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jenbsbooks 's review for:
Dark Matter
by Blake Crouch
dark
tense
fast-paced
I liked this a lot, super complex, multiple world theory. Lots of "what if" thoughts. The Midnight Library by Matt Haig has a similar idea, but the presentation of these is totally different. This was mystery/action/thriller.
*** that was my original review back in October 2021. Rereading for book club discussion, and I have a few more thoughts in prep for our discussion.
I went with the kindle copy this time (bought the physical book as well) so I could make some notes as I went. I liked it just as much this second time (not remembering everything, but I had remembered a lot). More proFanity than I'd recalled (f-bomb x35) and some sexual stuff. Hope it's not TOO much for book club.
1st person/present tense ... except there are a couple chapters that switch to Daniela's POV, 3rd person, still present tense. They are a little jarring, as there isn't a header or anything to indicated the switch, and it's a different world (literally) than where we'd just been with Jason, the MC.
Reading with my EYES ... it was interesting to note some of the sentence structure. Quite a bit of white space, as often it's one or just a few words to a line. Almost poetic in format (especially after just reading [book:The Crossover|18263725]) ... like there in chapter six (another Daniela 3rd person chapter).
The warm autumn day is cloudless.
Windless.
Timeless.
The air redolent of -
Roasted peanuts.
Popcorn.
Plastic cups filled to the brim with beer.
There were a few alcohol references ... "the whiff of alcohol" "her breath is wine-sweet" (uggg, wine smells terrible and I can only imagine the taste, I'm not a 'sauce'y gal. Despise/loathe/abhor drinking - I think Hubs thinks I fake my revulsion at smells, but they are there and they're awful).
There are the ... not "premonitions" because our MC is unaware, but he's telling US/the reader ... "I'm unaware that tonight is the end of all this. The end of everything I know, everything I love." I mean, I guess we already know that if we've read the blurb. Sometimes it can be a bit of a spoiler (some books our MC will say something like "I look back on my long life and ..." and then you know that he's going to survive everything, which I guess we assume anyway, usually the MC doesn't die ... except in the mini-series 1883, where as the series starts up, we see the MC get shot in the stomach with an arrow, an unrevivable wound ... and then the show starts up months earlier and builds to that point, that we've already seen. Grrrrrr. Didn't like that!) I'm just not overly fond of those "little did I know but that would be the last time I'd see her" type insights earlier than actual action.
Quote: It’s the beautiful thing about youth. There’s a weightlessness that permeates everything because no damning choices have been made, no paths committed to, and the road forking out ahead is pure, unlimited potential.
Some words I note: tesseract (always remember that from A Wrinkle In Time), ubiquitous, roiling, route (I checked the audio - pronounced "root"), hearth (one previous audiobook pronounced it "harth" and so I always notice it now, that it's h-earth! the "metal sliding board" at the park ... um, the SLIDE? apropos of nothing ... have heard the phrase in a literary sense, don't think I've ever heard it in real life. A Black Lincoln Navigator was specifically mentioned, just noticed because a recent read seemed to focus a lot on the make/model of cars. Speaking of mentioning specific models/makes ... a Gaggenau refrigerator. Is there any reason to include that? I've not heard of the brand, I guess to show that it's really cool? Triptych (a picture in three panels) ... heard that one, not often used (although it IS often seen). Cathode-ray television... is it more descriptive to say that than to say "an old television" or something that might be more easily recognizable?
"Something they call DARK MATTER" ... title tie-in, and I'd just watched (on the prompting of my son) the Spiderman-Into the Multiverse. There were several similarities!
After looking through the alternate Daniela's art installation: Quote: We’re all just wandering through the tundra of our existence, assigning value to worthlessness, when all that we love and hate, all we believe in and fight for and kill for and die for is as meaningless as images projected onto Plexiglas.
Robert Frost's gold that cannot stay (had to look up the poem, although I was familiar with it)
Nature’s first green is gold,
Her hardest hue to hold.
Her early leaf’s a flower;
But only so an hour.
Then leaf subsides to leaf.
So Eden sank to grief,
So dawn goes down to day.
Nothing gold can stay.
A funny:
The challenge seems insurmountable.
"I don't know what to tell you ... you surmounted it."
More Quotes:
*** that was my original review back in October 2021. Rereading for book club discussion, and I have a few more thoughts in prep for our discussion.
I went with the kindle copy this time (bought the physical book as well) so I could make some notes as I went. I liked it just as much this second time (not remembering everything, but I had remembered a lot). More proFanity than I'd recalled (f-bomb x35) and some sexual stuff. Hope it's not TOO much for book club.
1st person/present tense ... except there are a couple chapters that switch to Daniela's POV, 3rd person, still present tense. They are a little jarring, as there isn't a header or anything to indicated the switch, and it's a different world (literally) than where we'd just been with Jason, the MC.
Reading with my EYES ... it was interesting to note some of the sentence structure. Quite a bit of white space, as often it's one or just a few words to a line. Almost poetic in format (especially after just reading [book:The Crossover|18263725]) ... like there in chapter six (another Daniela 3rd person chapter).
The warm autumn day is cloudless.
Windless.
Timeless.
The air redolent of -
Roasted peanuts.
Popcorn.
Plastic cups filled to the brim with beer.
There were a few alcohol references ... "the whiff of alcohol" "her breath is wine-sweet" (uggg, wine smells terrible and I can only imagine the taste, I'm not a 'sauce'y gal. Despise/loathe/abhor drinking - I think Hubs thinks I fake my revulsion at smells, but they are there and they're awful).
There are the ... not "premonitions" because our MC is unaware, but he's telling US/the reader ... "I'm unaware that tonight is the end of all this. The end of everything I know, everything I love." I mean, I guess we already know that if we've read the blurb. Sometimes it can be a bit of a spoiler (some books our MC will say something like "I look back on my long life and ..." and then you know that he's going to survive everything, which I guess we assume anyway, usually the MC doesn't die ... except in the mini-series 1883, where as the series starts up, we see the MC get shot in the stomach with an arrow, an unrevivable wound ... and then the show starts up months earlier and builds to that point, that we've already seen. Grrrrrr. Didn't like that!) I'm just not overly fond of those "little did I know but that would be the last time I'd see her" type insights earlier than actual action.
Quote: It’s the beautiful thing about youth. There’s a weightlessness that permeates everything because no damning choices have been made, no paths committed to, and the road forking out ahead is pure, unlimited potential.
Some words I note: tesseract (always remember that from A Wrinkle In Time), ubiquitous, roiling, route (I checked the audio - pronounced "root"), hearth (one previous audiobook pronounced it "harth" and so I always notice it now, that it's h-earth! the "metal sliding board" at the park ... um, the SLIDE? apropos of nothing ... have heard the phrase in a literary sense, don't think I've ever heard it in real life. A Black Lincoln Navigator was specifically mentioned, just noticed because a recent read seemed to focus a lot on the make/model of cars. Speaking of mentioning specific models/makes ... a Gaggenau refrigerator. Is there any reason to include that? I've not heard of the brand, I guess to show that it's really cool? Triptych (a picture in three panels) ... heard that one, not often used (although it IS often seen). Cathode-ray television... is it more descriptive to say that than to say "an old television" or something that might be more easily recognizable?
"Something they call DARK MATTER" ... title tie-in, and I'd just watched (on the prompting of my son) the Spiderman-Into the Multiverse. There were several similarities!
After looking through the alternate Daniela's art installation: Quote: We’re all just wandering through the tundra of our existence, assigning value to worthlessness, when all that we love and hate, all we believe in and fight for and kill for and die for is as meaningless as images projected onto Plexiglas.
Robert Frost's gold that cannot stay (had to look up the poem, although I was familiar with it)
Nature’s first green is gold,
Her hardest hue to hold.
Her early leaf’s a flower;
But only so an hour.
Then leaf subsides to leaf.
So Eden sank to grief,
So dawn goes down to day.
Nothing gold can stay.
A funny:
The challenge seems insurmountable.
"I don't know what to tell you ... you surmounted it."
More Quotes:
- ...he would have rationalized it somehow. That’s how decent people justify bad behavior.
- ...that’s how a good man works himself up to do a terrible thing.
- Is this what God feels? The rush that comes from having literally spoken a world into existence?
- It’s a heart-crushing thing to feel revulsion for the one you love.
- “This isn’t how your life turned out. Only how it ended. Your life was beautiful.”
- I have total control, but only to the extent I have control over myself.
- If you go in with fear, fear is what you’ll find.”
- I built something that could actually eradicate regret. Let you find worlds where you made the right choice.” Daniela says, “Life doesn’t work that way. You live with your choices and learn. You don’t cheat the system.”
- When you write something, you focus your full attention on it. It’s almost impossible to write one thing while thinking about another. The act of putting it on paper keeps your thoughts and intentions aligned.”
So - looking forward to the discussion.
I may need to check out the series - recently produced on AppleTV (which we don't have at the moment).