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Finity
Professor Lyle Peripart's world makes perfect sense, until he is recruited by an odd industrialist and begins to see evidence of alternative universes all around him, including one in which the United States surrendered to the USSR back in the 1970s
303 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1999
5 people are currently reading
252 people want to read
About the author
John Barnes
263 books198 followersJohn Barnes (born 1957) is an American science fiction author, whose stories often explore questions of individual moral responsibility within a larger social context. Social criticism is woven throughout his plots. The four novels in his Thousand Cultures series pose serious questions about the effects of globalization on isolated societies. Barnes holds a doctorate in theatre and for several years taught in Colorado, where he still lives.
See also http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Bar...
See also http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Bar...
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 40 reviews
August 11, 2019
Lyle Peripart is reasonably content with his quiet life as an expatriate American academic in New Zealand, a pleasant backwater in a world ruled by the Twelve Reichs. Until he accepts a plum job offer from a billionaire industrialist -- and he's roughed up by the Gestapo in Surabaya, shot at in Saigon, and comes home to a smoking crater where his house used to be. Then things get really weird. . . .
Experienced SF readers will have little doubt as to what's happening -- the Many Worlds hypothesis has been a fertile SF breeding-ground for quite some time -- but, as always, the genius is in the details. In Finity we get such goodies as robot taxicabs with easily-hurt feelings, private suborbital jump-boats (but no automobiles) for the middle-class, and a neat new quantum-computing rationale for Many Worlds slippage. Not to mention -- finally! -- an explanation for all those one or 2-ring phantom phone calls I get.
What we don't get is a particularly consistent or well-thought-out plot or backstory. I didn't have any problems suspending disbelief while reading Finity -- a matter of 3 or 4 hours -- but if you're a critical reader, this one may not be for you. If you're looking for a light, fast, read-once entertainment -- as I was -- Finity will fill the bill nicely.
Barnes dedicates Finity to a reader who asked, "Just once, would it kill you to write an adventure story, with a reasonably happy ending, and only a little weird?"
Experienced SF readers will have little doubt as to what's happening -- the Many Worlds hypothesis has been a fertile SF breeding-ground for quite some time -- but, as always, the genius is in the details. In Finity we get such goodies as robot taxicabs with easily-hurt feelings, private suborbital jump-boats (but no automobiles) for the middle-class, and a neat new quantum-computing rationale for Many Worlds slippage. Not to mention -- finally! -- an explanation for all those one or 2-ring phantom phone calls I get.
What we don't get is a particularly consistent or well-thought-out plot or backstory. I didn't have any problems suspending disbelief while reading Finity -- a matter of 3 or 4 hours -- but if you're a critical reader, this one may not be for you. If you're looking for a light, fast, read-once entertainment -- as I was -- Finity will fill the bill nicely.
Barnes dedicates Finity to a reader who asked, "Just once, would it kill you to write an adventure story, with a reasonably happy ending, and only a little weird?"
July 9, 2020
I usually like John Barnes' work, but this novel didn't work for me, in spite of the fact that I liked the basic scenario of the world that the main character lives in and finds to be normal turning out to be much more bizarre than he could imagine (and more bizarre than is apparent to the readers, who know that in reality, Germany did not win WWII). One characteristic moment that pulled me out of the novel was the moment when one of the characters reminds another character that discussions of one's personal past have become rare in recent years, with parents redirecting children if they start to talk about such things, as if the whole subject is tabu or distasteful; since this incident occurred well into the book, and no inkling of such a remarkable cultural practice had been given earlier on, I was disappointed. I should add (since some people who read my reviews have expressed an interest in getting this kind of warning) that there is an unpleasant sex scene in the middle of the book; it does have a plot-related reason for occurring but is more intense than necessary to get the point across. On the positive side, some of the scenes which demonstrate the American expat culture that has grown up after several generations of being exiled from America are memorable - I liked the "gourmet restaurant" take on the traditional American picnic fare.
October 14, 2017
Lyle Peripart is an average astronomer, an American ex-pat living in New Zealand and making a pretty good go of it, in a world where the Nazis won WW2 and Twelve Reichs divide the globe. He's got a steady relationship, a nice house, and a talking suborbital rocketship. When he accepts a new job with a mysterious industrial tycoon his life gets seriously weird. He starts running into a Gestapo agent, his fiance is a gun-slinging international assassin rather than a history professor, and there are gaps in what Lyle can say and think: worlds and phrases that trigger headaches and amnesia. The biggest problem: no two people agree on what history looks like, and no one has every actually communicated with America. An entire country has been missing for decades, memory is a lie, and something is very fishy.
What follows is a thrilling quest into the empty heart of America, the weirdness of Many Worlds Quantum Mechanics, and what it means to really Pursue Happiness above all else. Finity is a strange strange book, a breezy picaresque tied to quantum speculation and a brutal death march, but it's quite cool and an under appreciated gem.
What follows is a thrilling quest into the empty heart of America, the weirdness of Many Worlds Quantum Mechanics, and what it means to really Pursue Happiness above all else. Finity is a strange strange book, a breezy picaresque tied to quantum speculation and a brutal death march, but it's quite cool and an under appreciated gem.
January 5, 2014
‘Lyle Peripart’s world is coming apart. Up to just a few days ago he was an obscure professor, quietly unenthusiastic about the Reichs that have dominated the world since the Axis victory over a century ago – but not looking for a fight with anyone.
Then Lyle was recruited for private industry by the mysterious industrialist Geoffrey Iphwin – and everything stopped making sense.
His mild mannered fiancée turns out to be a gun-toting weapons expert who grew up in a world in which America surrendered to the USSR in the 1970s. And several of their friends turn out to have grown up in more different worlds still. Worse, they gradually realise that not one of them has ever talked to anyone inside the continental United States.
In fact, just thinking about the United States is hard.
It’s as if someone is trying to stop them.
Something, in fact, seems to be trying to kill each of them. And Geoffrey Iphwin is trying to pull them together – for a quest into what’s actually going on.’
Blurb from the 2001 Gollancz paperback edition
Lyle Peripart, an academic specialising in an obscure branch of logic which he terms ‘abductive reasoning’ – his research aims to explore how human thought determines alternate choices essentially, how one quickly arrives a t a shortlist of alternatives without obviously going through an infinite list of possibilities.
He is offered a job by the mysterious Geoffrey Iphwin, Head of Contech, but before his interview receives a note warning him that Iphwin is more dangerous than he seems.
We are in a future, we soon realise, where most of the world, including the US, is controlled by Nazi Reichs. The descendants of exiled Americans keep their old country alive outside the Reichs, in Lyle's case in New Zealand or Enzy.
This future, however, has not stemmed from our past, but from another universe which diverged some time during the Second World War, or even earlier.
It now appears that people are slipping between alternate universes. Anomalies begin to appear. people recall irreconcilable versions of historical events. Most tellingly, when Lyle and his wife Helen are out having dinner, a Nazi hitwoman attempts to shoot Lyle, but is gunned down by Helen who suddenly not only believes herself to be a Secret Agent, but is also carrying a small arsenal in her evening dress.. Added to all this is the peculiar fact, which no one seems to be able to think about, that America has disappeared.
Iphwin, who turns out to be an AI embodied in flesh, has recruited Lyle, his wife and several others to travel to America to discover what has happened to it.
It’s a clever and fast-paced novel, laced with Barnes’ dry wit and ironic observations, containing interesting scenes and set pieces. The obsequious talking ships and cabs for instance are reminiscent of Dick’s talking taxis and household appliances.
Barnes has also thought out some of the other consequences of meeting people from alternate time lines. Helen, now the muscular and efficient Secret Agent, rather than historian, turns out to be a sadomasochist dominatrix who subjects Lyle to a sexual experience she presumes he is enjoying (as Lyle’s alternative self did). Another colleague remembers not only being to Lyle but that his father and pregnant mother did not die in a car crash and that his previously unborn brother grew up to be gay. It is encouraging that Barnes mentions or includes gay characters in his novels as a matter of course, something that is still lacking in US SF as a whole.
It suffers as a novel in that it can’t quite decide what tone to take. It begins in a comically surreal fashion and becomes more serious in the second half. It also explores the nature of identity in an original way, suggesting that chance, our choices and our environment has much to do with what makes us the people we are, rather than merely genetics.
It’s not as Americocentric as some other recent novels, since much of the action takes place outside the US. It does assume however (perhaps quite rightly) that the descendants of US ex-pats would retain such a loyalty to their homeland that they would maintain that culture for generations without having it polluted by ‘those other cultures’
It’s not one of Barnes’ best novels, but certainly shows his flair for inventiveness and characterisation.
Then Lyle was recruited for private industry by the mysterious industrialist Geoffrey Iphwin – and everything stopped making sense.
His mild mannered fiancée turns out to be a gun-toting weapons expert who grew up in a world in which America surrendered to the USSR in the 1970s. And several of their friends turn out to have grown up in more different worlds still. Worse, they gradually realise that not one of them has ever talked to anyone inside the continental United States.
In fact, just thinking about the United States is hard.
It’s as if someone is trying to stop them.
Something, in fact, seems to be trying to kill each of them. And Geoffrey Iphwin is trying to pull them together – for a quest into what’s actually going on.’
Blurb from the 2001 Gollancz paperback edition
Lyle Peripart, an academic specialising in an obscure branch of logic which he terms ‘abductive reasoning’ – his research aims to explore how human thought determines alternate choices essentially, how one quickly arrives a t a shortlist of alternatives without obviously going through an infinite list of possibilities.
He is offered a job by the mysterious Geoffrey Iphwin, Head of Contech, but before his interview receives a note warning him that Iphwin is more dangerous than he seems.
We are in a future, we soon realise, where most of the world, including the US, is controlled by Nazi Reichs. The descendants of exiled Americans keep their old country alive outside the Reichs, in Lyle's case in New Zealand or Enzy.
This future, however, has not stemmed from our past, but from another universe which diverged some time during the Second World War, or even earlier.
It now appears that people are slipping between alternate universes. Anomalies begin to appear. people recall irreconcilable versions of historical events. Most tellingly, when Lyle and his wife Helen are out having dinner, a Nazi hitwoman attempts to shoot Lyle, but is gunned down by Helen who suddenly not only believes herself to be a Secret Agent, but is also carrying a small arsenal in her evening dress.. Added to all this is the peculiar fact, which no one seems to be able to think about, that America has disappeared.
Iphwin, who turns out to be an AI embodied in flesh, has recruited Lyle, his wife and several others to travel to America to discover what has happened to it.
It’s a clever and fast-paced novel, laced with Barnes’ dry wit and ironic observations, containing interesting scenes and set pieces. The obsequious talking ships and cabs for instance are reminiscent of Dick’s talking taxis and household appliances.
Barnes has also thought out some of the other consequences of meeting people from alternate time lines. Helen, now the muscular and efficient Secret Agent, rather than historian, turns out to be a sadomasochist dominatrix who subjects Lyle to a sexual experience she presumes he is enjoying (as Lyle’s alternative self did). Another colleague remembers not only being to Lyle but that his father and pregnant mother did not die in a car crash and that his previously unborn brother grew up to be gay. It is encouraging that Barnes mentions or includes gay characters in his novels as a matter of course, something that is still lacking in US SF as a whole.
It suffers as a novel in that it can’t quite decide what tone to take. It begins in a comically surreal fashion and becomes more serious in the second half. It also explores the nature of identity in an original way, suggesting that chance, our choices and our environment has much to do with what makes us the people we are, rather than merely genetics.
It’s not as Americocentric as some other recent novels, since much of the action takes place outside the US. It does assume however (perhaps quite rightly) that the descendants of US ex-pats would retain such a loyalty to their homeland that they would maintain that culture for generations without having it polluted by ‘those other cultures’
It’s not one of Barnes’ best novels, but certainly shows his flair for inventiveness and characterisation.
March 31, 2009
I found this book to be rather intriguing up front (an alternate history were Hitler won World War II in which the United States has begun to vanish from humanity’s collective memory!) but was ultimately disappointed by the novel’s conclusions. While the novel’s set up grabbed me it’s execution left me wanting much more.
August 24, 2011
It was a little confusing the first 100 pages in, but once I grasped the science behind it all, I was happy to keep reading. I've read and enjoyed Barnes before, but I don't think I've enjoyed any of his works this much. He used well-grounded analogies which made the science work for me.
Very good characters faced with very challenging prospects. A very good book.
Very good characters faced with very challenging prospects. A very good book.
September 24, 2009
Interesting ideas, but all of the explanations and conclusions were very unsatisfying.
March 26, 2021
A good alternate history that I read twenty years ago. I thought this copy was a different book than the one I read that starts out with Nazis being the bad guys in a many world scenario of science fiction. However, the blurb would have you believe that this book is about a Soviet takeover in the 1970s which is one of the many worlds in the book. After reading the book I remember that these books are the same with alternate covers and blurbs. Really misjudged a book by its cover this time.
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following reviews
READING PROGRESS
November 27, 2020 – Started Reading
November 27, 2020 – Shelved
November 27, 2020 – page 0
0.0% "Ok, I read a book with the same author name and the same title in the early aughts. It however was an alternate history novel where Nazis took over in the 1940s not the Soviets in the 1970s. Let me be clear I always view Nazis as a greater political threat than Stalinists though I dislike both."
November 27, 2020 – page 157
51.64%
November 27, 2020 – page 0
0.0%
November 29, 2020 – page 11
3.62% "Okay my belief that this was an entirely different book has wildly exaggerated the copy I have so looks like it merely has a different cover And the story of Soviets taken over in the 1970s might be unfounded it looks like the original book so far I read in the 1990s or early 2000s."
November 30, 2020 – page 182
59.87%
November 30, 2020 –
99.0%
November 30, 2020 – Shelved as: late-twentieth-century
November 30, 2020 – Shelved as: fiction
November 30, 2020 – Finished Reading
Like ∙ flag
following reviews
READING PROGRESS
November 27, 2020 – Started Reading
November 27, 2020 – Shelved
November 27, 2020 – page 0
0.0% "Ok, I read a book with the same author name and the same title in the early aughts. It however was an alternate history novel where Nazis took over in the 1940s not the Soviets in the 1970s. Let me be clear I always view Nazis as a greater political threat than Stalinists though I dislike both."
November 27, 2020 – page 157
51.64%
November 27, 2020 – page 0
0.0%
November 29, 2020 – page 11
3.62% "Okay my belief that this was an entirely different book has wildly exaggerated the copy I have so looks like it merely has a different cover And the story of Soviets taken over in the 1970s might be unfounded it looks like the original book so far I read in the 1990s or early 2000s."
November 30, 2020 – page 182
59.87%
November 30, 2020 –
99.0%
November 30, 2020 – Shelved as: late-twentieth-century
November 30, 2020 – Shelved as: fiction
November 30, 2020 – Finished Reading
November 6, 2025
Lyle Peripart has been headhunted by the mysterious Iphwin from ConTech, to be part of a project for which he will provide input on his area of expertise - abduction. This is the third form of logical inquiry, after deduction and induction, but Lyle cannot see how it would be remotely applicable to Iphwin’s plans. Lyle’s fiancee Helen is also hired, for handwavy reasons but the salaries and perquisites are too good to question too deeply. Strange things start to happen as attempts to dissuade Lyle from taking up the position devolve into physical violence. Upon closer examination both Lyle’s and Helen’s memories of historical events differ in substantial ways and Iphwin finally comes clean that the infinite parallel universes that exist have become unstable and there is more and more leakage from one to another. Billy Beard, a stocky female villian, becomes a common threat, trying to halt the experiment to unravel what’s going on, and even her death doesn’t seem permanent as different versions keep replacing her. It’s a world where the person you went to sleep with last night may not be the same one you wake up with. The clues start to hint at something very strange - nobody can remember anything about the United States, and the team assembled must go into that mysterious non-country to find answers. Riffing heavily on Philip K. Dick’s paranoia trips, this book by John Barnes is highly entertaining and a solid entry into this subgenre where every hand is turned against you.
March 31, 2018
Rescued this book from a library book sale; it now has a forever home on my sci-fi book case. I’ve read others by Barnes, so I was curious to see his version of the Happy Ending! The beginning was rather short, perhaps to show how quick it all happened. It was difficult to like Lyle in the beginning. However, the premise of the story was interesting ; why does no one have any current memories of America? Take one rich, crazy genius, gather a few random people with random skills, mix well with quantum physics & begin the quest! Barnes throws a few quirks in the mix; rapid personality changes, memory loss, and those annoying phantom phone rings with no one on the other end. My biggest complaint is the same one I have with one season tv shows; just as I’m really invested into the story & wondering which direction it’s going to take...boom...The End.
November 30, 2020
A good alternate history that I read twenty years ago. I thought this copy was a different book than the one I read that starts out with Nazis being the bad guys in a many world scenario of science fiction. However, the blurb would have you believe that this book is about a Soviet takeover in the 1970s which is one of the many worlds in the book. After reading the book I remember that these books are the same with alternate covers and blurbs. Really misjudged a book by its cover this time.
August 6, 2022
Granted, it’s the kind of book that is liked by people who like this kind of book. But I really enjoy tales that mess with time, even though you can rarely wrap your head around the problem, much less the solution. Lyle Peripart is the ideal narrator: wry, self-effacing, humane, and wildly funny. I put it on the shelf with “Mendoza in Hollywood,” “The Rise and Fall of DODO,” and Tim Powers’ Vickery and Castine series.
July 31, 2019
Entertaining high concept Gonzo romp, that falls off a cliff towards the end. Alternate title could be Deadline, after the looming publisher threat that must have pushed Barnes to rap everything up in three pages of exposition and wish fulfillment. Added to the hilarity for me, but I could see this concussion disguised as a conclusion pushing readers to throw this book at the wall.
August 28, 2021
Pretty good book.
Possible spoilers ahead: There are multiple universes and people sometimes shift from one to another. They go through various worlds to figure out what happened to the people of America, who had mostly disappeared, figuring it out at the end.
Possible spoilers ahead: There are multiple universes and people sometimes shift from one to another. They go through various worlds to figure out what happened to the people of America, who had mostly disappeared, figuring it out at the end.
May 3, 2025
Roller coaster ride - setting the theme of multi world before Marvel. Really makes you think. Only negative was the end just fizzled out
Read
May 26, 2025SCI FI Barnes John
August 3, 2025
South of 3.5. Crazy concept and story but not a satisfying ending for me.
April 4, 2013
Finity was an interesting book to read. The premise isn't new -- alternate worlds and histories. I mean Philip K. Dick has the market cornered on that. But Barnes seems to take a fresh approach to this and I couldn't put the book down. I enjoyed it quite a bit.
As the Goodreads description blurb reads, "A professor living in Auckland in a Reich-dominated world is recruited for private industry by a mysterious industrialist. Whenever he and his friends try to even think about the United States, it seems someone is trying to stop them--and even kill them." Lyle is an astronomer recruited by ConTech, owned by a man named Iphwin, in the year 2062, when there are a number of German Reichs around the world, because Germany won World War II. Lyle is an American expat living in New Zealand with other expats. His girlfriend, Helen, is also a professor living the same type of life.
Lyle is hired by Iphwin for his abductive reasoning capabilities, and Helen is hired as his admin assistant. Before they even have a chance to celebrate, Lyle is attacked by Billie Beard, a female Reich goon. And strange things start to happen. First, Lyle's talking boat/car has been messed with and its "brain" needs to be rebooted. Billie roughs him up on it. After he leaves to rendezvous with Helen, he discovers that he's already taken her there, to Saigon, earlier in the day even though he has no recollection of it. In any event, he proposes and they get a diamond ring. They then go a restaurant to celebrate and he is attacked and shot at by a fat German tourist. To his utter shock, his meek little girlfriend pulls out a gun and and shoots the attacker. They're both placed under arrest, where Lyle is shocked to find out his attacker was Billie Beard, again -- not the fat German tourist. Helen also claims she saw Lyle get shot in the attack, when he clearly didn't. Strange things are obviously occurring.
Lyle and Helen belong to a VR chat group. Iphwin places Lyle and Helen under his protection, but they are soon sent on a mission to rescue a ConTech employee in Mexico. When they get there, they are shocked to discover the members of their VR group are there too. Iphwin appears and tells them some things about the world(s) in which they live and why odd things are happening to each of them. He mentions that no one has had any contact with anyone in America for decades and wonders what's happened to America and its occupants. They go on a trek to America to find out for themselves. They discover that the world has been run by quantum computers engaged in parallel computing and that there are innumerable worlds and people jump from one to another -- without knowing it -- when using the Net, phone, or their computer operated vehicles. That explains the hardened battle operative Helen Lyle saw kill Billie Beard in the restaurant as opposed to his usually mild Helen. Even more odd, Iphwin lets them know he's one of these computing "phages" in human form and its his need to know what's happened to America that allowed them all to gather together simultaneously in the same world to go on this journey with him.
Their trip is dangerous. Billie Beard, thought dead, keeps appearing, trying to kill them. Turns out she's a phage too. Some of the group members are killed, but the survivors keep plugging along, determined to make it to a facility in Santa Fe called the Department of the Pursuit of Happiness. Iphwin thinks this will answer everything.
I'm not going to give away the ending, but I thought it too abrupt and unsatisfying. Barnes tries to tie everything up neatly, but it's not what I would have done if I were writing it, nor is it what I want as a reader. Thus, I'm marking it down to four stars instead of five. Still, the book really was a thriller and hard to put down and I enjoyed reading it. I shall have to read more of Barnes now. Recommended.
As the Goodreads description blurb reads, "A professor living in Auckland in a Reich-dominated world is recruited for private industry by a mysterious industrialist. Whenever he and his friends try to even think about the United States, it seems someone is trying to stop them--and even kill them." Lyle is an astronomer recruited by ConTech, owned by a man named Iphwin, in the year 2062, when there are a number of German Reichs around the world, because Germany won World War II. Lyle is an American expat living in New Zealand with other expats. His girlfriend, Helen, is also a professor living the same type of life.
Lyle is hired by Iphwin for his abductive reasoning capabilities, and Helen is hired as his admin assistant. Before they even have a chance to celebrate, Lyle is attacked by Billie Beard, a female Reich goon. And strange things start to happen. First, Lyle's talking boat/car has been messed with and its "brain" needs to be rebooted. Billie roughs him up on it. After he leaves to rendezvous with Helen, he discovers that he's already taken her there, to Saigon, earlier in the day even though he has no recollection of it. In any event, he proposes and they get a diamond ring. They then go a restaurant to celebrate and he is attacked and shot at by a fat German tourist. To his utter shock, his meek little girlfriend pulls out a gun and and shoots the attacker. They're both placed under arrest, where Lyle is shocked to find out his attacker was Billie Beard, again -- not the fat German tourist. Helen also claims she saw Lyle get shot in the attack, when he clearly didn't. Strange things are obviously occurring.
Lyle and Helen belong to a VR chat group. Iphwin places Lyle and Helen under his protection, but they are soon sent on a mission to rescue a ConTech employee in Mexico. When they get there, they are shocked to discover the members of their VR group are there too. Iphwin appears and tells them some things about the world(s) in which they live and why odd things are happening to each of them. He mentions that no one has had any contact with anyone in America for decades and wonders what's happened to America and its occupants. They go on a trek to America to find out for themselves. They discover that the world has been run by quantum computers engaged in parallel computing and that there are innumerable worlds and people jump from one to another -- without knowing it -- when using the Net, phone, or their computer operated vehicles. That explains the hardened battle operative Helen Lyle saw kill Billie Beard in the restaurant as opposed to his usually mild Helen. Even more odd, Iphwin lets them know he's one of these computing "phages" in human form and its his need to know what's happened to America that allowed them all to gather together simultaneously in the same world to go on this journey with him.
Their trip is dangerous. Billie Beard, thought dead, keeps appearing, trying to kill them. Turns out she's a phage too. Some of the group members are killed, but the survivors keep plugging along, determined to make it to a facility in Santa Fe called the Department of the Pursuit of Happiness. Iphwin thinks this will answer everything.
I'm not going to give away the ending, but I thought it too abrupt and unsatisfying. Barnes tries to tie everything up neatly, but it's not what I would have done if I were writing it, nor is it what I want as a reader. Thus, I'm marking it down to four stars instead of five. Still, the book really was a thriller and hard to put down and I enjoyed reading it. I shall have to read more of Barnes now. Recommended.
November 22, 2012
On re-reading in 2012, I liked it better. The ending is still poor - it's very abrupt and not satisfying. But most of the story is enjoyable enough.
Originally published on my blog here in May 2001.
John Barnes has written several novels about culture clashes (most recently A Million Open Doors); this paranoid alternative universe novel is almost more of the same. Finity is a science fiction thriller; investigation of sabotage at a huge company turns up evidence that a large number of alternate versions of reality are beginning to collide Colleagues no longer share the same idea of history, or even of recent events. In addition, something has happened to the USA, or its equivalent in every alternative reality; the rest of the world has lost contact with it, without realising.
There seem to me to be several holes in the explanations of what's going on in Finity (there is also more exposition than in most of Barnes' novels). Some things are just sloppy - Barnes surely cannot mean that there can only be a finite number of combinations of a finite number of symbols as he seems to say; an infinite collection of numbers can be built from the symbols 0-9. It is also not the case that a point has infinitely many neighbours; neighbour is not a valid concept in Euclidean space - within a particular distance of any point there are infinitely many points, but there are always ones closer than any given one). Some of his explanations of quantum physics also contain suspect statements, and the idea that use of quantum computer powered devices will swap an individual into an alternate universe seems pretty ludicrous.
Although alternative realities are interesting, it is difficult to see any way to travel from one to another, and this is something which an author needs to face once multiple alternates are introduced. This has been done in several ways. In The Man in the High Castle, they are fictions in each other (linked by the I Ching), and Michael Moorcock's Jerry Cornelius series makes them fantasies. In other Moorcock novels, alternate realities are a by-product of time travel, which is left with an unexplained mechanism, and Robert A. Heinlein mixes this idea with that of fiction in The Number of the Beast and the novels that followed it. Other ideas used by writers include traumatic events such as near death experiences or experiencing other universes by drug taking. In almost every case, though, these are more causes of travel between alternates than explanations of how it might be possible.
To have no real explanation, particularly when dealing with one of the well established components of the genre, is not really a problem. (The reader tends to think, "Oh yes, alternate realities" or "time machines", or whatever, and it's a concept already familiar and acceptable to them.) However, Barnes does attempt an explanation, and this is not very convincing. As a result, the novel as a whole is diminished. In general, Barnes is a writer I admire a great deal; but Finity is his most disappointing novel to date.
Originally published on my blog here in May 2001.
John Barnes has written several novels about culture clashes (most recently A Million Open Doors); this paranoid alternative universe novel is almost more of the same. Finity is a science fiction thriller; investigation of sabotage at a huge company turns up evidence that a large number of alternate versions of reality are beginning to collide Colleagues no longer share the same idea of history, or even of recent events. In addition, something has happened to the USA, or its equivalent in every alternative reality; the rest of the world has lost contact with it, without realising.
There seem to me to be several holes in the explanations of what's going on in Finity (there is also more exposition than in most of Barnes' novels). Some things are just sloppy - Barnes surely cannot mean that there can only be a finite number of combinations of a finite number of symbols as he seems to say; an infinite collection of numbers can be built from the symbols 0-9. It is also not the case that a point has infinitely many neighbours; neighbour is not a valid concept in Euclidean space - within a particular distance of any point there are infinitely many points, but there are always ones closer than any given one). Some of his explanations of quantum physics also contain suspect statements, and the idea that use of quantum computer powered devices will swap an individual into an alternate universe seems pretty ludicrous.
Although alternative realities are interesting, it is difficult to see any way to travel from one to another, and this is something which an author needs to face once multiple alternates are introduced. This has been done in several ways. In The Man in the High Castle, they are fictions in each other (linked by the I Ching), and Michael Moorcock's Jerry Cornelius series makes them fantasies. In other Moorcock novels, alternate realities are a by-product of time travel, which is left with an unexplained mechanism, and Robert A. Heinlein mixes this idea with that of fiction in The Number of the Beast and the novels that followed it. Other ideas used by writers include traumatic events such as near death experiences or experiencing other universes by drug taking. In almost every case, though, these are more causes of travel between alternates than explanations of how it might be possible.
To have no real explanation, particularly when dealing with one of the well established components of the genre, is not really a problem. (The reader tends to think, "Oh yes, alternate realities" or "time machines", or whatever, and it's a concept already familiar and acceptable to them.) However, Barnes does attempt an explanation, and this is not very convincing. As a result, the novel as a whole is diminished. In general, Barnes is a writer I admire a great deal; but Finity is his most disappointing novel to date.
October 14, 2013
This has to be one of the weirdest novels I've ever read.
It's the late 21st century, Lyle Peripart, an American ex-patriot living in a world in which Germany won WWII and the world has been divided into independent Reichs, is offered a job by Geoffrey Iphwin, owner of a hugely profitable company called ConTech. The company has come under attack and Iphwin thinks he can figure out the who,how and why behind the attacks, but he needs a specialist in 'abduction mathematics' to do so. It's a means of reasoning that is heavily discussed at the beginning, but isn't very clear on what, exactly, it is.
Strange events begin to occur, such as the repeated reappearance of a dead character bent on killing Lyle and anyone helping him. What he discovers is that no one has the same memories of anything. The problem, as he discovers, is that the use of devices based on quantum physics, which is allowing people, unbeknownst to them, to slip between realities, most of which are so close that people aren't even aware it has happened.
While it starts out slow and with loads of technical discussions between Lyle and Iphwin, it soon becomes a slow-paced adventure tale as Lyle and a hand-picked team try to discover what happened to America, which is off the international grid, so they can hopefully find out how to stop the attacks and interdimensional shifting. Plenty of bad guys and harsh terrain.
This turned out to be an interesting story with a cast of truly unique characters, but the pace was too slow for my taste. The ending is a surprise even though most of this novel is a surprise. If the pace had been better I'd have rated the story higher.
It's the late 21st century, Lyle Peripart, an American ex-patriot living in a world in which Germany won WWII and the world has been divided into independent Reichs, is offered a job by Geoffrey Iphwin, owner of a hugely profitable company called ConTech. The company has come under attack and Iphwin thinks he can figure out the who,how and why behind the attacks, but he needs a specialist in 'abduction mathematics' to do so. It's a means of reasoning that is heavily discussed at the beginning, but isn't very clear on what, exactly, it is.
Strange events begin to occur, such as the repeated reappearance of a dead character bent on killing Lyle and anyone helping him. What he discovers is that no one has the same memories of anything. The problem, as he discovers, is that the use of devices based on quantum physics, which is allowing people, unbeknownst to them, to slip between realities, most of which are so close that people aren't even aware it has happened.
While it starts out slow and with loads of technical discussions between Lyle and Iphwin, it soon becomes a slow-paced adventure tale as Lyle and a hand-picked team try to discover what happened to America, which is off the international grid, so they can hopefully find out how to stop the attacks and interdimensional shifting. Plenty of bad guys and harsh terrain.
This turned out to be an interesting story with a cast of truly unique characters, but the pace was too slow for my taste. The ending is a surprise even though most of this novel is a surprise. If the pace had been better I'd have rated the story higher.
April 8, 2015
Finity (1999) 303 pages by John Barnes.
I think I buy two or three books for every one that I read. In '96 or '97 when Charlie recommended I read something by John Barnes. I got one maybe more. I read Orbital Resonance and liked it. So on my future trips to the bookstores I would make a point of scanning the Ba...'s. Bringing me to today, I have eight Barnes' and Finity is the fifth that I've read.
Finity starts with Prof. Lyle Peripat, an American expat living in New Zealand, going for a corporate job interview. Outside his door he sees a note saying to skip the interview, which is weird because he hadn't even told anyone he had applied. He starts noticing discrepancies in what he perceives and what other people recollect.
He gets the job. Turns out that they are also interested in hiring his girlfriend. More things start happening. He asks his girlfriend how they met. She says, they came to the University in the same year, and were seated next to each other at orientation. He remembers being there a year before her, and having met her when she placed an ad for her lost cat, and he found it.
It's not limited to just personal history, but what has happened in the world as well. History seems to be fluid. Is it Saigon or Ho Chi Minh city? Later on we find out that people are traveling between parallel universes. I haven't given the away a big secret, the mystery of the story has more to do with how or why are people moving, and what the heck is up with the USA?
When I finished the book, I was kind of disappointed in the ending, but now that I've had about a month to let it sink in, he did OK. I was happy all along with the rest of the book.
I think I buy two or three books for every one that I read. In '96 or '97 when Charlie recommended I read something by John Barnes. I got one maybe more. I read Orbital Resonance and liked it. So on my future trips to the bookstores I would make a point of scanning the Ba...'s. Bringing me to today, I have eight Barnes' and Finity is the fifth that I've read.
Finity starts with Prof. Lyle Peripat, an American expat living in New Zealand, going for a corporate job interview. Outside his door he sees a note saying to skip the interview, which is weird because he hadn't even told anyone he had applied. He starts noticing discrepancies in what he perceives and what other people recollect.
He gets the job. Turns out that they are also interested in hiring his girlfriend. More things start happening. He asks his girlfriend how they met. She says, they came to the University in the same year, and were seated next to each other at orientation. He remembers being there a year before her, and having met her when she placed an ad for her lost cat, and he found it.
It's not limited to just personal history, but what has happened in the world as well. History seems to be fluid. Is it Saigon or Ho Chi Minh city? Later on we find out that people are traveling between parallel universes. I haven't given the away a big secret, the mystery of the story has more to do with how or why are people moving, and what the heck is up with the USA?
When I finished the book, I was kind of disappointed in the ending, but now that I've had about a month to let it sink in, he did OK. I was happy all along with the rest of the book.
October 31, 2013
Well I didn't enjoy this as much this time around as I did when I read it back in 2001. But it was okay. There are long, drawing parts that just seem to go on forever, stringing you along with useless dribble. But it's not bad. It's just not great.
There's a whole lot of math-science in here, and quantum mechanics, and the many-worlds theory in application, which is cool. He even mentions Schroedinger's Cat a couple of times. All in all, it's a fun story, but some of the situations are a little too much even for science fiction. If you take all that with a grain of salt, it makes for an enjoyable read, but I would not recommend it to anyone unless that person specifically likes a weird story that sort of resolves in the end to something akin to a fun movie ending. It's not entirely the way I would have wrapped it up were I in Mr. Barnes's shoes, but who can say?
When America disappears because of the fabled 'pursuit of happiness' it has the potential to get interesting. And it's a neat trick of a tale, and I can say Mr. Barnes did a pretty good job of telling it. It's just weird enough that most people probably wouldn't get into it. I'm changing my rating to three stars though. I will probably not read it again.
There's a whole lot of math-science in here, and quantum mechanics, and the many-worlds theory in application, which is cool. He even mentions Schroedinger's Cat a couple of times. All in all, it's a fun story, but some of the situations are a little too much even for science fiction. If you take all that with a grain of salt, it makes for an enjoyable read, but I would not recommend it to anyone unless that person specifically likes a weird story that sort of resolves in the end to something akin to a fun movie ending. It's not entirely the way I would have wrapped it up were I in Mr. Barnes's shoes, but who can say?
When America disappears because of the fabled 'pursuit of happiness' it has the potential to get interesting. And it's a neat trick of a tale, and I can say Mr. Barnes did a pretty good job of telling it. It's just weird enough that most people probably wouldn't get into it. I'm changing my rating to three stars though. I will probably not read it again.
May 28, 2015
Mixed reactions to this one. I liked the story in and of itself, with an interesting premise: parallel worlds seem to be bleeding, and even the individuals around the narrative voice, Lyle, are changing - his wife goes from physicist to marine at a blink, and though many worlds seem to exist, no one seems to be from a place that includes a currently free U.S.A - all universes seem to have the U.S.A. as having collapsed in war.
The physics, however, are mind-boggling. As the group travel to the U.S.A, trying to find out where it went, the physics lessons are just way too much. Also, Lyle is a bit weak as far as the rest of the supporting cast go - the rest are so amazing, he seems far too Joe Average to belong in their company, and is a kind of sad-sack narrative choice for the main voice of the story.
The physics, however, are mind-boggling. As the group travel to the U.S.A, trying to find out where it went, the physics lessons are just way too much. Also, Lyle is a bit weak as far as the rest of the supporting cast go - the rest are so amazing, he seems far too Joe Average to belong in their company, and is a kind of sad-sack narrative choice for the main voice of the story.
April 13, 2013
An enjoyable book. Another used book sale find. This book's style has a mid-century SF feel to it. Interesting take in an earth in which Nazi Germany wins WWII. I would have like that side of the story expanded a bit; but alas, the main thrust of the book is dealing with parallel universes. Nice commentary on the US of A evolving into a fascist theocracy. Again, just a tantalizing glimpse. Both the Reich dominated post WWII world and the USA as a fascist theocracy would make interesting stories in themselves. Good treatment of the parallel universe thing. If flipping around thru the various world's created by parallel universe's becomes the norm, this will be the benchmark book... Don't answer the phone...
March 11, 2012
This book started off interesting enough but went downhill fast. Hugely over-complicated discussions on abductive reasoning having absolutely nothing to do with the story, made me want to rip my eyes out.
Barnes probably knows his science, but certainly needs help with the fiction part. There is no logical flow to the story, so it was hard to consolidate what just happened to what is happening now. The ending was one of the worst examples of Deus ex Machina I've ever read. With no logical way to end the story, things just magically work out for the better, all within a handful of pages.
I don't recommend anyone read this unless they've already read all other books in existence...
Barnes probably knows his science, but certainly needs help with the fiction part. There is no logical flow to the story, so it was hard to consolidate what just happened to what is happening now. The ending was one of the worst examples of Deus ex Machina I've ever read. With no logical way to end the story, things just magically work out for the better, all within a handful of pages.
I don't recommend anyone read this unless they've already read all other books in existence...
March 2, 2013
When I read this book, I was about 9-10 years old, so this can't possibly be a reliable review — all the same, I enjoyed it at the time. Oddly enough, I wasn't into sci-fi at all yet, so this kind of book was something really new to me then. Of all the random books I used to pull from my dad's shelves, this one turned out to be a fun read for me. Even though I had to do the reading equivalent of covering my ears and singing when I encountered an ~adult scene or some crass humour, I thought the parallel worlds were pretty cool! I hesitate to rate it just because it's been so long, but I figure if this book can get a kid started with sci-fi, it deserves a "3/I liked it."
August 1, 2014
So, um. Spoilers: There is a fairly explicit rape scene halfway through this book? It comes out of nowhere in an otherwise pretty light-hearted novel? One that doesn't have any other explicit content, consensual or not? It's really disturbing and despite the book having other stuff to talk about I can't really judge it on anything else?
Why???
Why???
September 30, 2014
What a crazy book! I think I spent about half of the time confused about what was going on in the story and how it was happening. I enjoyed this science-fiction story, but there are still some things that I am confused about. The technical explanations between characters didn't always answer my own questions. I did, however, enjoy the story.
September 27, 2018
Like a lot of science fiction novels, this one started off poor. It had a slow build up while the author tried to find his ground, but when it got to the main subject matter, it really made it pop. This was an excellent look at the Many Worlds theory, and while not the greatest, I would still recommend reading it.
May 28, 2009
This is a fun read if you are a fan of alternative historical fiction.
In this world there are millions of alternate realities and people jump back and forth between the adjacent universes. Can make it a bit hard to follow at times but worth the effort.
In this world there are millions of alternate realities and people jump back and forth between the adjacent universes. Can make it a bit hard to follow at times but worth the effort.
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