??? What did I just read? I have almost no idea what happened in this novel, but I did enjoy the reading experience. (Notable exception being the uncomfortable prevalence of absurd euphemisms for the penis. Meaty joystick? WHY??) This book is packed with ideas, but I don’t feel like I was smart enough to put it all together. The story begins in the 1800’s and as it advances to the late 1900’s and finally 2024 it keeps circling back to this nineteenth century explorer character but I couldn't tell you why. There’s a ton of character building of another character, Cassio, stuffed in the middle that somehow didn’t allow me to understand him at all. Then when part three introduces a neat woman as the final protagonist, it keeps being about the previous characters much more than her. This book is solidly speculative, but I want to say it leans more towards the “literary” side of fiction, even though I still couldn’t explain to you what I think makes a book “literary”. I love how much tech was stuffed into this book, and the feeling that it was asking interesting questions, however far just outside my reach, but ultimately I have no idea what went down in this book. In search of someone to talk to about this one? I don’t know, somehow I’m not especially inclined to try to Google my way towards some elusive understanding, preferring to let this book stand alone yet inscrutable. I think I should have read it slower.