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    Che fine ha fatto Mr Y.
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    Che fine ha fatto Mr Y.
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    Che fine ha fatto Mr Y.
    Ebook523 pages7 hours

    Che fine ha fatto Mr Y.

    By Scarlett Thomas

    4/5

    ()

    Currently unavailable

    Currently unavailable

    About this ebook

    Strani eventi accadono intorno ad Ariel Manto, studentessa della British University. Prima scompare il suo professore, poi l’università crolla davanti ai suoi occhi, infine in un negozio di libri usati si imbatte in una copia di un libro rarissimo e maledetto, Che fine ha fatto Mr Y. Scritto da Thomas Lumas, uno scienziato del XIX secolo che compiva esperimenti sui poteri della mente umana, il libro è in grado di trasportare chi lo legge nella “Troposfera”, dove è possibile viaggiare nel tempo e nello spazio entrando nella mente di altri uomini. È una porta dimensionale che schiude un mondo di conoscenze, ma anche molti pericoli da cui Ariel dovrà fuggire… o è soltanto un’affascinante allucinazione?
    Che fine ha fatto Mr. Y. è un romanzo che intreccia con risultati avvincenti la suspense di un thriller con le visioni della fantascienza, ma che realizza anche un appassionante cocktail di filosofia, fisica, scienza e letteratura: un nuovo e sorprendente Alice nel paese delle meraviglie.

    «l viaggio della giovane Ariel Manto nelle possibilità della mente umana non è semplicemente un divertimento erudito: è uno slalom letterario che non vuole destare stupore in chi legge, ma puro piacere. Imperdibile.»
    Loredana Lipperini, Il Venerdì di Repubblica

    «Sono romanzi così che rendono un piacere (e un onore) tenere una rubrica di libri. Leggetelo. Vi piacerà da morire.»
    Antonio D’Orrico, Corriere della Sera Magazine

    «Un capolavoro.»
    Douglas Coupland

    «Geniale e originale.»
    Philip Pullman

    Scarlett Thomas
    insegna scrittura creativa presso la University of Kent e collabora con diverse testate giornalistiche. Nel 2001 l'«Independent on Sunday» l'ha segnalata tra i venti migliori giovani scrittori inglesi. Vive a Canterbury. La Newton Compton ha pubblicato i romanzi Che fine ha fatto Mr Y. e PopCo, accolti con grande favore dal pubblico e dalla critica.
    LanguageItaliano
    PublisherNewton Compton Editori
    Release dateDec 16, 2013
    ISBN9788854124011
    Unavailable
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    Reviews for Che fine ha fatto Mr Y.

    4/5

    846 ratings66 reviews

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    • 4/5
      Surreal but fascinating. It´s fiction, not philosophy, but it manages to weave in philosophy, religion, quantum physics, relativity, thought experiments, literature, alternative universes, the big bang and much more. Mostly it´s quite fast-paced and engrossing.The hints of dark sex in the story are intriguing, giving insights into the main character and a touch of gritty reality without having to go into too much sordid detail.I find the ending rather weak. This is perhaps partly inherent in the story itself - it´s quite difficult to imagine what the ending could have been without some sort of anticlimax. It´s also a problem with any story which is very effectively narrated in the first person but which reaches an ending which apparently precludes the narrator from ever getting the story to the reader. There is an epilogue, which is often used to do this, but in this case wasn´t.But all in all, a very good read.
    • 5/5
      There's a slightly odd feeling about sitting down to read a book that if somebody asked you why you were reading it - the best explanation you could come up with was ... well ... "it sort of sounded slightly mad - and besides the central character wants to become part of a book.... ". You've got to be intrigued by that premise.THE END OF MR Y doesn't telegraph what sort of a book it is from the cover blurb - it sounds a bit like a mystery, it could be fantasy, there's even some elements that sound a bit like traditional science fiction. It's all of those things and a lot more because at the basis of everything else in this book there is the story of somebody's life that is fascinating, there are characters that you can care about. There's a story of disaffection and alternative ways of living your life that is intriguing. THE END OF MR Y is unpredictable, brash, exciting, slightly edgy and ever so slightly odd.At the centre of the book is Ariel. Ariel's a great character and narrator - she's very much in control (sort of), she's very focused (sometimes) and she's somebody who knows where she's going (okay now I'm stretching...) Ariel's engaging, she's fascinating, she's also slightly crazy, but what she really has is acute self-awareness. She's an impoverished PhD student from a decidedly dodgy background, she's got a very active sex life - many might say it's a very dangerous and unorthodox sex life. Some people might find a building dropping into a hole in the ground a bit unexpected but Ariel can let that roll, just as she can discover a copy of a mythical long lost book and not question where it could have come from. She can find a way to handle her odd sex life with her married lover becoming increasingly risky. She can even develop an attraction to Adam, the ex-priest forced to share her University office because of the collapse of the other building. And finally she can enter the Troposphere and find it threatening and comforting all at the same time. But Ariel is used to the unexpected. In fact she really doesn't know what is supposed to be normal - life is just what happens. There's a great quote on the back of the book which explains her attitude perfectly:"Real life is regularly running out of money, and then food. Real life is having no proper heating. Real life is physical. Give me books instead, give me the invisibility of the contents of books, the thoughts, the ideas, the images. Let me become part of a book".It's impossible to read THE END OF MR Y and not consider the possibility of the Troposphere. And compare the possible absurdity of the idea of an alternative reality with a current day obsession like Second Life. Fantasy and science fiction blurring into reality in a very intriguing way?Along the way Ariel must try to find out about the two strange men and their two childish offsiders pursuing her. She must find her PhD supervisor - Professor Burlem - because he alone also seems to understand the ramifications of the Troposphere. She must work out what she wants with the equally troubled Adam. She must also decide how or where she wants to live her life.
    • 2/5
      Marvellously imaginative, but it didn't capture me. The good ideas didn't quite paper over the gaps—and there were a lot of good ideas! I almost wanted to see the “troposphere” setting explored more thoroughly, perhaps through a series of short stories, or by more than one author.
    • 3/5
      I feel a little overwhelmed by this novel. It drew me and pulled me along with promises of some sort of grand revelation, but I confess I spent most of the journey feeling like I was sprinting to keep up, and might never actually understand what was going on. Like so many other books about books I've read lately, this one seems to be a platform for the author to showcase her knowledge of a favorite subject and a few pet theories. I feel vaguely suspicious that the bulk of the plot was cooked up in order to support the Epilogue, but I did enjoy the story, so I won't go quite that far.

      In the end, this was a surreal adventure laced a bit heavily with metaphysics and philosophy, but which concludes satisfactorily. If it leaves you with dozens of questions about possible plot holes or theoretical inconsistencies, the nature of the book itself serves as an excuse which makes all the problems seem more intentional than accidental.

      Recommended by: Christa D.
    • 5/5
      Scarlett Thomas's unusual fantasy-rich novel is outside of my usual wheelhouse. I'm glad it ended up in my hands, because it was an utterly enjoyable book. Ariel is a graduate student whose advisor has disappeared. She finds a copy of a book that supposed didn't exist anymore, The End of Mr Y, that both she and her academic advisor had been interested in. She is then drawn into an odd world called the Troposphere, while being hunted by some unsavory men claiming to be with the CIA and helped by an ex-priest. It's an imaginative tale, studded with odd bits of philosophy and physics. It's kind of The Night Circus meets Sophie's World.
    • 4/5
      I'm not quite sure what to make of this. It was quite engrossing, but the scientist in me had a few issues. Homeopathy is presented as equally as valid as Newtonian physics, Quantum mechanics and Einstein's theory of relativity. Not on your nellie, baby. But if we ignore that quibble, the rest of the book is actually really enthralling.It deals with a sphere called, in this book ,the Troposphere. this appears to be a plane of existence made entirely of thoughts, where it is possible to enter the mind of another. You know that moment when you catch someone's eye and you just know exactly what they're thinking? Well this is the plane that you're communicating on (this is about as best as I can explain it, it all gets a bit confusing to be honest). It's also the plain on which Gods exist - they are created and sustained by thoughts (prayer being, if you like merely a subset of thought). So when Ariel encounters a mouse god, he has limited power and influence, having only a small circle of believers praying to sustain him. How come this is the only God she meets in a plane that should be teeming with them is never satisfactorily explained. If I have a complaint about this book it is that the main character is, frankly, someone I'd not want to meet. One of those from a tough background who uses that as a shield to justify being generally obnoxious. She makes a thing of being promiscuous and generally boastful of her wide ranging sexual experience - yet seems to be using this to elicit sympathy (aww, poor me - look what I've been reduced to). She's a PhD student, has no money, is not above driving away from petrol stations without paying and doesn't do much to endear herself to the world at large. To be honest I ended up more concerned with the fate of the book than her. It rolls along at a fair old pace. It's inventive and has plenty of twists and turns to keep you guessing right to the very end. The concept is really intriguing, and the way that thought can be powerful enough to change the world is explored. I'm not very well read when it comes to philosophy, so have no idea if Derrida et al are well represented or not. Part of me want to read it again to work out the science, but I'm afraid that a more careful reading might identify a few more holes than the first, pacy, read through did. I may well leave it at that.
    • 2/5
      What would have been a thought-provoking and well-written novel with a mind-bending ending is derailed by an annoying tendency for logical fallacy and a failure to live up to the premise and early atmosphere. Look, "quantum" has an actual meaning; you can't just use it as a stand-in for "it doesn't make sense".
    • 4/5
      Quantum physics, philosophy, and the nature of consciousness. And yet it's not dry or dull, and it all makes a weird sort of sense.

      Because I'm a jerk, I'm deducting a star for the awful font they chose for the paperback edition. (Maybe it's the same as the hardback, I don't know.) I understand you want to use a different font for the offset text, the excepts from the mysterious cursed book, but maybe that's the part you should set in the borderline-frilly Sovereign Light--not the main 90% of the book. It's a good book but a little hard on the eyes.
    • 5/5
      I plan on reviewing this later after I've gotten thoughts together
    • 4/5
      This book had GREAT promise when it started. And I think the height of its promise partially resulted in the fall of its disappointment. I loved this book when I started it and through about half of the book. I felt attached to it in something akin to the way I had felt attached to Ready Player One. And then it just took a nosedive. I don't know what happened.You know when you read a book that's interesting and creative and smart, and the author puts a lot of intellectual stuff in there that's also interesting, and it doesn't weigh the book down? and you feel like you're learning new things, and it's just wonderful? that's the first half of the book. All the additional science information and philosophical information was good, interesting, and appropriately "lengthed." And then it was like the author felt like this was her chance, she was going to EDUCATE her readers, darnit, whether they wanted to be educated or not. The science and/or philosophical information stopped being relevant to the plot, stopped assisting with the movement of the story, and started feeling like the author's own opinions and soliloquies, rather than those of the actual characters. And it was too much and weighty and created disappointment.The story of the book is about a book called The End of Mr. Y, written by an author who engaged in "thought experiments" (considers some hypothesis, theory,[1] or principle for the purpose of thinking through its consequences), and who is supposedly brilliant. Supposedly, because all copies of the books, save 1 in a vault in a foreign country, have disappeared. Supposedly, because anyone who has ever read the book has allegedly succumbed to the curse and died. Supposedly, because no one really knows. Then, our protagonist stumbles upon the book and finds herself on a rapidly accelerating roller coaster to the ultimate thought experiment.Intriguing concept, and partially excellent executed. Thomas creates a few very vivid characters, and although her protagonist, Ariel, has been criticized by some readers as non-realistic, I strongly beg to differ. I know her -- I've spent many hours having those types of conversations with her. She is realistic, even if she's not your "typical" heroine. And I love Adam, one of her co-stars. I mean, he was expertly drawn. The idea was great, the characters were great, and the execution was, therefore, disappointing.If you're super philosophically read, you might enjoy this anyway. But for most people, it became more of a task than an enjoyable reading experience. Ultimately, it is a good book -- an intellectual modern sci-fi/fantasy. But not great.Overall, THREE AND A HALF of 5 stars.
    • 4/5
      Great book, slightly unsatisfactory end. But it really gets you thinking around the ideas used in the well paced story.
    • 4/5
      Full marks for ambition: no doubt about it. Scarlett Thomas, whose name sounds like a pseudonym but apparently isn't, shows real imagination and no small portion of erudition in constructing the world of Ariel Manto (whose name really is a pseudonym, and an anagram at that) and the "Troposphere" she happens upon when researching a long dead and forgotten Victorian mystic called Thomas Lumas, in which much of the action - and philosophical musing - comprising The End of Mr. Y happens. Yes, you read that right: Thomas combines a conventional "confront/defeat the monster" plot, which could almost earn a Hollywood treatment, with some thickly-laid on metaphysics which, even in the hands of the Wachowski brothers (to whose films this book bears only the flimsiest of similarities) decidedly would not especially as, ultimately, Hollywood-grade plotting loses out to post-structuralist posing some way before the end. Now you don't see *that* happen too often, so three cheers for that. And in parts it is a joyous, righteous, pseudo-intellectual romp. But in others it's just pseudo-intellectual: the means by which Thomas seeks to bring about her epistemological triumph over the (disappointly thinly drawn) bad dudes displays nothing like the lightness of touch such a manoeuvre requires. For one thing, she doesn't pull her philosophical punches at the slightest hint of stage 1 brain in a vat metaphysics, as a less ambitious (but more successful) writer might. Instead, she indulges on long ruminations, delivered in improbably lengthy and articulate chunks, about more obscure and difficult thinkers like Derrida, Baudrilliard, Heidegger and Husserl, with whom she should not expect the greater part of her (or any) audience to be well acquainted. Obliged, therefore, to indulge in exposition she elects to explain the salient insights of these thinkers through implausible conversations between characters who, if attention were being paid to plot arc and character development, would have better things to be thinking and talking about. Alas when she does have her characters do something else, it invariably involves copulating, which, given the narrative constraints she has imposed, is about as unlikely as casual dialogue about literary theory and to my reading seemed quite unneccessarily grittily depicted. As a way to give this novel an edge the fornicatory aspect seemed forced, gratuitous and, frankly, dull - like the intracies of Heidegger's dasein, a personal obsession Scarlett Thomas might have been better advised to keep to herself. For all that, when she does allow the plot to dictate the pace it picks up mightily and zips along. The characters face some neatly constructed conundrums, crises and paradoxes which flow from and support her epistemological point. The writing is playful and, at times, neatly constructed: there are in-jokes and word plays throughout, and I don't pretend to have got anything like all of them. In the end - though it may pain Ms Thomas to hear it - the cod philosophy can be safely dispensed with and the slightly icky bonking glossed over, since the wonderful contrivance of Thomas Lumas (itself a self-referential play on words, I suppose) and his Troposphere with its console, its choices, the mouse god Apollo Smintheus and his misfiring scooter carry the day, no matter how incoherent the whole may ultimately be.
    • 5/5
      This is an amazing book which manages to encompass quantum theory, homeopathy, Derrida, Hedigger, Samuel Butler and quite an interesting mystery within its 500 odd pages. As a result its really hard to sum this book up, except to say that this is a book that probably needs to be read several times.
    • 4/5
      I was drawn to 'The End of Mr Y' by the back cover blurb, which promises 'a thrilling adventure of love, sex, death, and time-travel', and I wasn't disappointed. In addition to the ripping yarn, though, I also got some fabulously rich characters, and a good dose of philosophy. The first part of the book established Ariel's ordinary life - ordinary in the extreme, a little bleak around the edges - and when she falls down the rabbit hole, the idiosyncratic, observational style continues, forcing the reader to experience some of Ariel's sense of disorientation. First person is often tricky, but is used here to excellent effect, drawing us into the internal world of graduate student Ariel Manto, first as she faces an unexpectedly difficult day on campus, and then as her worldview is permanently altered as a result reading a rare - allegedly cursed - novel by the Victorian scientist who is the subject of her research. With its romance-in-the-literature-department credentials, it's a little like A.S. Byatt's Possession, if it had taken a step to the side and entered the Matrix, and would probably appeal to steampunk and speculative fiction readers, and anyone who has ever studied literary criticism, philosophy, or taken an interest in theoretical sciences. It also provides an interesting introduction to the theories that it's characters try and use to understand and manipulate the world they discover through the cursed book. However, it is more than a novel of ideas - it's both a thought experiment, and a real story, populated with characters who, even if they're only on the page for short periods, have an emotional resonance. The reader can believe continue to exist when they're 'off screen', and they all have their own motivations for their actions, beyond just helping Ariel and the plot along. Ariel's depressed upstairs neighbour, and her supervisor, on the run from the ideas he unearthed, are just as convincingly drawn as Apollo Smintheus, god of mice, and the more threatening denizens of the alternate-world she discovers. The sense of confusion and threat is genuine, and as a result the action plot is engaging, and meshes well with the emotional, character led elements of the book. A very enjoyable read, although it needs reading
    • 5/5
      Where science meets humanities and poses more questions than it offers answers. A frighteningly believable fantasy that just makes you wonder if you should try that potion. Ariel is the quintessential redhead that surpasses all redheads that have gone before her. A pioneering traveler who challenges the boundaries of the physical world and who takes the ultimate choice on the edge of life and death.
    • 4/5
      Surreal but fascinating. It´s fiction, not philosophy, but it manages to weave in philosophy, religion, quantum physics, relativity, thought experiments, literature, alternative universes, the big bang and much more. Mostly it´s quite fast-paced and engrossing.The hints of dark sex in the story are intriguing, giving insights into the main character and a touch of gritty reality without having to go into too much sordid detail.I find the ending rather weak. This is perhaps partly inherent in the story itself - it´s quite difficult to imagine what the ending could have been without some sort of anticlimax. It´s also a problem with any story which is very effectively narrated in the first person but which reaches an ending which apparently precludes the narrator from ever getting the story to the reader. There is an epilogue, which is often used to do this, but in this case wasn´t.But all in all, a very good read.
    • 3/5
      I found this an entertaining, inventive, but also somewhat confusing read; it certainly stretched my brain cells. I found it literally a 'mind-blowing' experience, sometimes to such an extent that I wasn't really following the explanations, and had to skip the philosophical paragraphs before getting back to the plot. Perhaps a bit too concept-driven for my liking.I enjoyed the fact that the story was set in places I am particularly familiar with (a British university campus, Hitchin, Torquay), and liked the contrast with these places and the Troposphere environment.I think I understand the ending - am I right in thinking it is connected to Ariel's true name, beginning with E?
    • 3/5
      A potion described in a rare book allows Ariel Manto to travel between people's minds in a fast paced, thought provoking read that's peppered with poetic wit. Frequently though Ariel's tasks seem like lacklustre quests in the early chapters of a colourful RPG, and Scarlett is not quite as capable of blending narrative and speculative or scientific discourse as say Pynchon or Coupland.
    • 4/5
      This is my first Scarlett Thomas book and I found it to be engaging and well-written. The End of Mr Y is the story of Ariel Manto and her search for the cursed book of Thomas Lumas. There are a lot of big subjects to contend with – from philosophy and advanced science, but you don’t have to understand everything to move on with the narrative – certainly my knowledge of quantum physics is poor, but I was able to understand everything. I like the inclusion of Lumas’ “The End of Mr Y” within the story, as it helped to highlight how one man’s obsession can ruin lives. I struggled to empathise with Ariel, even though she’d obviously had a troubled up-bringing – her back story seemed clinical, but perhaps the author was attempting to show how Ariel had compartmentalised her life. I didn’t enjoy the ending – it didn’t seem to work. Overall, a great book to read and make you think.
    • 3/5
      A bit of a mixed bag, this one. In places, The End Of Mr Y is a fascinating exploration of philosophy and science. Thomas has done her homework and presents some genuinely intriguing food for thought. The concepts are brilliant and draw from a wide range of sources, and the author doesn't shy away from asking awkward questions and addressing logical paradoxes. It is within the realms of the Troposphere, the mysterious extra dimensional world that glues the story together, that we find the most imaginative, colourful and interesting aspects of the book. Unfortunately it is also here that the author's creativity is concentrated. In the "real world" the characters are clichéd to say the least - a neurotic, self-deprecating but brilliant student who is unaware of her latent abilities; a charismatic, elusive professor; a mysterious alpha-male love interest; and the clincher: nefarious "men in suits". The incidental characters are much the same, and it feels like their thought processes (we are introduced to many directly though their internal dialogue) are utterly predictable.The back-story suffers a similar fate, centring around a rare cursed book with which the protagonist has a passing interest. There are no prizes for guessing how the plot develops from there. In the end the story is left with far too many loose ends and the epilogue is cringe-worthy.It is almost as if Thomas started out a set of brilliant concepts but had no idea how to work them into a novel. The story genuinely feels like an afterthought and the characters are treated as a vehicle to convey the ideas, lacking depth and authenticity.Several times in the novel we are reminded that the central theme is a thought experiment and that, in a manner of speaking, a thought experiment is merely a story. However, the way it is phrased, this observation feels like a footnote by the author in which she reminds us that it is the concept itself and not the meat and bones of the novel that is important. While this may have been her intention, it might be misconstrued as an excuse for the weakness of the rest of the book.Unlike the homoeopathic tincture consumed by the protagonist, repeated dilution has perhaps weakened the strength of the author's central theme. That said the ideas are interesting enough to carry the rest, and it makes for an enjoyable, if not enlightening read.
    • 4/5
      "And then, in an instant that feels thinner and sharper than the edge of a razor, I'm falling. I'm falling into a black tunnel, the same black tunnel that Mr. Y described in the book.""The End of Mr. Y" is a book within this book, a supposedly cursed novel by an obscure writer. Graduate student Ariel Manto, whose thesis is about this writer, stumbles upon the lost work in a used book shop. Its titular character discovers how to enter a sort of mental universe, wherein he can experience the inner lives of others. This revelatory, dangerous journey is clearly described in the book, and the author spells out how the reader can do the same. Except that somebody has torn out the page with the instructions.Will Ariel find the hidden recipe? Will she try to replicate the experience for herself? Will it work? Will she then be exposed to further dangers? Does it all have anything to do with the strange death of "Mr. Y"'s author, and the disappearance of her faculty advisor? Well, of course.So far, so predictable. An interesting enough adventure, with some pleasantly moody writing, fairly two-dimensional characters, and a smattering of student philosophising. That could have been that.But Thomas' handling of the mental world that Ariel discovers the key to -- referred to as the "Troposphere" -- elevates this book above the ordinary. To convey what a mental landscape might be like, and show a character learning about it and journeying through it, without losing or confusing the reader, is some achievement. Plenty of authors fail at this, and plenty of strange worlds are left feeling somehow arbitrary. Not this one. It makes sense, and I'm impressed.
    • 5/5
      I was so completely immersed in this wonderful tale I never noticed the coffee shop closing around me. Oops! Luckily the barista understood the joy of getting lost in a book.I had never heard of Scarlett Thomas before I received this Early Reviewers book but I shall certainly be looking out for more of her work. Brilliant.
    • 3/5
      It's difficult to say a lot about the story of The End Of Mr Y without giving away too much. But as it starts, a young woman, unexpectedly forced to take a new route home, passes a second hand bookshop that she's never seen before, and happens on a rare, and reputedly cursed, book that she's been seeking for some time. At this point I thought I knew what to expect - strange happenings, an inability to find the bookshop ever again - your classic fantasy beginning. But in fact, while the book borrows from fantasy, it ends up being something rather different.In a way, The End Of Mr Y is another example of the (currently oddly popular) Postmodern Victoriana sub-genre - I'm thinking of books like Jonathan Strange or The Glass Books Of The Dream Eaters. But taking the postmodernity a step further, the book is actually about the nature of reality, language and thought, touching on post-structuralism and quantum theory among other things.There are some great things about this book. When the 'thriller' part of the story gets going, it's pacey and gripping, and as I got into the book I liked the 'ideas' too: particularly the description of 'poststructuralist physics', a sadly imaginary academic discipline which manages to explain brilliantly how quantum physics (specifically the idea that electrons are not in any specific location until they are observed) can be true.But unfortunately, both the pace and the interestingness of the ideas was very variable. And the worst thing for me was how irritating the narrator (Ariel Manto) was. She just seemed like such a cliche - a self-styled bad girl/damaged person, who boasts about her addictive personality and manages to name drop several times that she went to university in Oxford. Overall, then, an interesting read, but I couldn't help feeling that it could have been a lot better.
    • 5/5
      What a fantastic trip through quantum physics, philosophy, and mystery as Ariel Manto struggles to understand a supposedly 'cursed' book. One of my favorite books this year. I'll be re-reading it as soon as possible.
    • 4/5
      I really, really enjoyed this - perhaps not as much as I would have done when I was 17, but I'll stick my neck out and say it'll definitely make my top 10 this year, and probably my top 5. The plot rattles along at breakneck pace; Ariel, while I occasionally wanted to slap her around the head in exasperation, is an engaging heroine; and the ideas it discusses make your brain hurt in the most satisfying way. I'm about to sit down and make a list of all the books mentioned in the text I now want to read: Derrida, Baudrillard, Zollner, Samuel Butler, quantum theory...The edition I read contains an Aknowledgements section in which Scarlett Thomas gives her opinion on what the end of the book means. I'm inclined to disagree with her on this - I think the key to it all is in fact the very first sentence...
    • 5/5
      My favourite book from 2007! There are places where this book is challenging to read. On occasions you have to make decisions if you are going to explore the scientific facts (if you don't get them) in detail or just keep reading - I kept reading and decided there were pieces where I should research to confirm understanding but I chose not to. This book is an absolute fantastic adventure. It mixes genres; there is romance, crime, murder, science and mathematics, religion, philosophy, psychology, theology and goodness knows what else. Before even getting to the plot and the characters I want to discuss the cover. It's amazing! There are two covers available, one with a mouse on it (which is very relevant to the story) and the red one with black page endings; I had the latter so be warned if you're reading it in the bath! I was intrigued to know from the beginning who the shadow was on the back page and also to know why the book was cursed. It is exciting and riveting and you can see a lot of hard work went into this novel. Ariel Manto (the lead character) is very unusual and there is more to her than I was able to discover in this novel. I'm sure I missed something important that would show me another side to her that I hadn't identified. I read this novel along with other friends for a book group and we came up with some wonderful ideas after we'd all finished reading it. Obviously I can't mention them here as they would spoil the plot but I can say for certain that this book will get you thinking! She meets an amazing character along the way which you should research after you've read it as I thought he was just make believe but he is real! I've been to the official site for this novel and you should hunt it out and read through it. The novel seems to incorporate everything you study on a Cultural Studies degree and will have your head reeling in places. This will either make you want to read on or put it down. I fully recommend reading on. The epilogue will open up, after reading the rest of the novel, a whole range of thoughts. Cleverly written, a definite keeper for me (which happens once in a blue moon!).
    • 4/5
      There are a lot of things that are bad about this book-The very confusing metaphores about language and emotion, heavy philosophical debates that don't allow you to read it easily because you have to keep stopping to think, and lots of references to things the average reader isn't going to understand. Also the ending seems rushed and contradictory to the rest of the book. However I still give the book 4 stars because I enjoyed it most of the time and some of the ideas are interesting to think about.
    • 5/5
      Not at all what I expected. The basic story is simple enough, a girl whose supervisor goes missing, aquires a cursed book which (as she finds out) belonged to him. As she reads, she finds the book is missing a page. When she finds the page in her supervisor's books, she discovers a formula and the curse. The book tells how to travel to a 'Mindspace' or Troposhere, a place where you can go into people's minds and see all about them and even travel through time using ancestors. Each troposphere is unique as it uses metaphors of the traveller's mind.The book is filled with Quantum theory, theory of relativity, theories of a common ancestor and someis a bit confusing but when I read it again, it was clearer. A lot of the theory comes as a surprise in the narrative, but I found it extremely interesting.With all these concepts in the book, it is not one to read when you are tired. I liked the simple explaination of some very tough concepts especially the distance=time theories used in the Troposphere.
    • 3/5
      I found this book very hard to understand, even though I read it in Dutch. After a while, I discovered I should just go with the flow and accept the facts that were presented to me. It is just a very weird, intelligent story.I would describe the novel as a mix between Murakami and Alice in Wonderland.
    • 4/5
      I looked forward to reading this with anticipation, but I didn't really enjoy it. All credit to Thomas for introducing readable and understandable discussions about theoretical physics, the nature of consciousness and belief. I definitely know more now than before I started the book.But as a narrative I didn't find it very gripping or really care about any of the characters. One thing I found particularly annoying - the first part of the book anonymises the setting, although for anyone who knows the University of Kent, it's obviously Canterbury. Then Thomas switches to explicitly named locations.A graduate student finds the book she thought she never would and learns how to enter the 'troposphere" of collective consciousness.