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Even if RCW’s works aren’t overflowed with optimism, this one was really depressing. It gave me such a feeling of hopelessness, more so because of the first person narration. Tyler Dupree was a child when the stars in the sky vanished on an October evening. He and his only friends, the twins Jason and Diane, watched the event which changed their lives forever.

The Earth was surrounded by a sort of membrane, called the Spin, outside of which times fly by very differently: “One terrestrial second equals 3.17 years Spin time.�� Sun is expanding and without the Spin, the Earth will soon be gone.

What follows we get to see through Tyler’s blasé eyes �� he’s not however unconcerned, he just accepts the new surrounding reality and adjusts by it. Not the case with his friends though: Jason’s only purpose in life became the study of the Spin and the ones behind it and Diane, terrified by it, is ‘hiding�� behind a new religion. He became the steady pillar for the two, the balancing link between a world thrown into chaos and their own feelings.

As his other novels, this one is not action, but character driven. RCW follows human behavior facing a possible extinction. And it’s not a pleasant experience, mostly because he has a gift of making the experience so real. But it was an astonishing one; the scale of it is mind blowing. There were some chapters too dragged and Tyler’s submission was hard to swallow at times, but is all part of the characters development.

If not for the ending, I would have taken a break until the second part, because this one kind of drained me. But a sparkle of hope at the end and curiosity made me to keep going.