. Nevertheless, I’ll be checking out what North gives us next.
May 8, 2024
Look, In Universes did maybe confuse me a little? But I also enjoyed it quite a bit. In it, we meet Raffi, in multiple universes. Hence the title, right? Anyway. The whole book is slices of Raffi's life in parallel worlds, and some of them are more like our world, and some are not, and I feel like that is really it. It's a quieter book obviously, and very character driven, but it is also really entertaining to see the differences in Raffi (and others- plenty of folks in Raffi's "first" world appear throughout) and the worlds in general. A few of them flummoxed me a bit, but it was still fun, plus I got to use the word "flummoxed" in my review, so everyone wins. And, it makes you think about who you might be in other worlds, which I always find to be a good time.
Bottom Line: Quirky but enjoyable, I loved getting to see different versions of Raffi, and of the world.
You can find the full review and all the fancy and/or randomness that accompanies it at It Starts at Midnight
Bottom Line: Quirky but enjoyable, I loved getting to see different versions of Raffi, and of the world.
You can find the full review and all the fancy and/or randomness that accompanies it at It Starts at Midnight
January 26, 2025
A very cool book that is essentially a set of overlapping sci-fi-ish short stories about a small set of characters who keep finding each other in parallel universes throughout the multiverse. The book reads like literary fiction (no plot, just vibes) and although the middle section was a bit hard to follow, the beginning and end were beautiful.
The book explores big themes of how we unintentionally hurt those we love, queerness, loneliness, parent-child relationships, and bodily autonomy, while not shying away from some super weird sci-fi elements (a mother who turns into a talking horde of bees after giving birth/ a women who gives birth to an octopus baby).
It’s unlike anything I have ever read. My only real complaint is that if you’re gonna write a book in the multiverse- couldn’t at least one timeline be happy? I love a sad book, but this one had excessive amounts of doom and gloom, even for me.
The book explores big themes of how we unintentionally hurt those we love, queerness, loneliness, parent-child relationships, and bodily autonomy, while not shying away from some super weird sci-fi elements (a mother who turns into a talking horde of bees after giving birth/ a women who gives birth to an octopus baby).
It’s unlike anything I have ever read. My only real complaint is that if you’re gonna write a book in the multiverse- couldn’t at least one timeline be happy? I love a sad book, but this one had excessive amounts of doom and gloom, even for me.
May 25, 2025
À la fois bouleversant, dur, beau, ce roman m’a énormément touché et je recommande d’être mentalement prêt à lire quelque chose d’aussi « lourd » avant de se lancer dedans. On suit une personne à travers différentes réalités parallèles, à travers ses trauma, ses amours, ses deuils, ses pensées noires, ses choix. Des personnages apparaissent et disparaissent, des thématiques aussi (les études de physique, de philo, les huskys, les ours…) et surtout par dessus tout cette idée que quelque part une version d’elle/iel est heureuse, peut-être ?
Avertissement de contenu : deuil, trauma, suicide, tentative de suicide, pensées suicidaires, mort, mort violente, homophobie
Avertissement de contenu : deuil, trauma, suicide, tentative de suicide, pensées suicidaires, mort, mort violente, homophobie
dnf
August 24, 2025DNF @ 30%
I think I picked this up because someone mentioned enjoying it in a bookish Discord server, and it's partially narrated by one of my favourite audiobook narrators: Natalie Naudus.
Unfortunately I think this is just too much lesbian angst and not enough science fiction and alternate universes for me. It's very character driven with a lot of focus on serious topics and emotional trauma (or even just loss, regret, ennui) and pontificating over alternate paths their lives could have taken. But they're not the kind of characters I connect with and I prefer a lot more world-building and plots so this just isn't the book for me.
I think I picked this up because someone mentioned enjoying it in a bookish Discord server, and it's partially narrated by one of my favourite audiobook narrators: Natalie Naudus.
Unfortunately I think this is just too much lesbian angst and not enough science fiction and alternate universes for me. It's very character driven with a lot of focus on serious topics and emotional trauma (or even just loss, regret, ennui) and pontificating over alternate paths their lives could have taken. But they're not the kind of characters I connect with and I prefer a lot more world-building and plots so this just isn't the book for me.
Read
October 23, 2024In Universes is the classic “Your Mileage May Vary” novel.
I loved the central conceit. Broken into eleven chapters, the novel follows Raffi and her/their experience across the multiverse. Raffi doesn’t travel between parallel worlds; instead, we encounter different iterations of Raffi. A world where her mother is formed of bees, where alien-infected animals have wiped out most of humanity, and where the Biblical “City of Refuge” becomes a literal place. In each of these worlds, she/they is a little obsessed with the multiverse and struggles with her/their sexuality and gender. Raffi is mired in regret over an incident involving a childhood friend, Britt, and the death of Britt’s horse. They also struggle with matters of love, whether it’s Brit, Kay or Alice, the three recurring women in her/their life.
My problem with In Universes is Raffi—namely, how she/they is portrayed. No matter the parallel universe, she/they is plagued with the same anxieties and doubts. It’s not until the very last chapter—which is incredible, by far the most vital section of the novel recalling the final section of Elizabeth Costello—that Raffi sees any progression. Around halfway through the book, Raffi’s anguish, her inability to process her guilt, starts to feel needlessly cruel, as if North is deliberately punishing her character.
This is where mileages may vary. What I perceived as harsh others might view as profound, especially those who have experienced the same fears and insecurities as Raffi. I am not that person. I may, in fact, not be the intended audience of the novel—because as much as we might believe that works of fiction are universal, that’s not the case. Some stories have an audience in mind, and in the case of In Universes this may not include a cis-gendered male.
Although—and this is where I get wishy-washy again—Raffi is Jewish (so am I). She’s Ashkenazi (so am I). There’s mention of Rambam (I did a thesis on him), Mishnah Torah (which I’ve studied parts of), chicken soup and kreplach (which is the bestest comfort food in the world). I related to all of that. It’s possibly why I loved the final chapter so much because it not only features the Arei Miklat (City of Refuge) but centres on the Jewish notion of confession (“Vidui”). And it’s beautiful. So good that I started to doubt my feelings toward the rest of the novel.
This is why I find myself in a limbo state about In Universes, which, on reflection, is appropriate for a book about the multiverse.
I loved the central conceit. Broken into eleven chapters, the novel follows Raffi and her/their experience across the multiverse. Raffi doesn’t travel between parallel worlds; instead, we encounter different iterations of Raffi. A world where her mother is formed of bees, where alien-infected animals have wiped out most of humanity, and where the Biblical “City of Refuge” becomes a literal place. In each of these worlds, she/they is a little obsessed with the multiverse and struggles with her/their sexuality and gender. Raffi is mired in regret over an incident involving a childhood friend, Britt, and the death of Britt’s horse. They also struggle with matters of love, whether it’s Brit, Kay or Alice, the three recurring women in her/their life.
My problem with In Universes is Raffi—namely, how she/they is portrayed. No matter the parallel universe, she/they is plagued with the same anxieties and doubts. It’s not until the very last chapter—which is incredible, by far the most vital section of the novel recalling the final section of Elizabeth Costello—that Raffi sees any progression. Around halfway through the book, Raffi’s anguish, her inability to process her guilt, starts to feel needlessly cruel, as if North is deliberately punishing her character.
This is where mileages may vary. What I perceived as harsh others might view as profound, especially those who have experienced the same fears and insecurities as Raffi. I am not that person. I may, in fact, not be the intended audience of the novel—because as much as we might believe that works of fiction are universal, that’s not the case. Some stories have an audience in mind, and in the case of In Universes this may not include a cis-gendered male.
Although—and this is where I get wishy-washy again—Raffi is Jewish (so am I). She’s Ashkenazi (so am I). There’s mention of Rambam (I did a thesis on him), Mishnah Torah (which I’ve studied parts of), chicken soup and kreplach (which is the bestest comfort food in the world). I related to all of that. It’s possibly why I loved the final chapter so much because it not only features the Arei Miklat (City of Refuge) but centres on the Jewish notion of confession (“Vidui”). And it’s beautiful. So good that I started to doubt my feelings toward the rest of the novel.
This is why I find myself in a limbo state about In Universes, which, on reflection, is appropriate for a book about the multiverse.
March 28, 2024
Emet North's In Universes is a novel that captivates readers with the boundless possibilities of life and existence. North masterfully brings this to life through the main character, Raffi, whom we follow as the universe around them shifts, transforming their relationships with other characters from enemies to friends to lovers in each chapter.
Multiverse stories often disappoint me, as they rarely utilize their full potential. However, under the guidance of a skilled author, they can transform into some of the most captivating works. This holds true for North's debut. In Universes ignites a thought-provoking exploration of the common question, "How would my life be if x, y, or z had been different?” The literary quality of the novel makes it a delightful read. Each chapter stands as a unique short story, tracking Raffi through various life stages, from childhood to adulthood. With each tale, Raffi's connections to a consistent cast of characters shift, reflecting the dynamics of the universe they inhabit in that particular chapter. Add to this North's beautiful and often innovative writing style, and you have a narrative that, in just 250 pages, explores themes of mental health, identity, and emotions such as regret and hope more profoundly than many longer works that are twice its size.
In summary, if I were to describe this book in a single sentence, it would be: "In Universes is an experience." It's unique, innovative, empathetic, and oh so beautifully expressed, earning it a star from every universe where I've had the pleasure of experiencing it.
Multiverse stories often disappoint me, as they rarely utilize their full potential. However, under the guidance of a skilled author, they can transform into some of the most captivating works. This holds true for North's debut. In Universes ignites a thought-provoking exploration of the common question, "How would my life be if x, y, or z had been different?” The literary quality of the novel makes it a delightful read. Each chapter stands as a unique short story, tracking Raffi through various life stages, from childhood to adulthood. With each tale, Raffi's connections to a consistent cast of characters shift, reflecting the dynamics of the universe they inhabit in that particular chapter. Add to this North's beautiful and often innovative writing style, and you have a narrative that, in just 250 pages, explores themes of mental health, identity, and emotions such as regret and hope more profoundly than many longer works that are twice its size.
In summary, if I were to describe this book in a single sentence, it would be: "In Universes is an experience." It's unique, innovative, empathetic, and oh so beautifully expressed, earning it a star from every universe where I've had the pleasure of experiencing it.
May 21, 2024
In Universes follows a narrator named Raffi, who is studying dark matter in a cosmology lab. The more they seek out answers, the clearer it becomes that they may never find them. And so, they instead find themselves pulled more towards a queer sculptor named Britt.
But this, too, is something they have no answers for. After things fall apart, and fall apart quickly, they retreat with only the thought that maybe, in another universe, they got everything right.
Each chapter pulls us into a universe where Raffi has made alternate choices. And so, their life does look different. But each universe is carried through with the thread of who Raffi remains, no matter the choices they make.
The people in Raffi‘s life alternate by title in each universe. And yet, the love they have for these people, despite who specifically they are for them in that moment, also remains the same.
Which is how you end up with a novel showcasing the fluidity of love, gender, and personhood. And god, was it exquisite.
The last few lines left me feeling as though Emet had taken a sledgehammer to my heart—which is to say, yes, I highly recommend this.
A perfect five star book.
But this, too, is something they have no answers for. After things fall apart, and fall apart quickly, they retreat with only the thought that maybe, in another universe, they got everything right.
Each chapter pulls us into a universe where Raffi has made alternate choices. And so, their life does look different. But each universe is carried through with the thread of who Raffi remains, no matter the choices they make.
The people in Raffi‘s life alternate by title in each universe. And yet, the love they have for these people, despite who specifically they are for them in that moment, also remains the same.
Which is how you end up with a novel showcasing the fluidity of love, gender, and personhood. And god, was it exquisite.
The last few lines left me feeling as though Emet had taken a sledgehammer to my heart—which is to say, yes, I highly recommend this.
A perfect five star book.
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