Recursion by Blake Crouch
If you've been reading my blog for a while now, then you know that I am an unabashed fan of Blake Crouch. If anyone knows how to write thrillers that will have you guaranteed reading up late into the night, feverishly turning the pages to find out what happens next, terrified beyond measure - then that is Mr. Crouch. Wayward Pines has been my favorite series of his till date [ And the most popular blogpost till date!] With Dark Matter, Blake blew my mind off. How do you top something like that, wondered I? And then along came Recursion. Which by the record, is the buzziest release by the best-selling author who, by the looks of it, is spinning out enough and more material for the TV and Hollywood adaptation of grim alternate realities. If the last time it was alternate universes, then this time Blake goes a step beyond and plays on memories and how intimate is it, to the human psyche and how we measure time through memories. I mean, wow!
Recursion is your perfect escapist read into a mind-bending, beyond-dimension space that is the perfect blend of a summer read mixing a thrill-ride noir with science ideas. It is (as most Crouch books are!) truly cinemascopic [This one's heading to Netflix!], boasting of big ideas that will boggle your mind and paced furiously like a runaway freight train with twists and turns galore. Suffice to say, it's a wild heady campfire tale that will captivate you right from get go.The worse part about a Blake Crouch novel is letting the readers into a synopsis of the story. I mean, you've got to be tight-lipped lest you give away something crucial to the plot that is a twisting serpentine wormhole of impossibilities. So I will try to keep this short.
The central narrative is built around two characters: Barry Sutton an NYPD detective who is divorced and has a tragic past when he lost his teenage daughter in an accident, something that has been haunting him ever since, which has probably also led to the breakdown of his marriage. Now he's a committed police officer who cannot resist a good puzzle or problem that needs solving. And then there is Helena Smith, a scientist hell-bent on discovering a cure for Alzheimer's, that is slowly eating away her mom. Helena has just been offered a research grant by one of the most successful entrepreneur in Technology, known to many as a visionary and his offer is too good to refuse.
Both the stories are set in different timelines - Barry is in the present and his life takes a complete U-turn when one evening he encounters a woman on the verge of committing a suicide. She tells Barry that she remembers an alternate life that she had led, happily married to another man with a perfect son, a life that she can clearly remember but she knows, is not really hers. Barry is not able to stop her from committing the suicide but this incident intrigues him and leads him to chase this mystery down. He comes to know of a new disease that has struck the populace, called the False Memory Syndrome, with at least ten percent of those afflicted committing suicides.
In 2007, Helena is feverishly working on her research project and is ready to experiment on humans to check and validate the tests. But even as the "Memory Chair" that she has built gives positive results helping the test subject clearly "relive" a chosen memory, her mentor - Tech Extraordinaire Marcus Slade has a much bigger ambition for this project. And Helena realizes her discovery is much bigger and that Slade's ambition could just change the whole world.
The story unravels like a puzzle box juggling time-lines. As a reader you feel like you know where this is all leading to but this is Blake Crouch! And as he masterfully leads you down a false corner without you harboring any suspicion, you never see the left hook coming to slam into you. The story picks up pace [ what with all that time-travel happening, you can argue it never really slacked off!] with the new revelations even as Barry's timeline is going to collide with Helena's. And the wrangling together of the timelines is done in a deft manner by Blake Crouch, ratcheting up terrifying levels of tension in the narrative before you realize that you are ensnared in it. The stakes keep going up until of course it all implodes.
The best part about Blake's writing is the life he breathes into his lead characters. Though between Barry and Helena, Barry comes out as a lot more real and rounded compared to Helena, who is the cold, calculating scientist with the logical objective lens of life. Barry is unpredictable, an emotional wreck and this makes him a lot more exciting as a character. His hasty often thoughtless decisions propel the narrative forwards in hitherto new directions. While yes there is a lot of high-brow scientific ideas thrown in liberally that you might not always go along with, Blake mixes it up well with the tension that he never takes the pedal off from, philosophical musings about life and death and well, yes time-travel. But beneath all that layers, is a thrumming pulse of an emotional core. About second chances, even third chances . About life and death and all that we can achieve in between. This was what ultimately touched me as a reader and I am grateful I read this book.
Before the resolution of the problem however, our protagonists actually spend a lot of "time" in a loop and I frankly felt this did do injustice to the overall pacing of the book. But no complaints beyond that really.
With Recursion, this summer you should take a couple of days off because trust me, once you start reading, you will not be able to put it down. Heed my advice, take a break. You might just lose track of time, jumping across timelines [pun intended]. This book deserves all your undivided attention and will earn it, no matter how. You been warned.
Recursion is your perfect escapist read into a mind-bending, beyond-dimension space that is the perfect blend of a summer read mixing a thrill-ride noir with science ideas. It is (as most Crouch books are!) truly cinemascopic [This one's heading to Netflix!], boasting of big ideas that will boggle your mind and paced furiously like a runaway freight train with twists and turns galore. Suffice to say, it's a wild heady campfire tale that will captivate you right from get go.The worse part about a Blake Crouch novel is letting the readers into a synopsis of the story. I mean, you've got to be tight-lipped lest you give away something crucial to the plot that is a twisting serpentine wormhole of impossibilities. So I will try to keep this short.
The central narrative is built around two characters: Barry Sutton an NYPD detective who is divorced and has a tragic past when he lost his teenage daughter in an accident, something that has been haunting him ever since, which has probably also led to the breakdown of his marriage. Now he's a committed police officer who cannot resist a good puzzle or problem that needs solving. And then there is Helena Smith, a scientist hell-bent on discovering a cure for Alzheimer's, that is slowly eating away her mom. Helena has just been offered a research grant by one of the most successful entrepreneur in Technology, known to many as a visionary and his offer is too good to refuse.
Both the stories are set in different timelines - Barry is in the present and his life takes a complete U-turn when one evening he encounters a woman on the verge of committing a suicide. She tells Barry that she remembers an alternate life that she had led, happily married to another man with a perfect son, a life that she can clearly remember but she knows, is not really hers. Barry is not able to stop her from committing the suicide but this incident intrigues him and leads him to chase this mystery down. He comes to know of a new disease that has struck the populace, called the False Memory Syndrome, with at least ten percent of those afflicted committing suicides.
In 2007, Helena is feverishly working on her research project and is ready to experiment on humans to check and validate the tests. But even as the "Memory Chair" that she has built gives positive results helping the test subject clearly "relive" a chosen memory, her mentor - Tech Extraordinaire Marcus Slade has a much bigger ambition for this project. And Helena realizes her discovery is much bigger and that Slade's ambition could just change the whole world.
The story unravels like a puzzle box juggling time-lines. As a reader you feel like you know where this is all leading to but this is Blake Crouch! And as he masterfully leads you down a false corner without you harboring any suspicion, you never see the left hook coming to slam into you. The story picks up pace [ what with all that time-travel happening, you can argue it never really slacked off!] with the new revelations even as Barry's timeline is going to collide with Helena's. And the wrangling together of the timelines is done in a deft manner by Blake Crouch, ratcheting up terrifying levels of tension in the narrative before you realize that you are ensnared in it. The stakes keep going up until of course it all implodes.
The best part about Blake's writing is the life he breathes into his lead characters. Though between Barry and Helena, Barry comes out as a lot more real and rounded compared to Helena, who is the cold, calculating scientist with the logical objective lens of life. Barry is unpredictable, an emotional wreck and this makes him a lot more exciting as a character. His hasty often thoughtless decisions propel the narrative forwards in hitherto new directions. While yes there is a lot of high-brow scientific ideas thrown in liberally that you might not always go along with, Blake mixes it up well with the tension that he never takes the pedal off from, philosophical musings about life and death and well, yes time-travel. But beneath all that layers, is a thrumming pulse of an emotional core. About second chances, even third chances . About life and death and all that we can achieve in between. This was what ultimately touched me as a reader and I am grateful I read this book.
Before the resolution of the problem however, our protagonists actually spend a lot of "time" in a loop and I frankly felt this did do injustice to the overall pacing of the book. But no complaints beyond that really.
With Recursion, this summer you should take a couple of days off because trust me, once you start reading, you will not be able to put it down. Heed my advice, take a break. You might just lose track of time, jumping across timelines [pun intended]. This book deserves all your undivided attention and will earn it, no matter how. You been warned.
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