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Recursion
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"Recursion" Discuss Everything - *Spoilers*
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Eva
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rated it 4 stars
Oct 13, 2020 03:21PM
Until he realizes what that leads to and decides to saves them all, even though he knows it probably means his own permanent death.
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Even though it is sci-fi, I just couldn't get past the central concept. I just didn't buy the idea that jumping into your own memories could change the entire universe. Or that this could be stumbled across whilst dying.Of course, this is entirely subjective on my part. I had no problem with the concept laid out in the book, The First Fifteen Lives of Harry August . I felt that was the better book.
It was certainly a page turner in the easy to read thriller department. A Dan Brown type of book and I really did enjoy it even if it doesn't sound like it above. Can't decide whether to give it 3 or 4 stars
Mod
I need to broaden my social circle. The people I know that work in research are only addicted to caffeine.
Going to ask them which of their colleagues they think they'll need to kill to become a billionaire.
I can't think of a billionaire that invented anything besides a website.
Mod
Mod
I have to say, it was very disheartening to read another book about unethical trials/patient torture. I guess I'm not cut out to be a mob lawyer or anything, this is just so far away from my experience it takes me out. Hard to invest in a book when you log out of work and find yourself contemplating the Declaration of Helskinki during your "popcorn read."
Ryan wrote: "After Lex Luther I'm very much against the billionaire megalomaniac as villain story too, though Eva is right in saying we didn't quite get that in this novel."I'm over billionaires, just in general. Plot device, real life, whatever. Success only gets you so far, and after that it takes exploitation and ruthlessness to make it to that B mark... and I just don't see what's appealing about that.
But regarding THIS book, I may be unfairly and too closely aligning Pines and Recursion, and seeing more similarities than there actually were... especially since I didn't finish reading Recursion.
Paul wrote: "Even though it is sci-fi, I just couldn't get past the central concept. I just didn't buy the idea that jumping into your own memories could change the entire universe."
Agreed! I didn't even see how it would do anything for the disease it was supposedly invented to help. And that's MUCH more mundane than time-travel/creating new timelines.
Ryan wrote: "Or is a very good rating for this book, Paul. As in Or read something else."+1
Mod
Actually, it won Best SF 2019 here on Goodreads, but, yes, wasn't nominated for Nebula or Hugo (even not in..."
Trump. Bolsonaro. Brexit. Recursion. Democracy has a lot to answer for.
(sorry, I kinda just want to make jokes now)
Becky wrote: "Ryan wrote: "After Lex Luther I'm very much against the billionaire megalomaniac as villain story too, though Eva is right in saying we didn't quite get that in this novel."I'm over billionaires,..."
That guy was a VILLAIN, and also only a very minor character! And he was only a billionaire in one of many timelines. I really don't understand why one would feel the need to completely bash a book in post after post that are based on incorrect information, without even having read it.
Just FYI: over 30 of our members who read this with us ended up giving it 4 or 5 stars, but I can *fully* understand why they are choosing to lurk and not speak up about it.
I gave it 4 because I really did enjoy it as I said in my original post on here. But it did have its issues as well. I mean it kept me engaged and excited! From that perspective I reckon it did it’s job.Also like I said in my original comment, I really don’t think Slade was a villain. I think he understood he wasn’t permanently killing anyone, I think he just had a vision for what the chair could be! Flawed as that was. His vision was certainly the better of the evils that we seen in the book, even if the leaked designs happened on his watch
The billionaire aspect was an annoyance, but was actually not my main issue, or my main point in the original comment I posted. I just kept talking about it because there were responses to that point. I'm not sure how my comments would prevent anyone from discussing it and giving their opinions as you have, Eva. It's not like I'm arguing with you that you're wrong about the character, or that anyone who enjoyed the book as a whole was wrong. I gave my opinions, and admit that I may be unfairly evaluating it.
But message received. No worries.
Mod
Also please let's recall that we're friends here--we can ask for certain behaviors without attacking or pointing fingers.
As I mentioned in my earlier post, for me it was a fun departure from reality. Definitely, not a book to be taken too seriously. This was my first Blake Crouch book, which may have worked in his favor. I would/probably will read another one.Ryan wrote: "Trump. Bolsonaro. Brexit. Recursion. Democracy has a lot to answer for.
(sorry, I kinda just want to make jokes now)"
Whoah!! You are lumping in Recursion with Trump and Brexit?!?! I mean it isn't overtly about white supremacy or anything...though weirdly white people's memories seem to be entirely responsible for the universe, space and time continuum...or something... jk
This novel was a model of a very diverse world. They even had an Asian guy that had thoughts and spoke to the main characters and stuff... ;-)
Mod
...huh! Did we get any descriptors of anyone? Or just names to signify who might not be white?
An aspect around the relationships I liked was the idea of loss or tradgedy driving almost every character. The reason I liked the final reset at end of book was it didn’t take that tragedy out of Barry’s life or helenas, because these things shaped them all and motivated them. I thought Helena going back to Barry during her multiple loops felt manipulative on her part, and cruel to deprive him of 16 years of his daughter if her plan worked.
I also liked the chap who ran the special ops thing (can’t remember his name now). The idea that he has always been a tool of destruction and way he viewed the chair as a result. It was very reminiscent of slades motives I thought.
Mod
How many raised eyebrows do you think there were when the US government were using the chair to kill Islamist extremists? Even our brilliant female scientist didn't take issue with that.
We've already had the argument made that the white one time billionaire villain was well intentioned, but wrong. He even has a drug problem in all his other lives to contextualise his decisions. So nice to have been humanised in a way that the terrorists and other world leaders weren't. My gosh how little do non USians value life in this story?!
(I can't/won't go on. Satire only works so well)
Eva wrote: "I really don't understand why one would feel the need to completely bash a book in post after post that are based on incorrect information, without even having read it."I hope we aren’t going to start bashing people for participating in a group discussion when they didn’t finish the book. Seeing somebody get attacked for posting their opinions seems like a larger deterrent to lurkers than seeing people post different opinions would be.
I think it’s interesting to read why somebody abandoned a book, and I’d rather see more conversation not less. Becky always made it clear that she hadn’t finished the book so that her opinions could be weighed against that. She wasn't trying to force anybody to see things her way, and I think we're all independent enough to form our own opinions.
I stuck up for you when somebody gave you a hard time about giving a one-star rating to a book you hadn’t finished. I feel very strongly that everybody should have the right to express their opinions about a book, no matter what quantity of it they’ve read.
Eva wrote: "Just FYI: over 30 of our members who read this with us ended up giving it 4 or 5 stars, but I can *fully* understand why they are choosing to lurk and not speak up about it."
If you look next to the names of the people posting in the thread, you can see the star rating they gave it. (Except yours which for some reason isn’t showing, even though I can see your rating on the book page.)
If I counted correctly:
* 26 different people have posted in this thread.
* 10 of them show a rating of 4 or 5 stars. 11 counting you.
* 4 people gave it 1 or 2 stars.
* 10 people gave it 3 stars.
* 2 people don’t show a star rating.
I don’t think the people who liked the book are holding back; there are always a lot of lurkers who don’t feel comfortable joining in on the discussion or just don’t have the time.
stefano wrote: "Thinking back on the building issue, i don't think it's the way the memories came back that i found inconsistent, it was the fact that Meghan had memories of it at all. I think that if the author had spent a bit more time with the FMS it may have become clearer in my head but as things are the way i see it is that the building and Meghan exist in two separate timelines. As in, in the time line the bend was built Meghan is surely dead and in the timeline Meghan is alive the building is never built. I can't get that mechanism straight in my head since at the merge of the memories there is no timeline where Meghan has been up that building.."For what it's worth, this was how it slotted together in my head:
* We have the original timeline where Meghan was killed by a hit-and-run as a teenager.
* On November 5, 2018 of an alternate timeline, Barry finds Slade’s place. At that time, he also meets a guy who used to be an architect who was scheduled to use the chair the next day. But Barry goes back in time first.
* So in the next alternate timeline, Barry prevents Meghan from getting hit by the car. She’s still alive by November 6, although she’s just been traumatized by having just regained the memories of her death.
* Then the architect’s changes take effect. I can’t remember how far back the architect went, but even if he went further back than Barry, their lives never intersected so nothing he did prevented Barry from the events that led to his saving Meghan.
Regarding my last bullet point, it really does hurt my head to try to figure out how the alternate timelines would all be sequenced, though. Like I said, I can't remember how many years the architect went back. But pretend for the sake of argument that he went back to an earlier date than Barry did. If we say the timeline where Barry first saves Meghan becomes Timeline X, did the architect go back to Timeline X – 1? Or after Barry went back and created Timeline X, did that becomes the new timeline including both its past and its future, so when the architect goes back he lands in Timeline X and creates Timeline X + 1?
YouKneeK, your explanation makes sense to me. I had been making the assumption that they both departed from same timeline and made two separate timelines, but what you suggest is Barry goes back, saves Meghan, lives his life then architect goes back and Barry essentially replays that timeline without knowing it until the point the architect went back and hence the confusion over building being there or not. Makes sense!Like I say though I personally would have liked more discussion in the book on FMS and the timelines to make what author was portraying clearer. I guess these convos are fun also though, as in working it out and hearing how others reason it out.
Yes, that’s a much more concise way of expressing it! :) I guess after Barry went back, the architect’s nose would have bled and he would have remembered seeing Barry as a "false" memory and then remembered a new timeline in which he never encountered Barry. Then he went back in time himself.I do agree that all the FMS stuff is a bit unclear at times, and difficult to keep straight. I still get myself twisted up with it sometimes. I have fun trying to untangle stuff like this though, and I love reading a book like this as part of the group. Talking about it helps me hammer things out in my own head, and helps me remember it better than I would without the discussion.
Based on my partial reading (and thus partial understanding), my take on the FMS aspect was that it was implied that we, as a person, only have one true "self" and that no matter what happens in the various timelines that we may exist in (or stop existing in), those events still relate to the central "self", and thus cause the FMS - because all of the different timeline memories are linked to one point/person. But I don't think that really works either because then everyone would have FMS, not just people who have had significant experiences, like death, etc. If I go back in time, causing a new timeline, all of the people who are alive at the time are affected by that and are ALSO living in the new timeline with me - even though they technically are still also in their original timeline too.
I think that there was, toward the beginning of the book, a woman who was distraught over her FMS because she remembered an entirely different family, right? But why was she the only one of them that had FMS?
Stupid time travel paradoxes. LOL
(Also, thanks for your comment, YouKneeK. :) )
In general I think I'm a fan of time travel stories so that helped here. I had read some of the works he was referencing (at one point I felt like he was liberally taking ideas from Slaughterhouse-Five and I thought it was funny when a subsequent chapter quoted a line from it.) Enjoyment of literature I feel is subjective enough that I'm okay with someone hating a book I enjoyed and vice versa. Often I feel like the particular circumstances where you read the book could push the star rating up or down. Here I wanted something to distract me and really pull my attention away from other things and this really fit the bill. As another example some others said this book was too similar to the author's other work -- but I hadn't read anything else by him yet, so maybe seeing the trick for the first time is more enjoyable no matter which one it happens to be.
Christopher wrote: "Often I feel like the particular circumstances where you read the book could push the star rating up or down."So very true. I'm a big rereader, and I've revisited books that I'd read previously and had a completely different reading experience with different circumstances, both positive and negative.
Christopher wrote: "As another example some others said this book was too similar to the author's other work -- but I hadn't read anything else by him yet, so maybe seeing the trick for the first time is more enjoyable no matter which one it happens to be. "I heard from multiple people that the order in which one reads Recursion and Dark Matter usually (not always) determines which one will be seen as "better". Recursion was my first book by this author and I enjoyed it as an exciting sci-fi thriller. I see inconsistencies now, but they didn't spoil my experience as I didn't expect hard sci-fi from this particular work. But then I read Dark Matter and I felt like I already read that book before and I found it disappointing. And then I also read Pines and thought: "Wow, this author has a strong preference for a narrow set of themes!"
Monica wrote: "though weirdly white people's memories seem to be entirely responsible for the universe, space and time continuum...or something... jk This novel was a model of a very diverse world. They even had an Asian guy that had thoughts and spoke to the main characters and stuff... "This really made me chuckle!
Also re: Allison- I think one of the guys who worked on the chair had a Korean name? Or am I suffering from FMS?
(And wow- this thread got spicy while I was away lol)
Mod
I attribute the spiciness to the thriller aspect--everyone's blood is still up from the full throttle ending!
Becky wrote: "I think that there was, toward the beginning of the book, a woman who was distraught over her FMS because she remembered an entirely different family, right? But why was she the only one of them that had FMS?"She (Ann) wasn’t the only one, actually. Ann’s would-have-been husband (Joe) always remembered it because he was the one who had gone back in time to save his first wife and caused Ann’s FMS. He was just lying to her. Before she jumped off the building, Ann said that she could tell Joe remembered even though he said he didn’t. At the time I read that I wasn’t sure if she was had just been seeing what she wanted to see, but she was right. It was confirmed a little later in the book, shortly after Barry’s first FMS experience. Joe called Barry and told him what he’d done as a way to lure Barry to Slade. Joe also said that Franny (his first wife) had a breakdown when she remembered, so she knew too. Franny and everybody else who knew them would have had the memories of Franny jumping off the building and dying back at the same time Ann did.
I do agree with some of the premise issues people have brought up, like what you mentioned about the chair’s intended purpose not being a true solution for Alzheimer’s patients.
Christopher wrote: "Often I feel like the particular circumstances where you read the book could push the star rating up or down. Here I wanted something to distract me and really pull my attention away from other things and this really fit the bill. As another example some others said this book was too similar to the author's other work -- but I hadn't read anything else by him yet, so maybe seeing the trick for the first time is more enjoyable no matter which one it happens to be."This all fits me perfectly. :) One thing I’ve definitely gotten from this thread is that I shouldn’t try reading another Blake Crouch book until a lot of time has passed!
I did read his book Run several years ago, which I remember as being very different from this one story-wise. I don't remember enough about the characters to remember if there were similarities in character types. I rated it 3 stars because I enjoyed it ok, but it got repetitive and I have vague memories of being annoyed by how it ended.
Banshee wrote: "But then I read Dark Matter and I felt like I already read that book before and I found it disappointing. And then I also read Pines and thought: "Wow, this author has a strong preference for a narrow set of themes!""Agreed.
YouKneeK wrote: "Franny and everybody else who knew them would have had the memories of Franny jumping off the building and dying back at the same time Ann did."
OK that makes sense, but it doesn't seem like it was shown very well that everyone else (their friends, neighbors, mail carrier, insurance agents, etc) would also be suffering from FMS. At least not that I can recall anyway. FMS should have been a much bigger, widescale problem, but it seemed to me that it was only displayed in people directly affected by whatever change was made by someone going back to change something.
I would think that as soon as the chair was used to go back/create a new timeline, it would cause this gigantic ripple effect of sudden "mental illness" across the globe, as now EVERYONE alive in both timelines would have dual memories. Hmm... but maybe it DID cause worldwide FMS, but for many/most people, their lives were unaffected by the duality/plurality, and so their memories still matched.
These are the kinds of nitpicky things that I can't get over in order to enjoy this kind of book. I get caught in these circles thinking about the logistics and usually end up overthinking it to the point of no longer enjoying the story. :(
One requires a lot of patience to read this book.This personally ruined the fun for me.
Mod
Becky wrote: "OK that makes sense, but it doesn't seem like it was shown very well that everyone else (their friends, neighbors, mail carrier, insurance agents, etc) would also be suffering from FMS. At least not that I can recall anyway."They showed a little of that after they caught up to the time when Barry went back and saved Meghan. He was getting calls from people who knew them who suddenly had “false” memories of Meghan dying. I guess the author was trying in the beginning not to be too detailed about what was going on, and slowly reveal the mechanics of things to create suspense. Whenever I thought he’d changed the rules partway through, I’d realize he hadn’t really, he’d just been more vague earlier in the book. One of the things I like about reading on the Kindle is that it's really easy to find previous passages I remember reading, so I did that occasionally if I thought there was a contradiction and if my curiosity about verifying that was stronger than my desire to just keep reading.
But yeah, I think people who’d had no interaction with the people involved didn’t experience anything, because their memories weren’t altered in any way. There were also a few mentions of the déjà vu sensation becoming more frequent.
I think it would have been a more dull book, at least for me, if all the details had been revealed in the beginning, but I can see why it might have also been frustrating for some not to get them sooner. Actually, the main reason I gave it 4 stars instead of 5 was because I thought the story was a little too predictable. I think if I’d also understood all the mechanics from early on, I would have rated it lower, because figuring out how everything was working and trying to piece that and the timeline together was fun for me.
Gave this 3 stars in the end but struggled with the writing style. I kept waiting for stage directions to pop up, it was too descriptive in the third person for me. Thought the idea was good but execution a bit lacking. The main concept fell down for me in that one person's memories could change everyone's, we all know that if you asked for an account of an event then no two people will give the same account. Confusing in parts due to the split timelines. Gave it three stars, it would have normally been two because I finished it but would not seek the author out again, but gave it 3 as I did want to see what happened in the end, the best part of the book as it wasn't disappointing as it could have been.
Mod
YouKneeK wrote: "They showed a little of that after they caught up to the time when Barry went back and saved Meghan. He was getting calls from people who knew them who suddenly had “false” memories of Meghan dying. I guess the author was trying in the beginning not to be too detailed about what was going on, and slowly reveal the mechanics of things to create suspense. Whenever I thought he’d changed the rules partway through, I’d realize he hadn’t really, he’d just been more vague earlier in the book."Gotcha. So my issue was my lack of patience or interest to let him play out the story, propped up by my annoyance with the illogical science that premised it. :)
Simeon wrote: "The main concept fell down for me in that one person's memories could change everyone's, we all know that if you asked for an account of an event then no two people will give the same account."
This is a good point, and I completely agree. Eyewitness testimony is notoriously untrustworthy, so relying on memory - which is fluid and changeable and can be influenced and revised - as the anchor of the story doesn't really work for me.
Though that does make me wonder... does the chair somehow get to the REAL memory, not our interpreted memory? Can someone misremember an event, use the chair, and have changed history because of it?
About the different memories and world-altering actions/timelines: I think time travel concepts always have difficulties with complete integration of consequences. You'd have to be a genius, perhaps, to actually achieve that sort of complete integration. Or maybe it's impossible. Maybe that's part of the fun and mind-bendyness of stories about it. It also means that different people can come away with different understandings of what happened, and maybe each be right. Yes? No? I'm not a SF buff, so this is just casual observation.
RecursionFirst book from this group for me. It happened to be on my bookshelf already, so I simply bumped it to the front of the queue and started digging in two days ago. I finished this afternoon.
The overlapping stories was one of the core elements of this book. It worked well for me because the author did not go too far or get too complex. I enjoyed the pacing, and really enjoyed the two main characters. Perhaps because I am the same age as the male protagonist... There could have been more difference between their presentations, but as a mechanism for pointing two cameras at the same story from two different angles worked well enough.
The writing kept me engaged from the first few pages. I have two children of my own and the concept of losing either or both of them is overwhelming. What Dreams May Come handles this tragedy very well, and the book in hand, while not exploring the grief as deeply, does a pretty good job of painting the story of a shared grief that tears a relationship apart. The pacing from then on was all good, and I felt no slow moments.
I liked the ending. Yes it was happy-ever-after, but not quite. The couple were never to have children of their own, and never accomplish the miracles they were capable of, but the author successfully convinces me that this kind of thing is secondary to finding peace and acceptance. I bought into it.
Love stories are always a challenge to place into Science Fiction. So often, an author doesn't even give lip service to what makes up so much of our lives, the desire to find love and companionship. The author does a good job and I felt very satisfied. The pacing was fast, and having done a few slogs this year, I was happy for an easier read. The science part was a little light, and requires some willful suspension of disbelief, but for me it was not overwhelming. I sense that some others might have a few "What the heck?" moments. I would have liked a little more character development though it might risk slowing down the pacing. I felt there was more for Barry, Helena and Slade to tell us about their motivations. Maybe this book's success will prompt the author to go a little more character deep next time.
Mod
Grief and death are something our society completely ignores. We take drivers ed before we drive. We study everything about how to do anything before we are allowed to do it, except death. I served as a volunteer for hospice for over four years so perhaps I am a little to close to this topic, but when I see an author explore grief and death, I feel something is added to our awareness and we all benefit a little when we learn how other people (even imaginary characters) process it successfully.
Mod
Funny how a book about memory and timelines has been described as forgettable by so many commentators. I just finished this last night, and I enjoyed it overall. I couldn’t help but feel that the use of the deprivation tank was borrowed a bit from an old, favorite film of mine, Altered States. The book was somewhat compelling and fast paced. I thought Crouch did a good job of exploring what makes up our memories, our hopes and fears, love and family, etc. He succeeded (with me, anyway) of making an emotional connection with the reader, I felt.
Has anyone here ever seen the TV Show Fringe? This book feels a lot like a double-episode of that series. Which is probably why I liked it a lot.Anyway, about the book itself, it was a very fast-paced captivating reading for me. The concept of the FMS, the machine that Helena and Slade were building, the idea of different timelines, it all made me eager to read the next page to find out not how it worked within the story but how it would be used to push the narrative further. And I was very pleased with the outcome.
I agree with some comments that say that the scientific aspects were not that well detailed or even realistic, but I don't think that is fair to judge the book only by this light because that's not the point here. The whole sci-fi background is merely an excuse to talk about how people deal with traumas, the heaviness of decisions in key moments, and, in Helena's case, the burden of creating something so powerful that changed the world and reality in a way that she felt responsible for.
These personal dilemmas are the core of the narrative, and when it focus on these moments, the book shines brighter to me. I was very touched by Barry's first time travel to save her daughter and by Helena talking to her mother without getting any response back. The pain of these moments were palpable and relatable without being melodramatic, and I admire them for that.
However I must agree with most of the criticism about the sci-fi aspects of this book. The mechanics of time travel and how it worked were subpar at best. They were mainly confusing or incoherent. It's like Crouch was so eager to tell Barry and Helena's story that he overlooked these aspects.
Also I don't understand how so many people thought that the book says that Helena was the only one with the knowledge to create the chair. I mean, Slade realized what she created before herself, it is stated that many others created their own chairs throughout the book. It was a fluke in a series of tests that led to the apocalyptic scenario that we see at the end. The reason why Helena wants to come back and stop herself to create that technology is not to erase it from existence once and for all. Is to take the burden of her shoulders and, if possible, delay such catastrophic scenarios for Earth and its population.
This was my first Blake Crouch novel and I liked it a lot. If you're looking for a great sci-fi, this ain't it. But if you're looking for a popcorn time with some interesting concepts and some thought-provoking moments, I believe this is the perfect choice for a reading.
I forgot to say this, but I have a problem with the love story in this book. It all happens "off page" (I don't know the equivalent of offscreen for a book hahaha), so it kinda makes Barry and Helena's relationship a little bit unconvincing for me. I wish Crouch used one PoV to just let us see the romance blossom and grow between them.
I've not read a group read for a while. I really enjoyed this, it went places I did not expect and while not a great fan of time travel stories with a reset this was very well done.As the book progressed the melancholy was an unexpected but not unrealistic tone in the story and was well handled.
The pacing was odd in that there was a lot of attention and character at the start but is shifted into a very narrative driven loop story of the last quarter. It made the reading experience more unique and completely different from the detective fiction style I was anticipating after the first chapter.
This was good, I'm glad I read it and any book that belies expectations is a good book in my view.
(Unless the expectation was it was going to be good and it turns awful)
I finished this evening, I think after everyone else. I did like the ending, I did find it compelling overall, but more so in the earlier parts, on the oil rig. It did feel like Groundhog Day in the latter section. Loved the end where Barry had gone in and swapped out the bullets of Slade’s gun. I have read a couple books on physics, quantum mechanics and the whole thing about time as heat from motion is so mysterious and mind blowing. So the parts about past, present future in this book made me think about that again. I do enjoy the club, as it expands the authors that I read, which I appreciate even if I don’t end up loving a given book. Glad I joined!
What an interesting discussion, too many people and points to call out; thank you all for bringing up these opinions and Aspects.I would give it a 3.5 - 4 for the fun and page-turning, serious ideas, and dealing with grief and philosophy; 3 for being too Lite and not delving deep enough into details of time travel and messing with memories.
The numerous books, movies and TV shows I was reminded of, while reading, will take a whole 'nother entry.
Becky wrote: "I would think that as soon as the chair was used to go back/create a new timeline, it would cause this gigantic ripple effect of sudden "mental illness" across the globe, as now EVERYONE alive in both timelines would have dual memories. Hmm... but maybe it DID cause worldwide FMS, but for many/most people, their lives were unaffected by the duality/plurality, and so their memories still matched."Agree. I had to consider this "Science Fantasy" not Science Fiction, because unless you're in a hardcore Carl Jungian world I just don't think this many people's psyches COULD be affected like that. Too many people would begin going mad. To address that would require more serious "literary" writing like imagine a Gene Wolfe version.
While reading I often paused to try to reconstruct how memories or timeliness were being affected, and then being reminded of how some other story tackled them.At end of Part One around 33%, reminded of William Hurt going into sensory deprivation tank in the movie Altered States, then arguing about whether the results were real or hallucinated. (Saw on TV when I was a kid.)
Part Four, with DARPA and the missions to go back and prevent crimes, "Person of Interest" or The Minority Report. How can we use technology to bring about good and prevent bad?
Part Five with the time loops, TV shows "12 Monkeys" and "Continuum," and especially "Dark" and "Travelers" where I struggled to comprehend what was happening with recurring and multiple loops. Remember "Travelers" episode 2.7 "17 Minutes" where they keep sending an agent farther and farther back during the skydive, trying to succeed in the mission at the lake? Also "Russian Doll" and someone already mentioned The First Fifteen Lives of Harry August.
Books Time and Again, Dragonquest, the too ambitious Zeus Inc. project in The Company series (start with #1 In the Garden of Iden) I don't think they had loops; they needed to track what had or had not been been changed in time.
And now I shall go pluck another TBR time travel book from my shelf, Replay. What could go wrong!
SciFi and Fantasy Book Club
Books mentioned in this topic
The First Fifteen Lives of Harry August (other topics)Altered States (other topics)
The Minority Report (other topics)
Time and Again (other topics)
Dragonquest (other topics)
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Authors mentioned in this topic
Gene Wolfe (other topics)Ursula K. Le Guin (other topics)
