Accidental Time Machine discussion -- Lead Character " Matt Fuller " * no spoilers*

[Helen]

What are your thought's about the lead character, Matt Fuller? Do like him? Do you not like him? Is there anything about the character you would/would not change and why?

[Libby]

I'm not that far in yet but at present I feel the book spends a bit too much time in Matt's head without much going on. I like the character and think he's charming in his bumbling anti-hero way, but I'd like to get out of his thoughts and get the plot moving

[Jon]

I was annoyed by Matt. I have a son who is 23 and until recently quit as unfocused as Matt is. I also didn't like the selfishness inherent in his pursuit of the "Nobel Prize for Physics" but perhaps I'm just unfamiliar with the ruthlessness of that academic competition.

[Kevin]

He needs a kick in the butt. I have known many "professional students". I have personally experienced the difficulties of writing a thesis and having it fall flat. Its hard to deal with and can result in having to start over.

Matt is likeable but needs to find his course. As a grade student his experimentation seemed very haphazard. I cant see (after the first few tests up to maybe the turtle) him not setting up a controlled test in a lab.

He understood the significance imediately and the fact that it was possibly a one time effect. He would have been more methidodical,

[Danielle]

Jon wrote: "I also didn't like the selfishness inherent in his pursuit of the "Nobel Prize for Physics""

Yeah, I couldn't relate to that at all either. I just accepted it and moved on because I can't comprehend that sort of "all the glory for me" thinking. Guess I'm just not that ambitious :)

[David]

Matt has missed his academic window, and he's looking for a back door. He finds the back door, but then he feels that his intelligence has been insulted, and he over-estimates the force of his intellectual contribution (there wasn't one). All that Matt did was play with something he didn't understand. It was Marsh who understood it. So Marsh gets the Nobel and Matt feels envy. This is sort of an update of the Lee DeForrest/Edwin Armstrong radio patent wrangles.

I think the point is that decent people, at times, also struggle with their egos.

[Maria]

I didn't like him much at first, but he definitely grew on me. Mostly after meeting Martha. The two complement each other well.

[Libby]

I finished the book and still have so-so feelings about Matt. I don't feel like he really developed at all - just had a series of experiences and ended up in a better situation without proactively doing anything

[David]

Maybe Matt is incomplete because he short circuits the journey. Where (who) is his guide? He disavows Marsh, he doesnt accept Martha as a viable source, and La just scares him. Does "self" discovery require an external catalyst?

[Jeff]

I agree with Kiwiria. I liked Matt a lot better after he met Martha. That relationship was a lot of fun. I also don't think he deserved a Nobel Prize, because he really didn't "discover" anything at all.

[Sandi]

I liked the way Matt's character developed over the course of the book. At the beginning, he's at a loss. His career is going nowhere fast. He's lost his girl. He has a job as a glorified mechanic. Then, this extraordinary thing happens. He's so caught up in it, he doesn't have time to do any real analysis. But, he's very good at adapting to his surroundings. He's good at figuring out what's happening around him.

I thought he did the most growing-up when he got to Martha's time. I had the feeling that the old Matt may have just done "it" with her, but this Matt is a real gentleman and never takes advantage of her. Their relationship is really sweet.

[Richard]

OK, late addition:

I thought Matt was mostly a cipher. As a simple SciFi romp the book was adequate, but Haldeman completely relied on genre tropes to do half his work for him. The brilliant-but-under-achieving scruffy grad-student is too tired of a cliche for the author to get any sympathy from me.

Other than that, I liked the character.

:-)