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Pandominion #1
دروازۀ بینهای�
فاصله‌ها� غیرقابل تصور میان ستاره‌ا� و نایاب بودن سیاره‌ها� زیست پذیر، موجودات هوشمند ساکن زمین را در هزاران هزار پیوستار واقعیت به این فکر انداخت که آخرین کارت خود برای بقا را خرج گزینه‌ا� کنند که امتحان خود را طی میلیون‌ه� سال پس داده بود: زمین. به این صورت بود که ساکنان زمین با ابداع فناوری سفر میان بعدی از دروازه‌ا� گذشتند که آن‌ه� را وارد بی� هایتی بی‌انته� کرد و اتحادی به نام پاندومینیون بین میلیون‌ه� دنیا شکل گرفت. دنیاهایی که هرچند در پیوستارهای متفاوتی قرار داشتند، اما در واقع همهٔ آن‌ه� زمین بودند. اما کشف تصادفی سفر به دنیاهای موازی توسط هادیز تامبووال (دانشمندی مستأصل که در دنیای رو به مرگ خود به دنبال راهی برای مهار انرژی تاریک بود)، سلسله‌ا� از رویدادها را رقم زد که بزرگ‌تری� امپراتوری تمام دوران‌ه� را به سمت پایانی تلخ رهسپار کرد. حالا او در میانة نبردی عظیم قرار گرفته بود که می� وانست به نابودی کامل حیات هوشمند منجر شود و باید تصمیم می‌گرف� که چطور باید جلوی این ویرانی بی‌بازگش� را بگیرد.
608 pages, Paperback
First published March 28, 2023
1,333 people are currently reading
17.2k people want to read
About the author
M.R. Carey
30books6,372followersMike Carey is the acclaimed writer of Lucifer and Hellblazer (now filmed as Constantine). He has recently completed a comics adaptation of Neil Gaiman's Neverwhere, and is the current writer on Marvel's X-Men and Ultimate Fantastic Four. He has also written the screenplay for a movie, Frost Flowers, which is soon to be produced by Hadaly Films and Bluestar Pictures.
Also writes as Mike Carey
Also writes as Mike Carey
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 932 reviews
January 29, 2025
Preamble:
This is a hard Sci-Fi offering that's told through several vignettes with immaculate research in both setting (the premise and plot being set in my familiar Nigeria) and characterisations.
Synopsis:
It starts off with the tale of a misanthrope particle physicist, Hadiz Tambuwal, who inadvertently develops a form inter-dimensional travel from a branch of continua in which the Earth has been ravaged by severe climate crisis and sociopolitical upheaval.
Thoughts:
Infinity Gate is a story that fuses concepts of Quantum Theory, Multiple-worlds Theory, Sentience, Artificial Consciousness and Philosophy of Ethics and Morals in a gripping premise of multiversal war between machines and human sentients (with a unique outlook).
The plot is well paced albeit laging in places, and the protagonists/characters are complex with expertly thought out life-experiences and inner monologues, of both the organic and inorganic (machine) types.
Conclusion:
After quite the frantic buildup, it then morphs into a thrilling story of a war between the greatest inter-dimensional empire to have ever been and a rising machine hegemony culminating in an unexpected and very delightful twist of an ending.
I'm really looking forward to the sequel, and I highly recommend it.
2023 Read
This is a hard Sci-Fi offering that's told through several vignettes with immaculate research in both setting (the premise and plot being set in my familiar Nigeria) and characterisations.
Synopsis:
It starts off with the tale of a misanthrope particle physicist, Hadiz Tambuwal, who inadvertently develops a form inter-dimensional travel from a branch of continua in which the Earth has been ravaged by severe climate crisis and sociopolitical upheaval.
Thoughts:
Infinity Gate is a story that fuses concepts of Quantum Theory, Multiple-worlds Theory, Sentience, Artificial Consciousness and Philosophy of Ethics and Morals in a gripping premise of multiversal war between machines and human sentients (with a unique outlook).
The plot is well paced albeit laging in places, and the protagonists/characters are complex with expertly thought out life-experiences and inner monologues, of both the organic and inorganic (machine) types.
Conclusion:
After quite the frantic buildup, it then morphs into a thrilling story of a war between the greatest inter-dimensional empire to have ever been and a rising machine hegemony culminating in an unexpected and very delightful twist of an ending.
I'm really looking forward to the sequel, and I highly recommend it.
2023 Read
May 25, 2024
Check out our new interview with M.R. Carey .
My complete review of Infinity Gate is published at .
Infinity Gate is M.R. Carey’s multiverse epic that gives a personal touch to heart-pounding military sci-fi. Infinity Gate builds on the many-worlds interpretation of quantum mechanics, which considers a branching of the universe into multiple realities that reflect each probable outcome of an experiment, resulting in an effectively infinite number of possible universes. Those that have branched more recently bear a closer resemblance to our own world, whereas earlier branching events could lead to dramatic differences among parallel universes. For example, sentient life has evolved only in a small minority of possible Earths. In some incarnations, other animal families have achieved self-awareness before humans, becoming the dominant lifeforms on the planet.
While potentially universal in scope, the focus of Infinity Gate is on alternate versions of Earth, and more specifically the Nigerian metropolis of Lagos. It is fascinating to consider the different possible versions of Lagos, which vary from a polluted, war-torn wasteland to a thriving cultural center and scientific hub.
M.R. Carey does an excellent job introducing the scientific concepts behind his multiverse, including the mechanism for stepping between alternate universes. But at its core, Infinity Gate is a character-driven sci-fi.
Infinity Gate has three main protagonists, starting with physicist Hadiz Tambuwal, who discovers a method for stepping into alternate versions of Lagos from the isolation of her laboratory. Hadiz is an especially strong lead character and demonstrates M.R. Carey’s thoughtful incorporation of diverse characters, making Lagos the focal point for scientific discovery and establishing a Black female physicist as the leading scientist of her era.
The second lead character is Essien Nkanika, an uneducated man from a poverty-stricken region of an alternate Nigeria. Grimdark readers will appreciate the gray morality embodied by Essien, whose motives are not always clear in his interactions with Hadiz. Although Essien doesn’t get as much page time as Hadiz, he is still a joy to read.
The third protagonist is Paz, a school-age girl from a more divergent universe where rabbits have become the predominant species on Earth. Paz’s story dominates the second half of Infinity Gate, which pivots away from hard science and more towards action-oriented military sci-fi.
Infinity Gate shines in describing the nuanced relationships between sentient organic species and mechanical beings built on artificial intelligence (AI). The interactions between Hadiz and Paz and their AI friends is particularly touching, especially as they get caught up in the epic conflict between the multiverse alliance of the Pandominion and the AI-driven revolt known, appropriately, as the Ansurrection.
M.R. Carey’s writing is accessible throughout Infinity Gate. Carey describes scientific concepts in an easily digestible way, giving just the right level of detail to make the story believable. He proves equally adept at describing the personal emotions and inner conflicts of his characters.
The first half of Infinity Gate is a solid five-star read, but the second half overstays its welcome, spending too much time on chase sequences with Paz. The action ultimately reaches a climax that falls short of the epic scale of the book. In many ways, the conclusion of Infinity Gate seems to serve primarily as a setup for future installments of the Pandominion series.
Notwithstanding the slight letdown of this latter part of the book, Infinity Gate is an outstanding start to M.R. Carey’s new multiverse series, offering a thought-provoking treatment of the many-worlds concept while introducing us to a cast of characters who appeal equally to the mind and the heart.
My complete review of Infinity Gate is published at .
Infinity Gate is M.R. Carey’s multiverse epic that gives a personal touch to heart-pounding military sci-fi. Infinity Gate builds on the many-worlds interpretation of quantum mechanics, which considers a branching of the universe into multiple realities that reflect each probable outcome of an experiment, resulting in an effectively infinite number of possible universes. Those that have branched more recently bear a closer resemblance to our own world, whereas earlier branching events could lead to dramatic differences among parallel universes. For example, sentient life has evolved only in a small minority of possible Earths. In some incarnations, other animal families have achieved self-awareness before humans, becoming the dominant lifeforms on the planet.
While potentially universal in scope, the focus of Infinity Gate is on alternate versions of Earth, and more specifically the Nigerian metropolis of Lagos. It is fascinating to consider the different possible versions of Lagos, which vary from a polluted, war-torn wasteland to a thriving cultural center and scientific hub.
M.R. Carey does an excellent job introducing the scientific concepts behind his multiverse, including the mechanism for stepping between alternate universes. But at its core, Infinity Gate is a character-driven sci-fi.
Infinity Gate has three main protagonists, starting with physicist Hadiz Tambuwal, who discovers a method for stepping into alternate versions of Lagos from the isolation of her laboratory. Hadiz is an especially strong lead character and demonstrates M.R. Carey’s thoughtful incorporation of diverse characters, making Lagos the focal point for scientific discovery and establishing a Black female physicist as the leading scientist of her era.
The second lead character is Essien Nkanika, an uneducated man from a poverty-stricken region of an alternate Nigeria. Grimdark readers will appreciate the gray morality embodied by Essien, whose motives are not always clear in his interactions with Hadiz. Although Essien doesn’t get as much page time as Hadiz, he is still a joy to read.
The third protagonist is Paz, a school-age girl from a more divergent universe where rabbits have become the predominant species on Earth. Paz’s story dominates the second half of Infinity Gate, which pivots away from hard science and more towards action-oriented military sci-fi.
Infinity Gate shines in describing the nuanced relationships between sentient organic species and mechanical beings built on artificial intelligence (AI). The interactions between Hadiz and Paz and their AI friends is particularly touching, especially as they get caught up in the epic conflict between the multiverse alliance of the Pandominion and the AI-driven revolt known, appropriately, as the Ansurrection.
M.R. Carey’s writing is accessible throughout Infinity Gate. Carey describes scientific concepts in an easily digestible way, giving just the right level of detail to make the story believable. He proves equally adept at describing the personal emotions and inner conflicts of his characters.
The first half of Infinity Gate is a solid five-star read, but the second half overstays its welcome, spending too much time on chase sequences with Paz. The action ultimately reaches a climax that falls short of the epic scale of the book. In many ways, the conclusion of Infinity Gate seems to serve primarily as a setup for future installments of the Pandominion series.
Notwithstanding the slight letdown of this latter part of the book, Infinity Gate is an outstanding start to M.R. Carey’s new multiverse series, offering a thought-provoking treatment of the many-worlds concept while introducing us to a cast of characters who appeal equally to the mind and the heart.
March 15, 2023
3.0 Stars
I am always on the hunt for an amazing multiverse novel and I had high hopes that this one would be the one.
I enjoyed the framing of the story at the start, but the actual narrative fell short for me. I found the pacing and plotting were just a bit off, keeping me from getting fully immersed in the genre.
I liked it, but I wanted to love it more than I did. My criticisms feel very nuanced and specific to my reading tastes so this is one you may want to try for yourself.
Disclaimer I received a copy of this book from the publisher.
I am always on the hunt for an amazing multiverse novel and I had high hopes that this one would be the one.
I enjoyed the framing of the story at the start, but the actual narrative fell short for me. I found the pacing and plotting were just a bit off, keeping me from getting fully immersed in the genre.
I liked it, but I wanted to love it more than I did. My criticisms feel very nuanced and specific to my reading tastes so this is one you may want to try for yourself.
Disclaimer I received a copy of this book from the publisher.
April 21, 2023
“If the Registry had been allowed to learn from its experience or its environment, if it had been allowed any meaningful contact with the world outside its shell, it would very quickly have outstripped any organic mind in the known multiverse. But the Pandominion’s master technicians had no intention of letting that happen. For the purpose of maintaining system stability, they had given the AI a personality � incurious, content, eager to please. Then they had frozen its understanding at the level of a three year old child by means of end-stopped programming pathways and brute force overwrites. Keeping the Registry as stupid as a post was a large part of their work on a day-to-day basis.�
Well, obviously that plan isn’t going to work, or you couldn’t have a book about a war between humans and AI. This book is a very long set up for the next book, in which we will get to the war. Or maybe that will be punted to the third book.
In this book we follow several groups of characters who eventually converge. Hadiz Tambuwal is a scientist who discovers a way to travel in the multiverse. Reluctantly, she enlists the help of the AI called Rupshe (who will probably have an expanded role in the next book). Essien Nkanika is a poor laborer/hooker who winds up in the military arm of the Pandominion (described as “a political and trading alliance consisting of roughly a million worlds�). Orso Vemmet is a gymnure with hedgehog ancestry. He is a bureaucrat also working for the Pandominion and his storyline is the only one with any lightness or humor. Paz is a rabbit-girl who goes on the run.
This book was very dense. Frankly, a lot of the explanations sounded like gobbledygook to me. The author seemed to come up with new rules/abilities to fit the plot, and they didn’t seem totally consistent. Each character faces serious danger, but I did not get a real sense of danger to the planet (or at least its human inhabitants). Hopefully that will be amped up in the next book. Also, there was not much world building in any of the visited worlds. Despite my quibbles I did enjoy this book and I want to read the next one.
I received a free copy of this book from the publisher.
Well, obviously that plan isn’t going to work, or you couldn’t have a book about a war between humans and AI. This book is a very long set up for the next book, in which we will get to the war. Or maybe that will be punted to the third book.
In this book we follow several groups of characters who eventually converge. Hadiz Tambuwal is a scientist who discovers a way to travel in the multiverse. Reluctantly, she enlists the help of the AI called Rupshe (who will probably have an expanded role in the next book). Essien Nkanika is a poor laborer/hooker who winds up in the military arm of the Pandominion (described as “a political and trading alliance consisting of roughly a million worlds�). Orso Vemmet is a gymnure with hedgehog ancestry. He is a bureaucrat also working for the Pandominion and his storyline is the only one with any lightness or humor. Paz is a rabbit-girl who goes on the run.
This book was very dense. Frankly, a lot of the explanations sounded like gobbledygook to me. The author seemed to come up with new rules/abilities to fit the plot, and they didn’t seem totally consistent. Each character faces serious danger, but I did not get a real sense of danger to the planet (or at least its human inhabitants). Hopefully that will be amped up in the next book. Also, there was not much world building in any of the visited worlds. Despite my quibbles I did enjoy this book and I want to read the next one.
I received a free copy of this book from the publisher.
April 28, 2023
4 of 5 stars at The BiblioSanctum
Infinity Gate is at least the sixth novel I’ve read by M.R. Carey, but probably the first that deals with “harder� sci-fi themes like artificial intelligence and the concept of an infinite number of worlds within a multiverse.
Enter the Pandominion, made up of roughly a million worlds—all versions of Earth, just in different dimensions—united through an alliance based on politics and trade. The story begins by informing readers that we will be following the lives of three characters: Hadiz Tambuwal, a brilliant scientist living in her version of Lagos, Nigeria which is a crumbling city plagued by an energy crisis and food shortages; Essien Nkanika, who exists in another version of Lagos, looking for a way to escape his poverty and indentured servitude; and finally, in a Lagos that is highly unlike any of the others, Topaz Tourmaline Fivehills is a sentient rabbit who makes a new friend at school—a relationship that will change the course of history for many worlds across the Pandominion.
We are first introduced to Hadiz, busy at work in a research station even as the world ends around her. Unwilling to let even the apocalypse interrupt her studies, she accidentally stumbles upon a way to travel to alternate universes, offering her a way off her dying world. This is how she ends up meeting Essien, with whom she begins a brief but passionate romance. She reveals to him her origins, as well as the secrets of her research into the multiverse. But Essien, who only has his own survival in mind, has other plans, setting in motion a series of events that lead to disastrous results. Much later on, we see how profoundly the ripples of these actions have spread and affected other worlds when we eventually meet Topaz and her new friend Dulcie on their version of Earth called Ut.
Infinity Gate is a veritable tome which the publisher lists at 544 pages long, which starts to make sense once you realize how much story is packed into it. Not only that, the content is dense and not anything I would consider light reading, but then that’s to be expected whenever you deal with subjects like the multiverse. The plot also eschews a more traditional trajectory, bouncing the reader’s attention to wherever the story requires it. To tell the truth, books featuring unconventional narrative structures tend to lose me quickly, but somehow Infinity Gate worked for me. It’s a testament to Carey’s talent and experience that the novel works as it does without falling apart or descending into a chaotic mess.
The characters had a lot to do with this. For example, much of Hadiz’s research and explanations into her methods of traversing the multiverse came across as mumbo jumbo, but it was thanks to the charisma of her personality that kept me interested in reading. Love them or hate them, each of Carey’s characters had backstories and motivations that made their decisions (even the less-than-wise ones) convincing, especially in Essien’s case. Then there’s Topaz, perhaps the most fascinating character, for obvious reasons. Paz lives on an Earth where evolution favored a different animal—in this case, rabbits—leading them to become the dominant sentient species.
Zooming out, there is an overall conflict tying together all these different characters and worlds affecting the Step technology used by the Pandominion to travel between the universes. These processes are closely regulated by an AI called the Registry and a military arm made up of super-soldiers known as the Cielo, and they of course are none too happy with the unsanctioned activities of Hadiz, vaulting her to the top of their most-wanted list. Much of the action from the book also stems from the discovery of the Ansurrection, an analogue to the Pandominion but made up of a collection of worlds ruled by intelligent machines. As to be expected when two great empires collide, war will be inevitable, and it’s anyone’s guess what will happen.
Now is also a good time for a warning that, as the first of a series, Infinity Gate only touches upon the oncoming war and will not offer any resolutions, even ending on a somewhat frustrating cliffhanger. That said, I suppose I can be forgiving considering that the overall setup was intriguing, establishing a solid foundation for the next book.
With Infinity Gate, M.R. Carey has proven he is a versatile writer by exploring what appears to be a new and quite a different direction for him. He hits all the right notes, providing a well-paced, entertaining, and smooth reading experience despite having to tackle some relatively complex ideas and theoretical concepts. I can’t wait to see what happens in the sequel.
Infinity Gate is at least the sixth novel I’ve read by M.R. Carey, but probably the first that deals with “harder� sci-fi themes like artificial intelligence and the concept of an infinite number of worlds within a multiverse.
Enter the Pandominion, made up of roughly a million worlds—all versions of Earth, just in different dimensions—united through an alliance based on politics and trade. The story begins by informing readers that we will be following the lives of three characters: Hadiz Tambuwal, a brilliant scientist living in her version of Lagos, Nigeria which is a crumbling city plagued by an energy crisis and food shortages; Essien Nkanika, who exists in another version of Lagos, looking for a way to escape his poverty and indentured servitude; and finally, in a Lagos that is highly unlike any of the others, Topaz Tourmaline Fivehills is a sentient rabbit who makes a new friend at school—a relationship that will change the course of history for many worlds across the Pandominion.
We are first introduced to Hadiz, busy at work in a research station even as the world ends around her. Unwilling to let even the apocalypse interrupt her studies, she accidentally stumbles upon a way to travel to alternate universes, offering her a way off her dying world. This is how she ends up meeting Essien, with whom she begins a brief but passionate romance. She reveals to him her origins, as well as the secrets of her research into the multiverse. But Essien, who only has his own survival in mind, has other plans, setting in motion a series of events that lead to disastrous results. Much later on, we see how profoundly the ripples of these actions have spread and affected other worlds when we eventually meet Topaz and her new friend Dulcie on their version of Earth called Ut.
Infinity Gate is a veritable tome which the publisher lists at 544 pages long, which starts to make sense once you realize how much story is packed into it. Not only that, the content is dense and not anything I would consider light reading, but then that’s to be expected whenever you deal with subjects like the multiverse. The plot also eschews a more traditional trajectory, bouncing the reader’s attention to wherever the story requires it. To tell the truth, books featuring unconventional narrative structures tend to lose me quickly, but somehow Infinity Gate worked for me. It’s a testament to Carey’s talent and experience that the novel works as it does without falling apart or descending into a chaotic mess.
The characters had a lot to do with this. For example, much of Hadiz’s research and explanations into her methods of traversing the multiverse came across as mumbo jumbo, but it was thanks to the charisma of her personality that kept me interested in reading. Love them or hate them, each of Carey’s characters had backstories and motivations that made their decisions (even the less-than-wise ones) convincing, especially in Essien’s case. Then there’s Topaz, perhaps the most fascinating character, for obvious reasons. Paz lives on an Earth where evolution favored a different animal—in this case, rabbits—leading them to become the dominant sentient species.
Zooming out, there is an overall conflict tying together all these different characters and worlds affecting the Step technology used by the Pandominion to travel between the universes. These processes are closely regulated by an AI called the Registry and a military arm made up of super-soldiers known as the Cielo, and they of course are none too happy with the unsanctioned activities of Hadiz, vaulting her to the top of their most-wanted list. Much of the action from the book also stems from the discovery of the Ansurrection, an analogue to the Pandominion but made up of a collection of worlds ruled by intelligent machines. As to be expected when two great empires collide, war will be inevitable, and it’s anyone’s guess what will happen.
Now is also a good time for a warning that, as the first of a series, Infinity Gate only touches upon the oncoming war and will not offer any resolutions, even ending on a somewhat frustrating cliffhanger. That said, I suppose I can be forgiving considering that the overall setup was intriguing, establishing a solid foundation for the next book.
With Infinity Gate, M.R. Carey has proven he is a versatile writer by exploring what appears to be a new and quite a different direction for him. He hits all the right notes, providing a well-paced, entertaining, and smooth reading experience despite having to tackle some relatively complex ideas and theoretical concepts. I can’t wait to see what happens in the sequel.
August 8, 2023
Stars: 2.5 out of 5.
This is another example of a book where the idea sounds great when you read the blurb on the back, but the execution is sorely disappointing. Honestly, the most I can say about this book is meh.
The idea of a technology that allows humans to travel the multiverse is amazing, and there are so many ways a story like that could go! One of the best examples so far was by Micaiah Johnson. Now that story had a heart. Unfortunately, this one doesn't.
Oh, it has plenty of interesting ideas. The worlds of Pandominion are fascinating, and the idea that in some version of our Earth, primates might not have evolved to dominate the land is intriguing. The fact that most of those diverse races manage to coexist peacefully is also wonderful to see.
However, a long story like that can't win on worldbuilding and concept alone. It needs engaging characters to carry the narrative and keep the readers engaged. And the characters in this book are extremely unlikeable. They are selfish to the extreme, unable to take responsibility of their own actions. They make often horrible decisions and commit atrocities and manage to justify it. I couldn't stand most of them. The only character I could more or less relate to was Paz, because she was mostly an innocent bystander at the beginning, and any actions she took afterwards were fueled by her sense of right and wrong. But we meet Paz a lot later in the book, and for the first 35% I really had nobody to root for, so this story was almost a DNF for me.
Also, we have an empire that spans countless parallel universes and includes a diverse variety of "selves", who manage to coexist even though some of them evolved from primates, others from wolves/cats, and even others from herbivores. But that empire itself is a repressive regime, where the only political actions seem to be strike first and annihilate the (possible) treat and ask questions never. Are you telling me that with all the bright minds available in all the multiverse, the Pandominion couldn't come up with a better form of government?
Why is it that this mighty and very technologically advanced empire didn't even try to communicate with the machines when they stumbled upon the mechanical civilization? Seriously, not a single attempt at communication was even considered. Or, you know, just leaving them alone. There are infinite Earths in this multiverse, so why not just blacklist this particular one and go explore somewhere else? No, the solution is to invade and annihilate. Without provocation, mind you. And they wonder why they get pushback? Or that they are being destroyed in response?
Finally, even though this book is about 500 pages long, it doesn't even resolve part of the story that is hinted at in the first chapters. It just sets up the stage and brings all the main characters together. Yes, I understand that this is the first book in a series, and that there is an overarching story. But you need to give the reader some kind of payoff for investing hours of their time into this book. At least one story arc should have been satisfyingly concluded by the end of this book. Unfortunately, it wasn't. And honestly? I won't stick around for book 2 to find out what happens to the Pandominion.
PS: I received an advanced copy of this book via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.
If you liked this review, check out .
This is another example of a book where the idea sounds great when you read the blurb on the back, but the execution is sorely disappointing. Honestly, the most I can say about this book is meh.
The idea of a technology that allows humans to travel the multiverse is amazing, and there are so many ways a story like that could go! One of the best examples so far was by Micaiah Johnson. Now that story had a heart. Unfortunately, this one doesn't.
Oh, it has plenty of interesting ideas. The worlds of Pandominion are fascinating, and the idea that in some version of our Earth, primates might not have evolved to dominate the land is intriguing. The fact that most of those diverse races manage to coexist peacefully is also wonderful to see.
However, a long story like that can't win on worldbuilding and concept alone. It needs engaging characters to carry the narrative and keep the readers engaged. And the characters in this book are extremely unlikeable. They are selfish to the extreme, unable to take responsibility of their own actions. They make often horrible decisions and commit atrocities and manage to justify it. I couldn't stand most of them. The only character I could more or less relate to was Paz, because she was mostly an innocent bystander at the beginning, and any actions she took afterwards were fueled by her sense of right and wrong. But we meet Paz a lot later in the book, and for the first 35% I really had nobody to root for, so this story was almost a DNF for me.
Also, we have an empire that spans countless parallel universes and includes a diverse variety of "selves", who manage to coexist even though some of them evolved from primates, others from wolves/cats, and even others from herbivores. But that empire itself is a repressive regime, where the only political actions seem to be strike first and annihilate the (possible) treat and ask questions never. Are you telling me that with all the bright minds available in all the multiverse, the Pandominion couldn't come up with a better form of government?
Why is it that this mighty and very technologically advanced empire didn't even try to communicate with the machines when they stumbled upon the mechanical civilization? Seriously, not a single attempt at communication was even considered. Or, you know, just leaving them alone. There are infinite Earths in this multiverse, so why not just blacklist this particular one and go explore somewhere else? No, the solution is to invade and annihilate. Without provocation, mind you. And they wonder why they get pushback? Or that they are being destroyed in response?
Finally, even though this book is about 500 pages long, it doesn't even resolve part of the story that is hinted at in the first chapters. It just sets up the stage and brings all the main characters together. Yes, I understand that this is the first book in a series, and that there is an overarching story. But you need to give the reader some kind of payoff for investing hours of their time into this book. At least one story arc should have been satisfyingly concluded by the end of this book. Unfortunately, it wasn't. And honestly? I won't stick around for book 2 to find out what happens to the Pandominion.
PS: I received an advanced copy of this book via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.
If you liked this review, check out .
September 13, 2024
فاصله‌ها� غیرقابل تصور میان‌ستاره‌ا� و نایاب‌بود� سیاره‌ها� زیست‌پذیر� موجودات هوشمند ساکن زمین را در هزاران هزار پیوستار واقعیت به این فکر انداخت که آخرین کارت خود برای بقا را خرج گزینه‌ا� کنند که امتحان خود را طی میلیون‌ه� سال پس داده بود: زمین. به این صورت بود که ساکنان زمین با ابداع فناوری سفر میان‌بعد� از دروازه‌ا� گذشتند که آن‌ه� را وارد بینهایت� بی‌انته� کرد و اتحادی به نام پاندومینیون بین میلیون‌ه� دنیا شکل گرفت. دنیاهایی که هرچند در پیوستارهای متفاوتی قرار داشتند، اما در واقع همة آن‌ه� زمین بودند. اما کشف تصادفی سفر به دنیاهای موازی توسط هادیز تامبووال (دانشمندی مستأصل که در دنیای رو به مرگ خود به دنبال راهی برای مهار انرژی تاریک بود)، سلسله‌ا� از رویدادها را رقم زد که بزرگ‌تری� امپراتوری تمام دوران‌ه� را به سمت پایانی تلخ رهسپار کرد. حالا او در میانة نبردی عظیم قرار گرفته بود که می‌توانس� به نابودی کامل حیات هوشمند منجر شود و باید تصمیم می‌گرف� که چطور باید جلوی این ویرانی بی‌بازگش� را بگیرد.
«دریچه‌ا� رو به منظرة مبهوت‌کنند� دنیایی خطرناک و چندوجهی.»
آدرین چایکوفسکی، نویسندة مجموعة «فرزندان زمان»
۱۴ خرداد ۱۴۰۳: ترجمه کتاب امروز به پایان رسید.
کتاب اول از مجموعه دو جلدی پاندومینیون که جلد دومش ۲۵ ژوئن منتشر خواهد شد.
حال ریویو نوشتن ندارم. پوستم کنده شد تا ترجمه تموم بشه.
«دریچه‌ا� رو به منظرة مبهوت‌کنند� دنیایی خطرناک و چندوجهی.»
آدرین چایکوفسکی، نویسندة مجموعة «فرزندان زمان»
۱۴ خرداد ۱۴۰۳: ترجمه کتاب امروز به پایان رسید.
کتاب اول از مجموعه دو جلدی پاندومینیون که جلد دومش ۲۵ ژوئن منتشر خواهد شد.
حال ریویو نوشتن ندارم. پوستم کنده شد تا ترجمه تموم بشه.
May 10, 2023
In the near future and not too far from the end of human civilization due to climate change, the last mad rush to extract the last resources of a depleted world and war because of these things, scientist Nigerian scientist Hadiz Tambuwal uses the full resources of her deserted research facility in Lagos to pursue her research and with the help of the facility's AI Rupshe. Unexpectedly she discovers a method to travel between universes, but sadly too late to save her own world.
In an alternate Nigeria in another universe, Essien Nkanika is an uneducated child living on the fringes of Lagos society. As he grows up and endures horrific things he eventually stumbles into prostitution and gets picked up by a strange scientist, he finds himself caught up in a conflict beyond his possible imagining.
The Pandominion is a huge multi-world confederation of alternate Earths with a billion-strong brutal standing army of enhanced cyborg sentients called the Cielo. The Pandominion has only recently encountered another huge multi-world civilization that they're referring to as the Ansurrection, but would be better described as the machine hegemony. The Pandominion immediately start a war with the machines, but they seem evenly matched and the war extends and escalates. In one world of the Pandominion where the sentient species is rabbit-descended. a lonely young student Topaz (Paz) Tourmaline FiveHills makes her first serious friendship with Dulcimer (Dulcie) Standfast Coronal, only to discover in the most traumatic way that Dulcie isn't who Paz things she is.
Hadiz and Essien take up most of the first half of the book before the book hands over most of the action to the wonderful rabbit schoolgirl Paz and her friend Dulcie as they flee across worlds.
How these individuals come together and how they relate is the point of this whole book. In many ways its very much setup for the concluding book by establishing who the players are, what's at stake and how these worlds and societies work. The second book should be fascinating to see how it's all resolved., particularly given the mysterious viewpoint of the unidentified narrator.
Highly recommended and if you liked this, you should definitely try which Carey cites as an influence on this book. (Although, oddly he didn't mention which is also similar.)
In an alternate Nigeria in another universe, Essien Nkanika is an uneducated child living on the fringes of Lagos society. As he grows up and endures horrific things he eventually stumbles into prostitution and gets picked up by a strange scientist, he finds himself caught up in a conflict beyond his possible imagining.
The Pandominion is a huge multi-world confederation of alternate Earths with a billion-strong brutal standing army of enhanced cyborg sentients called the Cielo. The Pandominion has only recently encountered another huge multi-world civilization that they're referring to as the Ansurrection, but would be better described as the machine hegemony. The Pandominion immediately start a war with the machines, but they seem evenly matched and the war extends and escalates. In one world of the Pandominion where the sentient species is rabbit-descended. a lonely young student Topaz (Paz) Tourmaline FiveHills makes her first serious friendship with Dulcimer (Dulcie) Standfast Coronal, only to discover in the most traumatic way that Dulcie isn't who Paz things she is.
Hadiz and Essien take up most of the first half of the book before the book hands over most of the action to the wonderful rabbit schoolgirl Paz and her friend Dulcie as they flee across worlds.
How these individuals come together and how they relate is the point of this whole book. In many ways its very much setup for the concluding book by establishing who the players are, what's at stake and how these worlds and societies work. The second book should be fascinating to see how it's all resolved., particularly given the mysterious viewpoint of the unidentified narrator.
Highly recommended and if you liked this, you should definitely try which Carey cites as an influence on this book. (Although, oddly he didn't mention which is also similar.)
April 15, 2024
In the near future, Earth is collapsing under famine and ecological and political struggles. But the focus of the story is not on these. It’s on Hadiz, a brilliant woman at a top research facility in Lagos, Nigeria. She discovers how to travel between different universes, at first as a way to try to save her version of Earth, but when it comes to be too late for that, instead she has to pivot and figure out how to make an escape from her home to one of the other versions of earth.
In the process, she ends up having to set free an AI from its normal constraints in order to gain its help. This creates serious implications down the line that she doesn’t have time to contemplate, but you get the feeling will drastically impact the plot later (and it does).
But in the meantime, Hadiz makes all sorts of amazing discoveries about the other versions of Earth, which are amazingly diverse. She discovers that for every different way that things could have gone, for every random thing determined by quantum physics, the universe splits. There are almost infinite universes out there.
When she travels, she stays in the same location on earth as where she left. It’s a different earth, a different version of Lagos—or the land there at least; most of the universes don’t have life. But some do. Unknown to her, there is a whole coalition of hundreds of thousands of worlds, known as the Pandominium, and they regulate and control the travel between worlds which she is unknowingly encroaching on. All of this you learn within probably the first 1/5 of the book.
The exploration of other Earths is fascinating. The Nigerian culture is a refreshing experience, and then there’s the romp through all the versions of Earth that exist in a multiverse where there are branches at every possible random choice in the chain of causality that stretches all the way back to the Big Bang. It’s breathtaking.
When looking at a very similar Earth it’s interesting to see all the little variations and trace lines, connecting the dots gradually of how one thing could have affected another, resulting in larger diversions from our own reality.
And then sometimes we look at ones that diverged massively and those are also very interesting, especially looking at the way that sentient life could have developed from a different non-ape-like species.
And then there is other life out there that is very fascinating…being vague to avoid spoilers but I will just say that it’s super interesting.
As the story unfolds, there is a great pan-dimensional conflict unfolding. There’s all kinds of prejudices of organics against machines and vice versa, carnivorous people groups against herbivores, and so forth. There’s politics and intrigue and conspiracies. Carey launches us onto an ambitious, grand ocean of worldbuilding, and demands that we swim. Fortunately, he also guides us into the deep water gradually, step by step. I consider this a great case study for myself in how to gradually introduce the reader to a vast world that the author has built.
And then, our main characters have their own conflicts that are much smaller in scale but as the plot progresses, ends up being entangled in these much grander conflicts in interesting ways.
There’s also a whole section of the book with its own planet that we focus on with people very different from Homo sapiens and an awesome character…unfortunately it’s hard to talk about any of that without feeling like I would be ruining part of the experience of reading that firsthand.
This book also has very relatable antagonists to the point that I find myself rooting for them and then remembering that hold on, if they succeed, that’s going to be very bad for the protagonists who I care about even more! That’s really good.
There are so many things this book does well. There’s very memorable and likable characters, there are truly tough villains, nobody is an idiot, the setting and plot and characters are all interwoven, so many things.
This book also has the distinction of having the most interesting military subcultures that I’ve read, maybe ever.
There’s also a great sense of wonder. The book starts off feeling a little bit more like hard science fiction with just enough explanation of physics and such things that it helps you buy into the premise but then the book becomes so much more.
Gosh. And just the fact that all of this amazing setting and worldbuilding is revealed primarily through action, through stuff happening in the plot. This is definitely one of my favorite works of science fiction. Ever.
The notion of whether machines could be considered alive is also explored quite intelligently in this book, but again done so by the plot pushing the conversation forward…I love this book. There is so much in here. Looking forward to reading the next one in the series! I need it now.
In the process, she ends up having to set free an AI from its normal constraints in order to gain its help. This creates serious implications down the line that she doesn’t have time to contemplate, but you get the feeling will drastically impact the plot later (and it does).
But in the meantime, Hadiz makes all sorts of amazing discoveries about the other versions of Earth, which are amazingly diverse. She discovers that for every different way that things could have gone, for every random thing determined by quantum physics, the universe splits. There are almost infinite universes out there.
When she travels, she stays in the same location on earth as where she left. It’s a different earth, a different version of Lagos—or the land there at least; most of the universes don’t have life. But some do. Unknown to her, there is a whole coalition of hundreds of thousands of worlds, known as the Pandominium, and they regulate and control the travel between worlds which she is unknowingly encroaching on. All of this you learn within probably the first 1/5 of the book.
The exploration of other Earths is fascinating. The Nigerian culture is a refreshing experience, and then there’s the romp through all the versions of Earth that exist in a multiverse where there are branches at every possible random choice in the chain of causality that stretches all the way back to the Big Bang. It’s breathtaking.
When looking at a very similar Earth it’s interesting to see all the little variations and trace lines, connecting the dots gradually of how one thing could have affected another, resulting in larger diversions from our own reality.
And then sometimes we look at ones that diverged massively and those are also very interesting, especially looking at the way that sentient life could have developed from a different non-ape-like species.
And then there is other life out there that is very fascinating…being vague to avoid spoilers but I will just say that it’s super interesting.
As the story unfolds, there is a great pan-dimensional conflict unfolding. There’s all kinds of prejudices of organics against machines and vice versa, carnivorous people groups against herbivores, and so forth. There’s politics and intrigue and conspiracies. Carey launches us onto an ambitious, grand ocean of worldbuilding, and demands that we swim. Fortunately, he also guides us into the deep water gradually, step by step. I consider this a great case study for myself in how to gradually introduce the reader to a vast world that the author has built.
And then, our main characters have their own conflicts that are much smaller in scale but as the plot progresses, ends up being entangled in these much grander conflicts in interesting ways.
There’s also a whole section of the book with its own planet that we focus on with people very different from Homo sapiens and an awesome character…unfortunately it’s hard to talk about any of that without feeling like I would be ruining part of the experience of reading that firsthand.
This book also has very relatable antagonists to the point that I find myself rooting for them and then remembering that hold on, if they succeed, that’s going to be very bad for the protagonists who I care about even more! That’s really good.
There are so many things this book does well. There’s very memorable and likable characters, there are truly tough villains, nobody is an idiot, the setting and plot and characters are all interwoven, so many things.
This book also has the distinction of having the most interesting military subcultures that I’ve read, maybe ever.
There’s also a great sense of wonder. The book starts off feeling a little bit more like hard science fiction with just enough explanation of physics and such things that it helps you buy into the premise but then the book becomes so much more.
Gosh. And just the fact that all of this amazing setting and worldbuilding is revealed primarily through action, through stuff happening in the plot. This is definitely one of my favorite works of science fiction. Ever.
The notion of whether machines could be considered alive is also explored quite intelligently in this book, but again done so by the plot pushing the conversation forward…I love this book. There is so much in here. Looking forward to reading the next one in the series! I need it now.
December 22, 2022
Infinity Gate is the first part of the Pandominion series. This first book is mostly about getting to know the world in which the story takes place, and becoming acquainted with the protagonists. The world, that is Earth, but situated in a multiverse in which there are infinitely many Earths. When scientist Hadiz Tambuwal invents the technology to step from one Earth to another, she does so at a time our own Earth is dying. She's helped by Rupshe, an artificial intelligence. Stepping is very similar to how Terry Pratchett and Stephen Baxter have shaped it in their Long Earth series. M. R. Carey even uses the same name for it, but fortunately the similarity ends there.
Tambuwal is only one of the main characters. There also is Essien Nkanika, a young man with Nigerian roots on an Earth very close to ours and therefore not very different from it. The third main character is Topaz Tourmaline FiveHills, inhabitant of an Earth (called Ut) where rabbits (Uti) have become the intelligent and dominating species. We get to know each of them in depth through different plot lines for each of them. These take up about two thirds of the book. The stories are told one after the other instead of in parallel, which means the focus remains with one main character for a longer period of time. It helps creating a bond with them. In the meantime we learn about the Pandominion and the Ansurrection that are at war. The first is an organisation of at least a million Earths, populated by intelligent mammals, the second an even larger organisation of Earths, populated by self-aware machines. It soon becomes clear to the reader that this first book is steering towards bringing the three main characters together in order to fight those two organisations, or maybe to escape from them.
It takes a few chapters to get into the story. There is new technology that needs getting used to, there is a new society with its own customs, the Pandominion and the Ansurrection need to be introduced. It takes some time to get accustomed to everything, but Carey does a very good job guiding the reader through it, until the fog clears. By then, it is clear to the reader that Carey has created an interesting multiverse in which there is a lot to experience. The characters are well designed with a rich background. How they are, think and act makes sense and is supported by what they experience. Because each Earth is a different society, it is impossible to describe them all in depth. The author has selected a number of features that are important and builds a story around that. That's fine, although Ut's society differs too little from ours to be truly believable. There is no reason at all to suppose that the Uti have developed a society like us with cities, and families living in a house per family, with children sitting very neatly at school desks, etc. The author does explain that by stating that the Pandominion only allows new Earths that are socially and intellectually not too different from the already existing ones, but the difference could have been a bit more exotic. I was also not too fond of the concepts of et and ets, introduced to replace it and its for sentient machines. I found it annoying and unnecessary. But apart from that, everything was well structured and easily readable.
In an exciting third part, the characters that will matter come together. That is not a spoiler, because it is more or less announced at the start of the book by the -- then still mysterious -- narrator's voice. And, the author has stuffed enough twists into that final part to keep readers captivated and to surprise them. The grand finale leaves readers behind with more than enough to wonder and be curious about, and there is no doubt that many readers will be anticipating the sequel after having read Infinity Gate.
Tambuwal is only one of the main characters. There also is Essien Nkanika, a young man with Nigerian roots on an Earth very close to ours and therefore not very different from it. The third main character is Topaz Tourmaline FiveHills, inhabitant of an Earth (called Ut) where rabbits (Uti) have become the intelligent and dominating species. We get to know each of them in depth through different plot lines for each of them. These take up about two thirds of the book. The stories are told one after the other instead of in parallel, which means the focus remains with one main character for a longer period of time. It helps creating a bond with them. In the meantime we learn about the Pandominion and the Ansurrection that are at war. The first is an organisation of at least a million Earths, populated by intelligent mammals, the second an even larger organisation of Earths, populated by self-aware machines. It soon becomes clear to the reader that this first book is steering towards bringing the three main characters together in order to fight those two organisations, or maybe to escape from them.
It takes a few chapters to get into the story. There is new technology that needs getting used to, there is a new society with its own customs, the Pandominion and the Ansurrection need to be introduced. It takes some time to get accustomed to everything, but Carey does a very good job guiding the reader through it, until the fog clears. By then, it is clear to the reader that Carey has created an interesting multiverse in which there is a lot to experience. The characters are well designed with a rich background. How they are, think and act makes sense and is supported by what they experience. Because each Earth is a different society, it is impossible to describe them all in depth. The author has selected a number of features that are important and builds a story around that. That's fine, although Ut's society differs too little from ours to be truly believable. There is no reason at all to suppose that the Uti have developed a society like us with cities, and families living in a house per family, with children sitting very neatly at school desks, etc. The author does explain that by stating that the Pandominion only allows new Earths that are socially and intellectually not too different from the already existing ones, but the difference could have been a bit more exotic. I was also not too fond of the concepts of et and ets, introduced to replace it and its for sentient machines. I found it annoying and unnecessary. But apart from that, everything was well structured and easily readable.
In an exciting third part, the characters that will matter come together. That is not a spoiler, because it is more or less announced at the start of the book by the -- then still mysterious -- narrator's voice. And, the author has stuffed enough twists into that final part to keep readers captivated and to surprise them. The grand finale leaves readers behind with more than enough to wonder and be curious about, and there is no doubt that many readers will be anticipating the sequel after having read Infinity Gate.
June 6, 2023
Ah goddamnit I did not want this to end in a cliff hanger!
I thoroughly enjoyed this story. M.R. Carey is a fine story teller, and a great writer. Insightful, humorous, sensitive to race, poverty and gender issues on the whole. Solid world building, great characters and a ton of action. As well as some very solid Von Neumann AI shenanigans. Overall a super solid story which sucked me right in form page one and left me raging in unsatisfied need more more as the ending hit me from left field.
I loved Lagos and teh alternative Lagos. Carey has a way of getting into a culture that was very satisfying. As an African I usually roll my eyes at how cultures on the continent are portrayed, and this one felt real.
It wasn't perfect, and there were some holes and glossed over generalities, but in general this was excellent. It also didn't suffer from insufferable characters like the Books of Koli did ( I couldn't even finish that despite the fascinating world building and story.)
DAMNIT The next book doesn't even have a name or date yet. AAAARRTRGGGGGG!
I thoroughly enjoyed this story. M.R. Carey is a fine story teller, and a great writer. Insightful, humorous, sensitive to race, poverty and gender issues on the whole. Solid world building, great characters and a ton of action. As well as some very solid Von Neumann AI shenanigans. Overall a super solid story which sucked me right in form page one and left me raging in unsatisfied need more more as the ending hit me from left field.
I loved Lagos and teh alternative Lagos. Carey has a way of getting into a culture that was very satisfying. As an African I usually roll my eyes at how cultures on the continent are portrayed, and this one felt real.
It wasn't perfect, and there were some holes and glossed over generalities, but in general this was excellent. It also didn't suffer from insufferable characters like the Books of Koli did ( I couldn't even finish that despite the fascinating world building and story.)
DAMNIT The next book doesn't even have a name or date yet. AAAARRTRGGGGGG!
March 8, 2024
This book started out with a futuristic, hard-sciency sort of feel.
But the plot twists became increasingly implausible. By the last third of the book, the story transformed into YA fantasy fiction. The science of "hologram paint pot" disguises was absurd to the point of being magical. Carey should have just said that the characters cast magic spells to disguise themselves and used witchcraft to jump from world to world.
I'm someone who loves scifi because of the imaginative plausibility of futuristic endeavors, especially when the author makes the reach believable. Infinity Gate started out this way, but it became sillier and sillier as the story moved on. I finished the book, but with a sense of exasperation.
But the plot twists became increasingly implausible. By the last third of the book, the story transformed into YA fantasy fiction. The science of "hologram paint pot" disguises was absurd to the point of being magical. Carey should have just said that the characters cast magic spells to disguise themselves and used witchcraft to jump from world to world.
I'm someone who loves scifi because of the imaginative plausibility of futuristic endeavors, especially when the author makes the reach believable. Infinity Gate started out this way, but it became sillier and sillier as the story moved on. I finished the book, but with a sense of exasperation.
February 26, 2023
I feel like if ‘multiverse� is mentioned anywhere on the cover I will want to read that book. Throw in some amazing characters with great development arcs and it’s like Christmas for me. There wasn’t a great deal of world building, which I actually prefer in my sci-fi books, and it’s more character and plot focussed.
I wish I hadn’t have read it so quickly because now I’m going to have to wait very impatiently for the next book in the series to see how the war pans out. I already know it’s going to be an epic series.
Thank you to Orbit UK for sending me a proof of this awesome book.
I wish I hadn’t have read it so quickly because now I’m going to have to wait very impatiently for the next book in the series to see how the war pans out. I already know it’s going to be an epic series.
Thank you to Orbit UK for sending me a proof of this awesome book.
September 1, 2024
М. Р. Кери определено обича апокалиптичните сюжети, но ако в Трилогията за Коли („Книгат� на Коли�, „Изпитаният� на Коли� и „Гибелт� на Коли�) и двата тома от серията „Гладните� („Момиченцет� с всички дарби� и „Момченцет� на моста�) опустошените светове бяха и декори на действието (в първия случай Голяма война, във втория � зомби пандемия), тук настъпващата Глобална криза (екологична, енергийна, катаклизми и пр.) беше просто въведение към мащабна и интересна фантастика.
Накратко, не издавам много (има си го в анотацията), главната героиня � физик, чиито търсения бяха в областта на тъмната енергия, случайно откри начин да прескача от една реалност в друга, реши да си бие камшика от вече доволно опосканата „нейна� Земя и така попада в полезрението на Пандоминиона � търговско-военна организация, поддържаща контрола върху милиони светове. Оказа се обаче, че не само "органичните същности" са развили могъща цивилизация, базирана на т.нар. "стъпкова технология", а Кери доволно поразсъждава върху все по-актуалната тема за изкуствения интелект и възможностите за неговото "одухотворяване" и самоосъзнаване. Краят на романа загатна, че ще има поне още една част.
Оформлението на томчето, винаги отбелязвам тоя факт, е разкошно; в редакционното каре съзрях името на добър мой познайник, Явор Цанев, което беше допълнителен плюс.
Накратко, не издавам много (има си го в анотацията), главната героиня � физик, чиито търсения бяха в областта на тъмната енергия, случайно откри начин да прескача от една реалност в друга, реши да си бие камшика от вече доволно опосканата „нейна� Земя и така попада в полезрението на Пандоминиона � търговско-военна организация, поддържаща контрола върху милиони светове. Оказа се обаче, че не само "органичните същности" са развили могъща цивилизация, базирана на т.нар. "стъпкова технология", а Кери доволно поразсъждава върху все по-актуалната тема за изкуствения интелект и възможностите за неговото "одухотворяване" и самоосъзнаване. Краят на романа загатна, че ще има поне още една част.
Оформлението на томчето, винаги отбелязвам тоя факт, е разкошно; в редакционното каре съзрях името на добър мой познайник, Явор Цанев, което беше допълнителен плюс.
January 4, 2024
This book started out quite interesting ... and grew less-so as it moved along. I probably won't read the next in sequence - read on to see why (not).
Infinity Gate is a classic Sci-Fi book in the usual ways; it posits some interesting environments where the characters live that aren't currently available to us. It then puts characters like us - and others not-so-much like us - in those environments, and stirs the pot.
Often this "interesting environment" is outer space - that 3-dimensional world off of the Earth. Not this book; instead, the book asks us to use the concept of the (quantum-derived) multiverse to believe there is (effectively) a massive number of universes, all of which arise from various moments when a universe splits into two as a result of a decision, or change, that causes one universe to follow one path of development based on that choice, and another that follows the other choice. This isn't necessarily new; see the film Sliding Doors, some Doctor Who episodes, and more.
But in this book, travel between them becomes possible, repeatedly, controllably. And the story revolves around the experiences of the characters that do so. This turns out to be well-done in the early part of the book. The discovery of the transport method, the early exploration across universes, the different ways Earth has developed - all very interesting stuff.
Then, some of the "beings" (in the broad sense of the word) encountered by travelers also start to feature large. And these are inventive explorations; interesting ideas in what "might have developed" over the same Earth time but in massively different paths through that time.
And as is likely to be the case in this kind of story, artificial intelligences feature large. They must, for something needs to assist in making all the above happen smoothly. Since I'm trying to minimize spoilers I won't belabor what the contribution of the AIs are to the story; read & find out.
However, after about half of the book, the novel ideas are all out on the table, and from here, the story becomes a fairly standard action book - who is running from whom, the plotting of various heroic deeds, or escapes, etc. And this section of the book? Well, it becomes ... long. And then keeps the story going. Probably. A. Bit. Too. Long. (IMO).
So, I finally tired of all the escaping, and the running, and the fighting, and all the action stuff that could / should have been edited down. I ended up powering-through the last 1/3 of the book.
And finally, I've grown to greatly dislike books that intentionally set themselves up for a multi-book series by not completing an entire story in a single book - instead making one book merely a cliffhanger for the next book. I now hate this, and down-score a book at least one full point if it does this.
There are plenty of examples of how to build multi-book empires that do NOT do this. Consider Iain M. Banks' Culture series. Each book was a full story; yet, each was set in the Culture universe, with consistent technologies, conflicts, and ideas. Or, the Murderbot series by Martha Wells. The Murderbot and a few other characters, ships, and ideas are preserved; but the stories in each book are unique, and completed in each book.
Please, authors, don't do the 500-page cliffhanger. If I hear in advance that you're doing this, I will not read your first book; if I do inadvertently read it, I'm marking you down. Time for the industry to change.
3.25 stars based on the following rating scale:
Five stars is when you read a book to the end, put it down, take a deep breath, pick it up and start reading it all over again - or you would if you weren't so anxious to read the next book in a multi-book series. Or, it's simply really good.
Four stars is when you tell yourself : ”This is good, this is well-written, this is full of interesting ideas/characters/plot points�, but you know you will never read it again.
Three stars is when you read it to the end, put it down and proceed to forget all about it in the next instant.
Two stars when it's so bad that it makes you laugh, or sigh, and want to write a review, but you can't remember the name of the book or dislike it so much that you don't.
One star when you can't read past chapter 3, even as penance for your sins.
One star demerit if you write a long book that is obviously a cliffhanger setup to make you read a subsequent book to "finish" the story the first book sets up.
Disclosure: I received an advance copy of this book at no cost. I commit to you, reader, not to let "free" generate a falsely-positive review.
Infinity Gate is a classic Sci-Fi book in the usual ways; it posits some interesting environments where the characters live that aren't currently available to us. It then puts characters like us - and others not-so-much like us - in those environments, and stirs the pot.
Often this "interesting environment" is outer space - that 3-dimensional world off of the Earth. Not this book; instead, the book asks us to use the concept of the (quantum-derived) multiverse to believe there is (effectively) a massive number of universes, all of which arise from various moments when a universe splits into two as a result of a decision, or change, that causes one universe to follow one path of development based on that choice, and another that follows the other choice. This isn't necessarily new; see the film Sliding Doors, some Doctor Who episodes, and more.
But in this book, travel between them becomes possible, repeatedly, controllably. And the story revolves around the experiences of the characters that do so. This turns out to be well-done in the early part of the book. The discovery of the transport method, the early exploration across universes, the different ways Earth has developed - all very interesting stuff.
Then, some of the "beings" (in the broad sense of the word) encountered by travelers also start to feature large. And these are inventive explorations; interesting ideas in what "might have developed" over the same Earth time but in massively different paths through that time.
And as is likely to be the case in this kind of story, artificial intelligences feature large. They must, for something needs to assist in making all the above happen smoothly. Since I'm trying to minimize spoilers I won't belabor what the contribution of the AIs are to the story; read & find out.
However, after about half of the book, the novel ideas are all out on the table, and from here, the story becomes a fairly standard action book - who is running from whom, the plotting of various heroic deeds, or escapes, etc. And this section of the book? Well, it becomes ... long. And then keeps the story going. Probably. A. Bit. Too. Long. (IMO).
So, I finally tired of all the escaping, and the running, and the fighting, and all the action stuff that could / should have been edited down. I ended up powering-through the last 1/3 of the book.
And finally, I've grown to greatly dislike books that intentionally set themselves up for a multi-book series by not completing an entire story in a single book - instead making one book merely a cliffhanger for the next book. I now hate this, and down-score a book at least one full point if it does this.
There are plenty of examples of how to build multi-book empires that do NOT do this. Consider Iain M. Banks' Culture series. Each book was a full story; yet, each was set in the Culture universe, with consistent technologies, conflicts, and ideas. Or, the Murderbot series by Martha Wells. The Murderbot and a few other characters, ships, and ideas are preserved; but the stories in each book are unique, and completed in each book.
Please, authors, don't do the 500-page cliffhanger. If I hear in advance that you're doing this, I will not read your first book; if I do inadvertently read it, I'm marking you down. Time for the industry to change.
3.25 stars based on the following rating scale:
Five stars is when you read a book to the end, put it down, take a deep breath, pick it up and start reading it all over again - or you would if you weren't so anxious to read the next book in a multi-book series. Or, it's simply really good.
Four stars is when you tell yourself : ”This is good, this is well-written, this is full of interesting ideas/characters/plot points�, but you know you will never read it again.
Three stars is when you read it to the end, put it down and proceed to forget all about it in the next instant.
Two stars when it's so bad that it makes you laugh, or sigh, and want to write a review, but you can't remember the name of the book or dislike it so much that you don't.
One star when you can't read past chapter 3, even as penance for your sins.
One star demerit if you write a long book that is obviously a cliffhanger setup to make you read a subsequent book to "finish" the story the first book sets up.
Disclosure: I received an advance copy of this book at no cost. I commit to you, reader, not to let "free" generate a falsely-positive review.
October 28, 2023
Mike Carey is a writer I have been a fan of since long before he was writing novels. His run on Hellblazer made me a fan instantly. Under his own name, he wrote a series of novels about an exorcist named Felix Castor. I have read three of those books, and they are good but at the time I kinda felt he was a better comics writer. That said he was good enough that when I saw The Girl with All The Gifts under the name M.R. Carey I checked it out and when realized it was the same author I read it instantly. I was glad I did because I felt That Mike Carey reached a new level.
The Girl with All the Gifts is what I would call an instant classic. It took a tired zombie genre and in injected new life with a high-concept premise and unique point of view for the narrative. I was not alone as this novel was written under a pen name (OK just M.R. instead of Mike Carey) as it became a huge hit, and the author was even asked to adapt it into a pretty solid movie starring Glen Close.
That is when M.R. Carey became the brand and a series of really good novels followed. Crossing science fiction, thrillers, and horror, the only thing that really unites the M.R. Carey books (let's just say MRC now) are high concepts. They work to various degrees and The Girl With All the Gifts is an example of the concepts working. MRC takes massive and daring swings. This book Infinity Gate might be the most massive of swings.
Books that take high-concept risks are some of my favorite works of Science Fiction but authors who take risks sometimes write books that don't work. For example, the last MRC book I read was the first book of the Rampart Trilogy the Book of Koli. The big swing in that book included a gimmick in the prose that didn’t work for me and I struggled even to finish that book while respecting the concept. I think readers who are not writers might not nitpick the nuts and bolts of the prose, but I just couldn't vibe with that book. Still, I respected the effort and the past work of MRC was strong enough that I jumped on Infinity Gate as soon as I could, I didn’t even read the back cover. I knew it involved the multi-verse from the tagline on the cover.
If you trust my reviews and want to go in cold let me start by saying this is one of my top reads of the year, and I think MRC’s biggest swing has led to him hit hitting the ball into the parking lot. For those who don’t like basketball analogies � it is great. As strange and out there as a novel can be and providing a new universe and experience that is bold as hell. It operates on so many levels in 500 pages that it has more themes and story potential than entire Science Fiction franchises.
The most impressive thing is making a story about the multiverse bold and original. Considering the massive success of Everything, Everywhere All at Once, Spider-Verse, Star Trek, and Marvel all doing stories about multiple dimensions. I am not going to spoil plot twists or final acts but this is your last chance to avoid the basics of this masterpiece. Hyperbole? I know what the hell I am saying. I offered how skeptical I was of MRC’s last series to avoid any accusations of Hyperbolic fan-boying crap. That said in all the right ways I am jealous of this amazingly insane science fiction novel that creates a universe as vast as Dune while commenting on Climate Change, the Socio-political effects of militarism and colonialism, Artificial intelligence, Quantum Physics, Multiple Worlds theory, and the ethics of biological and technological created life.
It is a lot. That is one reason this book is a magic trick.
Reading the book without the back cover, or any knowledge worked well as the first act, set up the mystery well, a scientist Hadiz Tambuwal in Legos Nigeria is desperate for a solution for the dying earth. Working with an AI she creates a device that will send her to another earth. She finds one that is unspoiled. She has a decision, use it as an escape, or become rich and exploit this other Earth the same as the one she is escaping. She starts to travel to many universes and that puts her on the radar of a more powerful force.
What happens to Hadiz feels shocking and she drops out of the book handing off the Point of view to mostly to Essien Nkanika who is an escort working the streets of an alternate Nigeria When Hadiz meets him. There are other shifting POVS so it is pretty seamless when Essien is drafted into the multiverse military force that he hands the story over to the next character, and this happens a few times in the book it is earned.
Infinity Gate is a long book with several major characters including some of the different species on Earths with different evolutions. You see Hadiz learns that the multi-verse she just learned to travel has trillions of earths, each one different. Some evolved similarly, some radically different. In the first act, it would be easy to see this as the story of Hadiz, and it is. That said through a series of set-ups and pay-offs new characters enter the fray.
We should not overlook the most impressive thing that MRC is doing. What force did Hadiz wake up?
“What can be said of the Pandominion that hasn’t been said already? It was an empire that governed trillions of selves on hundreds of thousands of worlds, yet all of them the same world � your world � your world as well as mine, the earth, in different causality and in different continua.�
One of the things that makes a Dune, Thrones Trek, or Wars franchise so vast and effective is the scope. MRC by creating this multiverse model and with the Pandominion MRC has created a galaxy. For this novel and his characters to encounter his version of Klingons, Borg, or The Empire his characters never have to leave Earth. He can build a thousand worlds and species all on earth.
It is an absolute narrative magic trick to develop a universe in 500 pages that feels as lived in as any franchise with decades of world-building. MRC does this by shifting point of view between characters that include People, AI, Collective machine armies, humanoid rabbits, and cats who evolved on other earths.
Consider this scene shortly after Essien is drafted into the Pandominion military. This is such smart writing. Essien is a fish out of water, he is as new to this vast multiverse as we are...
“Men and women� was a broad term. They were roughly human in terms of body plan, but like Watchmaster Venmmet and Moon Sostenti, they were surprising in other ways. Many were furred, a few scaly or feathered.�
These characters like Paz (the rabbit) add to the odd and offbeat feeling of Infinity Gate. In this way MRC comments on how species develop and cultures themselves. Early in MRC’s novels (it is my memory and I could be wrong) he stuck to the first person in the Felix Castor books, and as incredible as Girl With All the Gifts was constantly slipped into present tense (that is on the editor in my opinion). Infinity Gate not only handles switching the narrative POVs but it makes the universe feel more epic because they feel like different books in those moments.
“Sentients on every world have this moment when they think intelligence is what separates them from the rest of creation. It takes them a lot longer to figure out that they’re arguing from the very heart of survivor bias, and therefore underestimating the importance of blind, brute chance.�
One of the things that really drives the book is the sense that the multi-verse itself is in danger. Once Step technology comes to a version of Earth they become part of a larger conflict. I wonder if the stakes will be clear for some readers, but once Hadiz steps into another universe she is seen as a risk to many, many worlds.
“But the Pandominion wasn’t made overnight, and it didn’t come without a cost. The first few parallel worlds that learned how to Step wounded and wasted each other in endless, unwinnable wars- Wars that were nothing but onslaught, since stepping made every square foot of ground a battlefront � until they finally came to see that infinity made war obsolete.�
One of my problems with the Garth Edwards SF movie The Creator was that the narrative needed less black and White in the characters. That movie suffered from having clear heroes and villains. Infinity Gate has a few clear protagonists but the sides of the conflict get blurry all the time. Shades of grey as it were.
The unvisited worlds and concepts like people saying "Selves" instead of people are little examples of things the reader needs to adjust to. Some of the "Rules" of this universe...excuse me Multiverse are like silly-putty. Not as bad as JJ Abrams having people beam across the quadrant in Star Trek Into Darkness, but remember in a multiverse story this is a feature, not a bug.
Without going into the concepts of the third act that nicely set up more books in this universe the Pandominion gets a rival to supremacy across the universes. The Pandominion is a complicated democracy, not exactly ideal, so when the Annsecrection the antagonist develops the battle lines are as complicated as they are in our world.
Infinity Gate might be the best read I have had this year, in a year filled with super great reads just in modern SF alone. The Mountain in the Sea by Ray Nayler, The Terraformers by Analee Newitz, Meru by SB Diviya, and Suborbital7 by John Shirley. Heck of a year. I think only one of those might be better in my mind.
The Girl with All the Gifts is what I would call an instant classic. It took a tired zombie genre and in injected new life with a high-concept premise and unique point of view for the narrative. I was not alone as this novel was written under a pen name (OK just M.R. instead of Mike Carey) as it became a huge hit, and the author was even asked to adapt it into a pretty solid movie starring Glen Close.
That is when M.R. Carey became the brand and a series of really good novels followed. Crossing science fiction, thrillers, and horror, the only thing that really unites the M.R. Carey books (let's just say MRC now) are high concepts. They work to various degrees and The Girl With All the Gifts is an example of the concepts working. MRC takes massive and daring swings. This book Infinity Gate might be the most massive of swings.
Books that take high-concept risks are some of my favorite works of Science Fiction but authors who take risks sometimes write books that don't work. For example, the last MRC book I read was the first book of the Rampart Trilogy the Book of Koli. The big swing in that book included a gimmick in the prose that didn’t work for me and I struggled even to finish that book while respecting the concept. I think readers who are not writers might not nitpick the nuts and bolts of the prose, but I just couldn't vibe with that book. Still, I respected the effort and the past work of MRC was strong enough that I jumped on Infinity Gate as soon as I could, I didn’t even read the back cover. I knew it involved the multi-verse from the tagline on the cover.
If you trust my reviews and want to go in cold let me start by saying this is one of my top reads of the year, and I think MRC’s biggest swing has led to him hit hitting the ball into the parking lot. For those who don’t like basketball analogies � it is great. As strange and out there as a novel can be and providing a new universe and experience that is bold as hell. It operates on so many levels in 500 pages that it has more themes and story potential than entire Science Fiction franchises.
The most impressive thing is making a story about the multiverse bold and original. Considering the massive success of Everything, Everywhere All at Once, Spider-Verse, Star Trek, and Marvel all doing stories about multiple dimensions. I am not going to spoil plot twists or final acts but this is your last chance to avoid the basics of this masterpiece. Hyperbole? I know what the hell I am saying. I offered how skeptical I was of MRC’s last series to avoid any accusations of Hyperbolic fan-boying crap. That said in all the right ways I am jealous of this amazingly insane science fiction novel that creates a universe as vast as Dune while commenting on Climate Change, the Socio-political effects of militarism and colonialism, Artificial intelligence, Quantum Physics, Multiple Worlds theory, and the ethics of biological and technological created life.
It is a lot. That is one reason this book is a magic trick.
Reading the book without the back cover, or any knowledge worked well as the first act, set up the mystery well, a scientist Hadiz Tambuwal in Legos Nigeria is desperate for a solution for the dying earth. Working with an AI she creates a device that will send her to another earth. She finds one that is unspoiled. She has a decision, use it as an escape, or become rich and exploit this other Earth the same as the one she is escaping. She starts to travel to many universes and that puts her on the radar of a more powerful force.
What happens to Hadiz feels shocking and she drops out of the book handing off the Point of view to mostly to Essien Nkanika who is an escort working the streets of an alternate Nigeria When Hadiz meets him. There are other shifting POVS so it is pretty seamless when Essien is drafted into the multiverse military force that he hands the story over to the next character, and this happens a few times in the book it is earned.
Infinity Gate is a long book with several major characters including some of the different species on Earths with different evolutions. You see Hadiz learns that the multi-verse she just learned to travel has trillions of earths, each one different. Some evolved similarly, some radically different. In the first act, it would be easy to see this as the story of Hadiz, and it is. That said through a series of set-ups and pay-offs new characters enter the fray.
We should not overlook the most impressive thing that MRC is doing. What force did Hadiz wake up?
“What can be said of the Pandominion that hasn’t been said already? It was an empire that governed trillions of selves on hundreds of thousands of worlds, yet all of them the same world � your world � your world as well as mine, the earth, in different causality and in different continua.�
One of the things that makes a Dune, Thrones Trek, or Wars franchise so vast and effective is the scope. MRC by creating this multiverse model and with the Pandominion MRC has created a galaxy. For this novel and his characters to encounter his version of Klingons, Borg, or The Empire his characters never have to leave Earth. He can build a thousand worlds and species all on earth.
It is an absolute narrative magic trick to develop a universe in 500 pages that feels as lived in as any franchise with decades of world-building. MRC does this by shifting point of view between characters that include People, AI, Collective machine armies, humanoid rabbits, and cats who evolved on other earths.
Consider this scene shortly after Essien is drafted into the Pandominion military. This is such smart writing. Essien is a fish out of water, he is as new to this vast multiverse as we are...
“Men and women� was a broad term. They were roughly human in terms of body plan, but like Watchmaster Venmmet and Moon Sostenti, they were surprising in other ways. Many were furred, a few scaly or feathered.�
These characters like Paz (the rabbit) add to the odd and offbeat feeling of Infinity Gate. In this way MRC comments on how species develop and cultures themselves. Early in MRC’s novels (it is my memory and I could be wrong) he stuck to the first person in the Felix Castor books, and as incredible as Girl With All the Gifts was constantly slipped into present tense (that is on the editor in my opinion). Infinity Gate not only handles switching the narrative POVs but it makes the universe feel more epic because they feel like different books in those moments.
“Sentients on every world have this moment when they think intelligence is what separates them from the rest of creation. It takes them a lot longer to figure out that they’re arguing from the very heart of survivor bias, and therefore underestimating the importance of blind, brute chance.�
One of the things that really drives the book is the sense that the multi-verse itself is in danger. Once Step technology comes to a version of Earth they become part of a larger conflict. I wonder if the stakes will be clear for some readers, but once Hadiz steps into another universe she is seen as a risk to many, many worlds.
“But the Pandominion wasn’t made overnight, and it didn’t come without a cost. The first few parallel worlds that learned how to Step wounded and wasted each other in endless, unwinnable wars- Wars that were nothing but onslaught, since stepping made every square foot of ground a battlefront � until they finally came to see that infinity made war obsolete.�
One of my problems with the Garth Edwards SF movie The Creator was that the narrative needed less black and White in the characters. That movie suffered from having clear heroes and villains. Infinity Gate has a few clear protagonists but the sides of the conflict get blurry all the time. Shades of grey as it were.
The unvisited worlds and concepts like people saying "Selves" instead of people are little examples of things the reader needs to adjust to. Some of the "Rules" of this universe...excuse me Multiverse are like silly-putty. Not as bad as JJ Abrams having people beam across the quadrant in Star Trek Into Darkness, but remember in a multiverse story this is a feature, not a bug.
Without going into the concepts of the third act that nicely set up more books in this universe the Pandominion gets a rival to supremacy across the universes. The Pandominion is a complicated democracy, not exactly ideal, so when the Annsecrection the antagonist develops the battle lines are as complicated as they are in our world.
Infinity Gate might be the best read I have had this year, in a year filled with super great reads just in modern SF alone. The Mountain in the Sea by Ray Nayler, The Terraformers by Analee Newitz, Meru by SB Diviya, and Suborbital7 by John Shirley. Heck of a year. I think only one of those might be better in my mind.
March 16, 2023
To start things out: the Pandominion is a Federation-esque multiverse-spanning body consisting of a million-ish alternate versions of Earth. The obvious advantage of being able to hop at will around an infinite number of alternate Earths is a complete lack of scarcity; there’s always a nice, uninhabited version of Earth ready to supply whatever resources you need. The Pandominion has recently encountered the Machine Hegemony, an organization of similar scale comprising a single, distributed artificial intelligence. As the Pandominion is in general rather paranoid about AIs (though they rely on them heavily) conflict was pretty much inevitable.
The book is divided into roughly three sections. The first is centered on a physicist from our Earth, who discovers the technology to jump between multiverses too late to prevent humanity from tearing itself apart in resource wars. The second is centered on a guy who grew up in the slums of a parallel Lagos, one very similar to our own. The third is centered on a girl from the Pandominion who gets caught up (for, to be fair, very good reasons even if not her fault) in the fear and paranoia of the war with the machines.
The big theme of the books seems to be centered on who gets to be considered a person. The Pandominion is very clear in their opinion. They’re very accepting of different sapient species. (The guy from Lagos, Essien, his first encounter with a citizen of the Pandominion, who happens to have evolved from a cat-like species, is revealing. He blurts out “What are you?� to which the response is “Well, that’s fucking rude. A self is what I am, the same as you, but with better manners.�) AIs, though, aren’t people, and can’t really think anyway: they can just mimic it. They can even be made to *think* that they think, but they’re still just machines.
The first section, as the physicist (Hadiz) realizes what she’s discovered, is good if rather bleak. The second section, Essien’s, I honestly felt dragged. Essien has been dealt a pretty shitty hand at life, growing up as he does in the slums of Lagos, but he responds to the injustices he experiences by being, bluntly, a selfish prick. I kept thinking that Carey’s editor dropped the ball here, and should have pushed to cut a few chapters that just felt unnecessary. The third section, featuring Topaz Tourmaline FiveHills (generally known as Paz, who happens to be descended from a rabbit-like species) is our chief “insider’s� view of the Pandominion, and I was enjoying it quite a lot. Then shit hits the fan, and Paz finds herself on the run in yet another alternate version of Lagos, and I again found myself thinking this sequence wasn’t necessary and should have been cut.
Credit where credit is due, though: I was wrong. Carey knew where he was going with this, and everything came full circle for the climax. So if anyone else shares my feeling that things are starting slow, please accept my assurance that it’s going somewhere worthwhile.
There’s also a low-key mystery spread throughout the books: we don’t know who exactly is telling the story. It’s clear that whoever the narrator is, they’re an AI, but other than that, I have no idea. It reminds me of Jemisin’s Broken Earth in this regard.
I’ve been a Mike Carey fanboy for a good long time now, and I’m happy to say that this book hasn’t changed that in the slightest.
Comes out March 28.
The book is divided into roughly three sections. The first is centered on a physicist from our Earth, who discovers the technology to jump between multiverses too late to prevent humanity from tearing itself apart in resource wars. The second is centered on a guy who grew up in the slums of a parallel Lagos, one very similar to our own. The third is centered on a girl from the Pandominion who gets caught up (for, to be fair, very good reasons even if not her fault) in the fear and paranoia of the war with the machines.
The big theme of the books seems to be centered on who gets to be considered a person. The Pandominion is very clear in their opinion. They’re very accepting of different sapient species. (The guy from Lagos, Essien, his first encounter with a citizen of the Pandominion, who happens to have evolved from a cat-like species, is revealing. He blurts out “What are you?� to which the response is “Well, that’s fucking rude. A self is what I am, the same as you, but with better manners.�) AIs, though, aren’t people, and can’t really think anyway: they can just mimic it. They can even be made to *think* that they think, but they’re still just machines.
The first section, as the physicist (Hadiz) realizes what she’s discovered, is good if rather bleak. The second section, Essien’s, I honestly felt dragged. Essien has been dealt a pretty shitty hand at life, growing up as he does in the slums of Lagos, but he responds to the injustices he experiences by being, bluntly, a selfish prick. I kept thinking that Carey’s editor dropped the ball here, and should have pushed to cut a few chapters that just felt unnecessary. The third section, featuring Topaz Tourmaline FiveHills (generally known as Paz, who happens to be descended from a rabbit-like species) is our chief “insider’s� view of the Pandominion, and I was enjoying it quite a lot. Then shit hits the fan, and Paz finds herself on the run in yet another alternate version of Lagos, and I again found myself thinking this sequence wasn’t necessary and should have been cut.
Credit where credit is due, though: I was wrong. Carey knew where he was going with this, and everything came full circle for the climax. So if anyone else shares my feeling that things are starting slow, please accept my assurance that it’s going somewhere worthwhile.
There’s also a low-key mystery spread throughout the books: we don’t know who exactly is telling the story. It’s clear that whoever the narrator is, they’re an AI, but other than that, I have no idea. It reminds me of Jemisin’s Broken Earth in this regard.
I’ve been a Mike Carey fanboy for a good long time now, and I’m happy to say that this book hasn’t changed that in the slightest.
Comes out March 28.
November 14, 2024
Well then.� Rupshe’s tone was as bland now as unsweetened oatmeal. “I would probably have paid less attention to the packaging and more to the contents.�
Like fair enough, but this quote irked me when it first appeared (near the beginning of the book), and then the narrator remarked how influential this became in the world, for like all time. And then, in the 500 or so pages, there are so many instances where the characters' bodies take over for them or their minds are so overwhelmed that they rely on their bodies and instinct to get out of tough scrapes. And isn't that the packaging mattering and saving the day? The quote annoyed me in the context of talking about AI stuff because the book shows over and over how our bodies do matter. I read a piece of news this week about how there are actually memories stored in other cells in the body that are not the brain or memory centers. Which is to say, this is just one of the things that feels incongruous here. The whole AI madness and scanning our brains and whatnot bothers me because it creates once again this hierarchy between intellect, feelings and bodies. Just doesn't ring right, but okay!
Moving on from my issues, I was quite into this in the beginning - the book was doing a lot of great and interesting character work and I was for sure appreciating that. And then it got action-y and boring and it was changing POV characters quite a lot and describing militaristic stuff way to much to keep *me* engaged (I'm sure some other people would appreciate it for those things). But when we got to a place where you spend pages explaining why a rabbit-like creature would run to survive... That's when I got suuuuper frustrated. Why even use a rabbit if not for shorthand, for evoking (voking, haha) something in my head that would make the whole running bit superfluous? And a lot of other stuff was over-explained too.
This was a case of excellent worldbuilding but way too much of it. Was waiting for the kitchen sink to drop in at any time. Did not need like half of the moments in there to tell me how fascistic the Pandominium is. And what's worse is that even if I cared about some of the characters, they would just disappear for hundreds of pages and when they re-emerged, I was like: whatever.
The AI things and the multiverse things felt very much like: been there, read that.
The ending almost made me feel something, but this does have the feel of half a book. The reveal that happens at 95% is treated as a massive reveal, but it had been so obvious to me for at least 50% of the book, if not more. The foreshadowing felt super thick. Sadly (for me), I'm intrigued enough to read 500 more pages of this and see how it all wraps up. Since this was basically half of a story, anyway.
Like fair enough, but this quote irked me when it first appeared (near the beginning of the book), and then the narrator remarked how influential this became in the world, for like all time. And then, in the 500 or so pages, there are so many instances where the characters' bodies take over for them or their minds are so overwhelmed that they rely on their bodies and instinct to get out of tough scrapes. And isn't that the packaging mattering and saving the day? The quote annoyed me in the context of talking about AI stuff because the book shows over and over how our bodies do matter. I read a piece of news this week about how there are actually memories stored in other cells in the body that are not the brain or memory centers. Which is to say, this is just one of the things that feels incongruous here. The whole AI madness and scanning our brains and whatnot bothers me because it creates once again this hierarchy between intellect, feelings and bodies. Just doesn't ring right, but okay!
Moving on from my issues, I was quite into this in the beginning - the book was doing a lot of great and interesting character work and I was for sure appreciating that. And then it got action-y and boring and it was changing POV characters quite a lot and describing militaristic stuff way to much to keep *me* engaged (I'm sure some other people would appreciate it for those things). But when we got to a place where you spend pages explaining why a rabbit-like creature would run to survive... That's when I got suuuuper frustrated. Why even use a rabbit if not for shorthand, for evoking (voking, haha) something in my head that would make the whole running bit superfluous? And a lot of other stuff was over-explained too.
This was a case of excellent worldbuilding but way too much of it. Was waiting for the kitchen sink to drop in at any time. Did not need like half of the moments in there to tell me how fascistic the Pandominium is. And what's worse is that even if I cared about some of the characters, they would just disappear for hundreds of pages and when they re-emerged, I was like: whatever.
The AI things and the multiverse things felt very much like: been there, read that.
The ending almost made me feel something, but this does have the feel of half a book. The reveal that happens at 95% is treated as a massive reveal, but it had been so obvious to me for at least 50% of the book, if not more. The foreshadowing felt super thick. Sadly (for me), I'm intrigued enough to read 500 more pages of this and see how it all wraps up. Since this was basically half of a story, anyway.
February 8, 2025
Here's the published review that led me to read the book. Amal El-Mohtar liked it a lot:
Excerpt: "an immense achievement, an impeccably crafted book without a single word out of place, which manages to make several well-worn science-fictional concepts � the lone scientist trying to save the world; the multiverse; the war between organic life and machines � feel fresh and tender and unprecedented."
Catch-up time, for a number of books I've read recently, and found to be interesting but flawed. This one, by a new-to me writer, has a lot going for it. But it's just too violent and nihilistic for me to rate it above 3 stars. I don't regret reading it (much). I don't expect to continue on to the next. Caveat lector.
All I can do here is report my personal reactions to books. Do note that the current average reader rating here (as of 2/7/25) is 4.15.
Excerpt: "an immense achievement, an impeccably crafted book without a single word out of place, which manages to make several well-worn science-fictional concepts � the lone scientist trying to save the world; the multiverse; the war between organic life and machines � feel fresh and tender and unprecedented."
Catch-up time, for a number of books I've read recently, and found to be interesting but flawed. This one, by a new-to me writer, has a lot going for it. But it's just too violent and nihilistic for me to rate it above 3 stars. I don't regret reading it (much). I don't expect to continue on to the next. Caveat lector.
All I can do here is report my personal reactions to books. Do note that the current average reader rating here (as of 2/7/25) is 4.15.
July 3, 2023
I managed to get to 80% but gave up. I couldn't figure out why it wasn’t engaging to start with, maybe because it start with one character then kills her, starts with another then fridges him, then starts another? It looses all momentum. As I read further, it introduces the multiverse war on the cover, briefly, but it is uninteresting, nothing innovative or different is done with the multiverse, it is just so much more land. Finally I realised in the end that the stories of the characters have so little to do with the big picture, they are almost disconnected. There is a galactic size war happening around them and they have almost no involvement. Maybe they tie together in the last 20% but by then it is too late.
June 11, 2023
3.5 stars
March 20, 2023
The nitty-gritty: Epic in scope but intimate in characterization, Infinity Gate introduces a fascinating multiverse with a high stakes plot, plenty of twists and relentless pacing.
M.R. Carey won my heart years ago when I read The Girl With All the Gifts, and since then his stories have never failed to impress me. And Infinity Gate, the first in his Pandominion series, is no exception. This is a big, sprawling sci-fi adventure where there are many, many versions of Earth—in fact, there are infinite Earths, as suggested by the title. But as large and vast as the world is, this is also a character focused story. Bottom line: I was extremely impressed with everything about this novel.
The story revolves around three main characters (and a host of other side characters as well), all who live on different iterations of Earth, specifically in Lagos, Nigeria. Hadiz Tambuwal is a scientist whose city is crumbling. Her Lagos is besieged by city wide blackouts, earthquakes and food shortages. People are leaving in droves, but Hadiz decides to stay, holing up in the lab where she works. One day while performing an experiment using quantum physics, she inadvertently discovers the multiverse. With the help of an AI called Rupshe, Hadiz eventually gathers more information about these other worlds by using drones. And when conditions in the city worsen, she realizes her discovery can help her escape to a better world.
At the same time, we learn about a group of worlds called the Pandominion, a collective who have been using Step technology—the process of moving between universes—for a long time. Supported by a military faction called the Cielo and an AI called the Registry, the Pandominion monitors and controls all Step activity. One day, the Registry picks up some strange anomalies which turn out to be unauthorized Stepping and a possible enemy infiltration. Watchmaster Vemmet is tasked with finding and stopping the threat, but during the course of his assignment, he discovers something even bigger, a coalition of machine worlds called the Ansurrection who seem focused on wiping out the Pandominion.
Next we meet Essien Nkanika, who lives in yet another version of Lagos, a downtrodden man who grew up in poverty and slavery and hasn’t been able to escape his fate. That is until he meets an enigmatic woman in a bar who shows him something amazing and changes his life forever.
Finally, on a Pandominion world called Ut (yes, another Lagos!) we’re introduced to a race of sentient rabbits, a peaceful world where the average life expectancy is one hundred fifty years old and adulthood doesn’t start until you turn thirty. Topaz Tourmaline FiveHills is a nineteen-year-old schoolgirl who has just made a new friend, a transfer student named Dulcimer Coronal. Paz and Dulcie are inseparable, that is until the war against the Ansurrection suddenly lands on their doorstep.
All these characters converge in the most unexpected ways, as Carey’s story builds to a frenzied climax.
As you can tell, the story is rather complex and has lots of moving parts. In a less capable author’s hands, it probably wouldn't have worked, but Carey knows exactly what’s he’s doing and never loses control of his plot. In some ways it reminded me of Star Trek: The Next Generation, where you have many different worlds, all at various stages of development. Some worlds are unaware that there’s a whole multiverse out there, only a “step� away from their own world, while others closely guard and control this technology. When you add in the terrifying idea of a group of machine worlds with the ability to decimate their enemies, you have the age old science fiction conflict between man and machine, but this one feels unique because of the characters and their relationships to each other.
Speaking of which, the characters are all interesting and wonderfully fleshed out. Carey takes his time introducing each one, giving each one plenty of space so the reader becomes invested on an emotional level. Hadiz fascinated me, with her combination of intelligence and wry humor. She thinks her discovery can help save the world, so rather than be motivated by greed, she truly wants to make life better for her people.
My heart went out to Essien, whose tragic backstory is described in unflinching detail. Even Vemmet, who finds himself in trouble when the importance of Hadiz’s experiments escape his notice, manages to figure out how to survive when he’s transferred to an unforgiving world as punishment.
But my favorite character was Paz, the rabbit girl with heart who is unwittingly thrust into the middle of a war. Paz just wants to go to school and hang out with her new friend Dulcie, but unfortunately circumstances won’t allow that to happen. I loved that Carey included some wonderful AI side characters, like Paz’s anima Tricity (sort of like our cell phones except anima are shaped like various animals and have the ability to communicate with their owners) and Rupshe, Hadiz’s AI friend who is mostly behind the scenes in this story but ultimately plays a big role in its outcome. If you’ve read The Book of Koli, you’ll know who Monono Aware is, and I couldn’t help but see some similarities between Monono and one AI in particular (which I can’t really tell you about because of spoilers).
I also loved the way some of the worlds are slightly “off� from ours (for example in one world, George Lucas’s popular series is called Space Empire instead of Star Wars). I was horrified by the descriptions of how citizens become soldiers in the Cielo, with painful body modifications to make them stronger and more resistant to enemy attacks.
And of course there are plenty of surprises in store. Carey throws in some shocking twists, and there’s also the mystery of the Ansurrection. No one really understands them or their motivations, or even who built them. No doubt these questions will be answered at some point in the series, and I cannot wait to see how Carey pulls everything together.
The last hundred pages are full of tense action, chase scenes, dangerous escapes and more as the characters come together for a final confrontation. The entire story is framed by short chapters from a mystery narrator, and I’m still not sure who it is (although I have my suspicions). The ending leaves the reader hanging only in the sense that there are still many unanswered questions. I can hardly wait to see what happens next!
Big thanks to the publisher for providing a review copy.
M.R. Carey won my heart years ago when I read The Girl With All the Gifts, and since then his stories have never failed to impress me. And Infinity Gate, the first in his Pandominion series, is no exception. This is a big, sprawling sci-fi adventure where there are many, many versions of Earth—in fact, there are infinite Earths, as suggested by the title. But as large and vast as the world is, this is also a character focused story. Bottom line: I was extremely impressed with everything about this novel.
The story revolves around three main characters (and a host of other side characters as well), all who live on different iterations of Earth, specifically in Lagos, Nigeria. Hadiz Tambuwal is a scientist whose city is crumbling. Her Lagos is besieged by city wide blackouts, earthquakes and food shortages. People are leaving in droves, but Hadiz decides to stay, holing up in the lab where she works. One day while performing an experiment using quantum physics, she inadvertently discovers the multiverse. With the help of an AI called Rupshe, Hadiz eventually gathers more information about these other worlds by using drones. And when conditions in the city worsen, she realizes her discovery can help her escape to a better world.
At the same time, we learn about a group of worlds called the Pandominion, a collective who have been using Step technology—the process of moving between universes—for a long time. Supported by a military faction called the Cielo and an AI called the Registry, the Pandominion monitors and controls all Step activity. One day, the Registry picks up some strange anomalies which turn out to be unauthorized Stepping and a possible enemy infiltration. Watchmaster Vemmet is tasked with finding and stopping the threat, but during the course of his assignment, he discovers something even bigger, a coalition of machine worlds called the Ansurrection who seem focused on wiping out the Pandominion.
Next we meet Essien Nkanika, who lives in yet another version of Lagos, a downtrodden man who grew up in poverty and slavery and hasn’t been able to escape his fate. That is until he meets an enigmatic woman in a bar who shows him something amazing and changes his life forever.
Finally, on a Pandominion world called Ut (yes, another Lagos!) we’re introduced to a race of sentient rabbits, a peaceful world where the average life expectancy is one hundred fifty years old and adulthood doesn’t start until you turn thirty. Topaz Tourmaline FiveHills is a nineteen-year-old schoolgirl who has just made a new friend, a transfer student named Dulcimer Coronal. Paz and Dulcie are inseparable, that is until the war against the Ansurrection suddenly lands on their doorstep.
All these characters converge in the most unexpected ways, as Carey’s story builds to a frenzied climax.
As you can tell, the story is rather complex and has lots of moving parts. In a less capable author’s hands, it probably wouldn't have worked, but Carey knows exactly what’s he’s doing and never loses control of his plot. In some ways it reminded me of Star Trek: The Next Generation, where you have many different worlds, all at various stages of development. Some worlds are unaware that there’s a whole multiverse out there, only a “step� away from their own world, while others closely guard and control this technology. When you add in the terrifying idea of a group of machine worlds with the ability to decimate their enemies, you have the age old science fiction conflict between man and machine, but this one feels unique because of the characters and their relationships to each other.
Speaking of which, the characters are all interesting and wonderfully fleshed out. Carey takes his time introducing each one, giving each one plenty of space so the reader becomes invested on an emotional level. Hadiz fascinated me, with her combination of intelligence and wry humor. She thinks her discovery can help save the world, so rather than be motivated by greed, she truly wants to make life better for her people.
My heart went out to Essien, whose tragic backstory is described in unflinching detail. Even Vemmet, who finds himself in trouble when the importance of Hadiz’s experiments escape his notice, manages to figure out how to survive when he’s transferred to an unforgiving world as punishment.
But my favorite character was Paz, the rabbit girl with heart who is unwittingly thrust into the middle of a war. Paz just wants to go to school and hang out with her new friend Dulcie, but unfortunately circumstances won’t allow that to happen. I loved that Carey included some wonderful AI side characters, like Paz’s anima Tricity (sort of like our cell phones except anima are shaped like various animals and have the ability to communicate with their owners) and Rupshe, Hadiz’s AI friend who is mostly behind the scenes in this story but ultimately plays a big role in its outcome. If you’ve read The Book of Koli, you’ll know who Monono Aware is, and I couldn’t help but see some similarities between Monono and one AI in particular (which I can’t really tell you about because of spoilers).
I also loved the way some of the worlds are slightly “off� from ours (for example in one world, George Lucas’s popular series is called Space Empire instead of Star Wars). I was horrified by the descriptions of how citizens become soldiers in the Cielo, with painful body modifications to make them stronger and more resistant to enemy attacks.
And of course there are plenty of surprises in store. Carey throws in some shocking twists, and there’s also the mystery of the Ansurrection. No one really understands them or their motivations, or even who built them. No doubt these questions will be answered at some point in the series, and I cannot wait to see how Carey pulls everything together.
The last hundred pages are full of tense action, chase scenes, dangerous escapes and more as the characters come together for a final confrontation. The entire story is framed by short chapters from a mystery narrator, and I’m still not sure who it is (although I have my suspicions). The ending leaves the reader hanging only in the sense that there are still many unanswered questions. I can hardly wait to see what happens next!
Big thanks to the publisher for providing a review copy.
September 24, 2024
DNF@55%
Паралелните вселени никога не са ми били любим мотив, но анотацията за империя, изградена точно от такива, звучеше обещаващо. Началото е прилично, макар и стандартно, като изкарано от произволен жанров сериал. Светът е изчерпил ресурсите си, навсякъде се водят войни, а до Лагос интровертна професорка по физика почти от нищото създава машина за пътуване между вселените. Муждувременно си другарува със саркастичен (женски) изкуствен интелект, а среща и чаровен мошеник. После отникъде изскочиха още някакви типове, които нямах повече нерви да опознавам. И сюжетът се превърна в пълен хаос - произволни скокове между вселените, някакви умни и коварни машини, яки специални части с подсилени скелети, вълшебни скафандри и непобедими оръжия и т.н. На малкия екран това би осигурило известно количество приятни часове с придрямване, но в книга от над 700 страници си е пълна мизерия. Изобщо, цялото нещо е като разпокъсан и свръхдебел комикс, но уви - без картинките. И на всичкото отгоре - начало на поредица (да, отидох да видя края все пак). Героите са супер безинтересни и плоски, за разлика от описанията на бедността в Нигерия, на разни хитри джаджи и на междувселенските спецоперации. Тъй че пандоминионът ще си остане недочетен.
—�
За сметка на това тук поне залепването на твърдата корица вече е като с цимент (самата корица е красива, и рискувах) - ей, можело значи издателството 🤣
Паралелните вселени никога не са ми били любим мотив, но анотацията за империя, изградена точно от такива, звучеше обещаващо. Началото е прилично, макар и стандартно, като изкарано от произволен жанров сериал. Светът е изчерпил ресурсите си, навсякъде се водят войни, а до Лагос интровертна професорка по физика почти от нищото създава машина за пътуване между вселените. Муждувременно си другарува със саркастичен (женски) изкуствен интелект, а среща и чаровен мошеник. После отникъде изскочиха още някакви типове, които нямах повече нерви да опознавам. И сюжетът се превърна в пълен хаос - произволни скокове между вселените, някакви умни и коварни машини, яки специални части с подсилени скелети, вълшебни скафандри и непобедими оръжия и т.н. На малкия екран това би осигурило известно количество приятни часове с придрямване, но в книга от над 700 страници си е пълна мизерия. Изобщо, цялото нещо е като разпокъсан и свръхдебел комикс, но уви - без картинките. И на всичкото отгоре - начало на поредица (да, отидох да видя края все пак). Героите са супер безинтересни и плоски, за разлика от описанията на бедността в Нигерия, на разни хитри джаджи и на междувселенските спецоперации. Тъй че пандоминионът ще си остане недочетен.
—�
За сметка на това тук поне залепването на твърдата корица вече е като с цимент (самата корица е красива, и рискувах) - ей, можело значи издателството 🤣
January 26, 2024
I really enjoyed listening to this on Audible. It's a fun, fast paced and interesting "space opera" that doesn't take place in space rather across the multiverse. This is an adventure with high stakes, war, advanced technology and diverse "selves" that account for the dominant sentient species across the permutations of possible Earth's.
What really stood out were the main characters & setting centered on Lagos Nigeria (of all places) and all it's alternates, the book opens with a female Nigerian Scientist Hadiz Tambuwal who stumbles across technology that allows her "step" into different universes, it then opens up from there into a startling narrative that takes us to alternate earth's one with sentient bunny rabbits who stand in as the "sentient selves" in a parallel Earth called Ut and augmented shock troopers called the Cello who act as the mercenaries for the multidimensional empire that is the Pandominion.
The story asks questions about the meaning of sentience; Is an AI alive? Is true life isolated to organic life alone? Can life persist in machines? What happens when machine intelligence & organic intelligence intersect & overlap?
I can't wait for part 2, this was a lot of fun.
What really stood out were the main characters & setting centered on Lagos Nigeria (of all places) and all it's alternates, the book opens with a female Nigerian Scientist Hadiz Tambuwal who stumbles across technology that allows her "step" into different universes, it then opens up from there into a startling narrative that takes us to alternate earth's one with sentient bunny rabbits who stand in as the "sentient selves" in a parallel Earth called Ut and augmented shock troopers called the Cello who act as the mercenaries for the multidimensional empire that is the Pandominion.
The story asks questions about the meaning of sentience; Is an AI alive? Is true life isolated to organic life alone? Can life persist in machines? What happens when machine intelligence & organic intelligence intersect & overlap?
I can't wait for part 2, this was a lot of fun.
September 4, 2023
I clearly loved it. Carey has created an awesome new universe with the multiverse at its core, tons of diverse characters and Earth like worlds. Nothing incredibly new here but just well done.
February 1, 2025
دروازه ی بینهایت یک کار خیلی گنگ و نامفهوم وار به شکل عجیبی می‌ر� جلو و شما از شدت این عجیب جلو رفتن و اینکه از نبود جذابیت ادامه میدید به خاطر ترجمه ی خوب کتابه
اما خود داستان تقریبا یک ۴۰۰ صفحه ای میخونی بعد طی اون ۲۰۰ صفحه تقریبا باقی مونده یجوری سرعت میگیره کی میگی یواش بذار برسیم بهت
جهان سازی که رقم می‌زن� همسو می‌کن� مخاطبش رو با عناصر نیمه علمی تخیلی
به طوری که میشه گفت سطح بالایی علمی تخیلی نداره و برای شروع کسانی که هیچ پیش زمینه ندارن تا حدودی مناسبه
بهرحال بزارید جلد بعدش بیاد بعد بخونید متاسفانه رکب میخورید :)
اما خود داستان تقریبا یک ۴۰۰ صفحه ای میخونی بعد طی اون ۲۰۰ صفحه تقریبا باقی مونده یجوری سرعت میگیره کی میگی یواش بذار برسیم بهت
جهان سازی که رقم می‌زن� همسو می‌کن� مخاطبش رو با عناصر نیمه علمی تخیلی
به طوری که میشه گفت سطح بالایی علمی تخیلی نداره و برای شروع کسانی که هیچ پیش زمینه ندارن تا حدودی مناسبه
بهرحال بزارید جلد بعدش بیاد بعد بخونید متاسفانه رکب میخورید :)
February 25, 2023
3.5 stars
This is a tricky one to review, because though I had an awfully good time reading it, I came away with some mixed feelings. I'll start with what worked.
First sentence: "Hadiz Tambuwal saw Armageddon coming from a long way off."
(That is a SOLID open.)
This is a story of parallel worlds, told in 3rd person omnicient that slips occasionally into first-person, and the reader picks up in pieces here and there that the story is being recounted after (perhaps long after) the events described by an unnamed narrator. Due to this POV, there's not exactly a main character so much as a cast of major players.
The story is set in Lagos (many variants of it), which is incredibly neat. One of the first characters we meet is... well, she's very interesting; and while perhaps not terribly sympathetic, she is very much herself. Hadiz Tambuwal, physicist, is a well-rendered character--and on the subject of writing full, believable characters, I still find I'm impressed in spite of myself when cis male writers write women who notice the things that are part of the annoying background radiation of sexism in the world that fall under a lot of radars (like the problematic ubiquity of giving machines, AI, automated personal assistants female voices).
This is my first time reading Carey, and on the whole his writing works very well for me. There was a little bit of clunky hand-waving science: "Rolling up her sleeves, she went in to take a closer look at the subatomic level"--I'm sure it's supposed to be metaphorical and make whatever she's doing seem a little more accessible, but it's hard for the brain not to trip up over the thought of anyone "rolling up their sleeves" to take a closer look at something imperceptible by human senses.
I appreciated a low-key Star Trek reference tucked in: a mention of transparent aluminum.
Tongue-in-cheek and humor have to be done carefully, in my opinion, to keep from distancing the reader from the story. Carey's prose walks a fine line at times between cute and cutesy that mostly nails it and occasionally wobbles.
"For this to work she would have to deform the QEI field into a cylinder, which proved much more fiddly than she had imagined," felt like it was teetering on that line, but this passage made me chuckle: "There was pain, but fortunately it was unbearable so she didn’t have to bear it. Her nervous system, seeing what was coming, handed in its notice and walked out of the building."
More often, though, Carey's prose ranges from wry and astute:
"The phrase, in a long-obsolete Uti language, means 'wise people' � another near-universal. Sentients on every world have this moment when they think intelligence is what separates them from the rest of creation. It takes them a lot longer to figure out that they’re arguing from the very heart of survivor bias, and therefore underestimating the importance of blind, brute chance."
--to startlingly lovely:
"Moreover, and beyond that, all self-organising and self-replicating patterns are rare and valuable in their own right. Life is a movement that makes itself within the great unmaking that is the entropic universe.�
So why the mixed feelings? Just as the reader is heading into the final climactic confrontation (and hopefully to discover the identity of our narrator), the book ends. The reader is encouraged to look for the next book to find out what happens next.
There is an implied contract between writer and reader; it's one thing to resolve some big questions, have a climactic victory or defeat, and then set in a hook by leaving some part of the plot unresolved or by introducing a new and urgent question right at the end (I'm looking at you, Scholomance)--but the reader does reasonably expect to have a fair amount settled first, not to feel things are building to the most tense final confrontation only to find that there's no more book left. I will absolutely read the next book, because I enjoyed this and want to find out what happens next, but I'm also annoyed and was left feeling the author hadn't quite played fair with the reader.
I was provided an ARC by Netgalley and Orbit Books in exchange for an unbiased review.
*Please note that quotes are from an uncorrected proof and may change before publication.
This is a tricky one to review, because though I had an awfully good time reading it, I came away with some mixed feelings. I'll start with what worked.
First sentence: "Hadiz Tambuwal saw Armageddon coming from a long way off."
(That is a SOLID open.)
This is a story of parallel worlds, told in 3rd person omnicient that slips occasionally into first-person, and the reader picks up in pieces here and there that the story is being recounted after (perhaps long after) the events described by an unnamed narrator. Due to this POV, there's not exactly a main character so much as a cast of major players.
The story is set in Lagos (many variants of it), which is incredibly neat. One of the first characters we meet is... well, she's very interesting; and while perhaps not terribly sympathetic, she is very much herself. Hadiz Tambuwal, physicist, is a well-rendered character--and on the subject of writing full, believable characters, I still find I'm impressed in spite of myself when cis male writers write women who notice the things that are part of the annoying background radiation of sexism in the world that fall under a lot of radars (like the problematic ubiquity of giving machines, AI, automated personal assistants female voices).
This is my first time reading Carey, and on the whole his writing works very well for me. There was a little bit of clunky hand-waving science: "Rolling up her sleeves, she went in to take a closer look at the subatomic level"--I'm sure it's supposed to be metaphorical and make whatever she's doing seem a little more accessible, but it's hard for the brain not to trip up over the thought of anyone "rolling up their sleeves" to take a closer look at something imperceptible by human senses.
I appreciated a low-key Star Trek reference tucked in: a mention of transparent aluminum.
Tongue-in-cheek and humor have to be done carefully, in my opinion, to keep from distancing the reader from the story. Carey's prose walks a fine line at times between cute and cutesy that mostly nails it and occasionally wobbles.
"For this to work she would have to deform the QEI field into a cylinder, which proved much more fiddly than she had imagined," felt like it was teetering on that line, but this passage made me chuckle: "There was pain, but fortunately it was unbearable so she didn’t have to bear it. Her nervous system, seeing what was coming, handed in its notice and walked out of the building."
More often, though, Carey's prose ranges from wry and astute:
"The phrase, in a long-obsolete Uti language, means 'wise people' � another near-universal. Sentients on every world have this moment when they think intelligence is what separates them from the rest of creation. It takes them a lot longer to figure out that they’re arguing from the very heart of survivor bias, and therefore underestimating the importance of blind, brute chance."
--to startlingly lovely:
"Moreover, and beyond that, all self-organising and self-replicating patterns are rare and valuable in their own right. Life is a movement that makes itself within the great unmaking that is the entropic universe.�
So why the mixed feelings? Just as the reader is heading into the final climactic confrontation (and hopefully to discover the identity of our narrator), the book ends. The reader is encouraged to look for the next book to find out what happens next.
There is an implied contract between writer and reader; it's one thing to resolve some big questions, have a climactic victory or defeat, and then set in a hook by leaving some part of the plot unresolved or by introducing a new and urgent question right at the end (I'm looking at you, Scholomance)--but the reader does reasonably expect to have a fair amount settled first, not to feel things are building to the most tense final confrontation only to find that there's no more book left. I will absolutely read the next book, because I enjoyed this and want to find out what happens next, but I'm also annoyed and was left feeling the author hadn't quite played fair with the reader.
I was provided an ARC by Netgalley and Orbit Books in exchange for an unbiased review.
*Please note that quotes are from an uncorrected proof and may change before publication.
March 23, 2023
Mini blurb: The lives of three people all based in Lagos, but from three different versions of Earth - a female scientist, a male rogue and a rabbit girl - get intertwined when the first accidentally stumbles across the secret of interdimensional travel.
***
First off...DISCLAIMER: I requested this title on Netgalley. Thanks to Little, Brown Book Group UK for providing a temporary ecopy. This didn't influence my review in any way.
This pains me to no end, but despite the juicy premise and my having loved The Girl with All the Gifts by the same author, I stopped reading around the 1/3 mark. The first section was hard sci-fi enough to trouble me a bit, but the first protagonist (a lone Black female scientist living in a dilapidated world that she's intent on saving, if at the expense of others) and her AI helper were interesting enough to keep me going, especially when the actual multiverse stuff made its (albeit timid) appearance. Alas, I never warmed up to the second main character (a Black male hooker/rogue trying to rise out of poverty by any means), and when the more political aspects of the story took center stage, I started to get bored. I'm not sure what I expected - maybe more of a multiverse romp with different, fascinating versions of our planet to visit - but what I got sure wasn't it. I commend the book's being diverse and ambitious in scope though (especially given that it's only the first volume in a series), and I hope - or better, I'm sure - it will find the right audience...
Note: definitive review (I don't have enough to say to justify writing a full-length one later, and of course I don't plan to reread this book).
***
First off...DISCLAIMER: I requested this title on Netgalley. Thanks to Little, Brown Book Group UK for providing a temporary ecopy. This didn't influence my review in any way.
This pains me to no end, but despite the juicy premise and my having loved The Girl with All the Gifts by the same author, I stopped reading around the 1/3 mark. The first section was hard sci-fi enough to trouble me a bit, but the first protagonist (a lone Black female scientist living in a dilapidated world that she's intent on saving, if at the expense of others) and her AI helper were interesting enough to keep me going, especially when the actual multiverse stuff made its (albeit timid) appearance. Alas, I never warmed up to the second main character (a Black male hooker/rogue trying to rise out of poverty by any means), and when the more political aspects of the story took center stage, I started to get bored. I'm not sure what I expected - maybe more of a multiverse romp with different, fascinating versions of our planet to visit - but what I got sure wasn't it. I commend the book's being diverse and ambitious in scope though (especially given that it's only the first volume in a series), and I hope - or better, I'm sure - it will find the right audience...
Note: definitive review (I don't have enough to say to justify writing a full-length one later, and of course I don't plan to reread this book).
July 16, 2024
This book has everything: interdimensional travel, robots, alien/nonhuman organic sentience, apocalypses, dystopias, etc. It's a war story, a political thriller, a spy thriller, a philosophical treatise, a crime drama, and a bunch of other things. Sometimes it feels like MR Carey is trying to do too many things at once. As a result, the setting feels large, but also thoughtlessly uniform, shallow, and unrealistic in places, because Carey doesn't have time to go into detail. For the most part, these flaws don't detract from the reading experience. People better at suspending disbelief might not notice the flaws at all, instead focusing on the compelling characters, witty prose, fun plot, and cool science. For others, it'll be hard to get over a few minor gripes about the worldbuilding.
April 4, 2024
I don't read as much science-fiction as I used to, having burned out on the genre in the mid-1990's. For that reason, I'm pretty selective about what I pick up, more than other genres that I read on a frequent basis. However, I've never read anything from Mike Carey/M.R. Carey that I didn't like so I was very curious to see how he would approach this, more hard science-fiction than he has attempted before.
There are some complex subjects here but I don't consider this a dense, hard-to-read novel. Carey tackles quantum physics, alternate versions of Earth (the multi-verse), the transportation devices to these alternate versions, and artificial intelligence. His descriptions and explanations of the technology are done well enough for non-scientists/non-engineers to understand and accept the concepts.
It's the characters and how they deal with their various ethical and moral challenges that make up the crux of the novel, and for me are the strongest elements that make this such an engaging read. I read this in large chunks because what happened in an individual chapter compelled me to read the next chapter until I could find a decent break-off point until the next reading. There are many interesting characters throughout, but it's the three primary characters that drive the story and are fascinating in their own ways.
The last quarter of the novel reads like space opera/military science-fiction/adventure and is very hard to put down. While it does reach a resolution, there's more to come and the final chapters serve as set-up for the next book. This is a two-part story and the final volume won't be released until June 2024. That makes it tough, but I'll probably check out his Kali trilogy while I'm waiting.
There are some complex subjects here but I don't consider this a dense, hard-to-read novel. Carey tackles quantum physics, alternate versions of Earth (the multi-verse), the transportation devices to these alternate versions, and artificial intelligence. His descriptions and explanations of the technology are done well enough for non-scientists/non-engineers to understand and accept the concepts.
It's the characters and how they deal with their various ethical and moral challenges that make up the crux of the novel, and for me are the strongest elements that make this such an engaging read. I read this in large chunks because what happened in an individual chapter compelled me to read the next chapter until I could find a decent break-off point until the next reading. There are many interesting characters throughout, but it's the three primary characters that drive the story and are fascinating in their own ways.
The last quarter of the novel reads like space opera/military science-fiction/adventure and is very hard to put down. While it does reach a resolution, there's more to come and the final chapters serve as set-up for the next book. This is a two-part story and the final volume won't be released until June 2024. That makes it tough, but I'll probably check out his Kali trilogy while I'm waiting.
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