“Are you happy with your life?”
Those are the last words Jason Dessen hears before the masked abductor knocks him unconscious.
Before he awakens to find himself strapped to a gurney, surrounded by strangers in hazmat suits.
Before a man Jason’s never met smiles down at him and says, “Welcome back, my friend.”
In this world he’s woken up to, Jason’s life is not the one he knows. His wife is not his wife. His son was never born. And Jason is not an ordinary college physics professor, but a celebrated genius who has achieved something remarkable. Something impossible.
Is it this world or the other that’s the dream? And even if the home he remembers is real, how can Jason possibly make it back to the family he loves? The answers lie in a journey more wondrous and horrifying than anything he could’ve imagined—one that will force him to confront the darkest parts of himself even as he battles a terrifying, seemingly unbeatable foe.
Source | Format | Pages | Publisher | Genre | Publication Date |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
Amazon | ebook | 342 | Macmillan | SciFi Thriller | August 11th, 2016 |
Amazon tells me I bought the book 7 months ago… blimey… and it would probably have been another 7 months before I read it if it wasn’t for Nicki @ SecretLibrary who suggested a buddy read. Thanks, Nicki- it was most certainly the little kick I needed to finally read this book and it was a joy to constantly catch up with you to exchange thoughts as we went through the book! 😉
Everyone, pop on over to Nicki’s to say hello and check out her review 🙂
The older I get, the less I understand.
Dark Matter… Oh, boy, Dark Matter, you were the talk of the blogosphere.. You rode into town with your scifi element and thrill and won over everyone’s hearts… I mean, you popped the cherry for many a reader who hadn’t read scifi-anything before. That’s something! Now the hype has died down, I hear a bit less about you but when I do it’s mostly people saying- “Ahhh, I really need to read this book!”
I think due to the hype surrounding this book having lodged itself in my mind I did go into reading it with some high expectations. Most of those expectations were met.
What I truly loved about this book was its source of inspiration- the many worlds theory and Schrödinger’s cat thought experiment. Fascinating! Mighty fascinating! Love this stuff to bits! Even though I failed my physics/chemistry/maths throughout my education years 😀 And it’s all mind blowing the more I think about these topics… I mean, I completely love what Crouch did here- essentially he explained complicated theories in simple terms- through storytelling. And the many worlds theory has been something of a niggle at the back of my head when thinking about all things life and choices but I never actually knew the theory existed until I read this book, so there! I can name it now, explore it and have interesting inner dialogues with myself!
I did not know what to expect in terms of plot and characters… I was pleased to be hooked into the story from pretty much paragraph one and when I thought perhaps I and Nicki wouldn’t have catch ups that often, we ended up DMing each other rather frequently! That was fun! It was great to try and guess what was going to happen next, chapter after chapter. I think we both had plenty of visions in our heads on how it was all going to play out or how we wanted the story to go… Personally, I got a bit anxious because the closer to the end of the book I got, the more gargantuan I was expecting the final ‘big bang’ (tee-hee!) to be… The conclusion certainly satisfied me! Although I do have questions about what happened to all those… *cough* …’people‘!
What I didn’t that much like, or well, what kind of took away from the complete enjoyment for me was the occasional sappiness. I get it: life = love! But man, there were some serious sappy moments in this book where I just rolled my eyes and thought: Ahh, you little sappy sap, Jason!
I have to admit, though- isn’t it always the case that when the status quo is shaken and stirred, we suddenly realize that what we’ve had all along, and what we’ve been taking for granted seems a lot more valuable to us. I do think that little piece of intimacy and emotional side of it was there to please the wider group of readers, HOWEVER, it also, in my mind, has its role to highlight the differences in between the Family Man Jason versus the Scientist Jason.
In the end… I have to admit, I enjoyed what Crouch accomplished. Part thriller/part scifi, centred around the ‘old as man’ question of love and happiness.
So, the only thing for me to do is ask you: Are YOU happy with your life? I would recommend reading this book to help you visualise all the different ways your life could change and whether what you currently have in your life suffices for happiness and peace. Dark Matter definitely made me think!
I absolutely loved this book, but I did read it before it came out, before the hype train took off, so I didn’t have any expectations. I’m dying to read his next book!
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So glad you enjoyed the book 🙂 What’s his next book? I have been under a rock lately… 😀
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Eurgh, sappiness! 😦 Great review, you (as always) sell the book well and make it sound interesting. 🙂 I’ve read both good and bad things about the book, mostly good though and I’m yet to read Crouch myself yet may have to give this a go if/when time allows.
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Thank you, Drew 🙂 I am trying to find out from others what Crouch would they recommend me try out next so I can compare a bit… but I think this one is definitely worth a read. The sappiness is only in a couple of places and generally it’s one of those books that you just have to give a try 🙂 I hope you enjoy when you do get around to it 🙂
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Fantastic review! Loved our buddy read it was great fun and really helped me to read the book as well!
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It feels like a wight off the shoulders after having looked at that cover n Kindle list for months on end… it’s done! read! dusted 😀
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😀
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I’ve had this on my kindle ages too- whoops! So I guess I’m one of those people saying “I need to read this” 😉 I’m glad your expectations were met with this 😀 This sounds so interesting even though I’m not a science/maths girl either 😉 hehe nice big bang pun 😉 So happy the conclusion was satisfying. hehe I’m actually a sucker for sappiness though, so not put off by that 🙂 This sounds so intriguing! Fabulous review!
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hahaha, got ya so! 😀 Again, amongst a few other bloggers I would be MOST interested in your thoughts about this book… you would have some pretty interesting opinions about it, whether positive or negative so I shall be keeping y eye on your blog… 😉
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hehehe thank you- now I’m even more curious!!! 😉
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I love that you and Nicki buddy read this! I also appreciate that you enjoyed it way more than I did. I am not sure it is Crouch’s style or just this particular story but I struggled. I read a ton of sci-fi, old and new, so I do not mind tech jargon and fancy talk.. but there were times it was a bit droning for myself. How do I say.. it felt like “let’s insert a bunch of big words and hope it sounds smart”. It didn’t work for me. Not in the over my head sense but in a frivolous way. Oh my, I am sure I will get some heat for admitting that haha. Anyways, I thoroughly enjoyed your take on this ❤
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Thank you, Dani! 🙂 I was actually wondering about this- droning on thing. Maybe I got along with it a bit more because I am hardly a scifi connoisseur next to hardcorers like you, so it’s great to see the other angle/take on the book that is for sure. And like we briefly discussed on twitter- the whole box journey thing- as long as it won’t be turned into a very detailed TV show, we’ll be fine 😀 have you read anything else by Crouch?
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Haha. I have not honestly. This one kind of turned me off. But I know a ton of fans, so maybe one day 😉 I know Wayward Pines has a huge following.
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Yeah, Wayward Pines is being mentioned a lot… should my tbr pile ever chill the heck out, I shall try and read it 🙂
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Then you can give me a “yay” or “nay” haha.
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This sounds powerful and awesome! I definitely need to give this author a shot someday. Crouch seems to have produced some pretty quality and popular work before too; do you plan on checking them out someday? 🙂 Awesome review as always, Liz. Glad to hear how much you enjoyed it.
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You know, I would actually be VERY interested to see what you make of the book… with your seriously good analytical skills and good eye to catching out those obscure things from the story… oy, your review would be quite interesting indeed! 🙂 I did enjoy this one but I think I will hang fire before I read another Crouch book. I have heard his stuff is great but… everything in small doses, for me! 😀
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Too much praise! You did an awesome job in highlighting the subtleties yourself here! 😉 And I completely understand hahah And who knows, maybe they aren’t as impressive as Dark Matter too! We don’t want to ruin the awesomeness too soon. 😉
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Dark Matter is one of my all time favorites, so reading your review makes me happy! ❤
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Woohooo! 🙂 Have you read anything else by Crouch? if yes, would you reccommend?
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Not yet! But I’ve heard good things about his Wayward Pines series. 🙂
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I agree , after reading this book , I kept thinking of all the crossroads in my life and how life would have been had I taken a different decision. It was a fun book to read , and yes as I did mention in my review I got a bit impatient and wanted the lead character to move on and stop being so sappy .
I was also curious to know what happened to that female companion of the lead character
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ooooh… you make a really good point about the female companion! I didn’t even think of her! Now I want to know myself 😀 hahaha…
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I’m happy most of your expectations were met! As a non sci-fi reader you’ve managed to even get me interested now, but I’m not sure I can really get into it.. I know it could expand my own thoughts perhaps but it could also be that I’m holding on to my own non-beliefs so strongly that it wouldn’t make enjoyable reading. I know I know, you don’t know unless you try it.. Maybe, maybe someday :-). Great review!
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I totally understand you-haha, I love it how you foresee my challenge to you around ‘you don’t know until you try’ – because I am like that with some things/stories myself… some of those beliefs just do not want to be challenged and that’s proper great in a way because it shows that what you think about something, you believe in it firmly 🙂 Thank you for reading my review 🙂 ❤
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Yeah, I don’t mind if a person has other beliefs in a novel but I don’t want to read a book that really starts out with another belief you know, forcing me to go with it :-). Haha you know me too well 🙂
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Mmm, absolutely! It’s never nice really when something is being shoved in your face as the truth and nothing but the truth… hehe…
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Ahhhhhh! Thank you so much for sharing your thoughts on this book, although it makes me even more pissed off at that blogger who gave it a bad review and when I mentioned that another blogger we both knew had loved it, she told me it wasn’t the same book, so I didn’t request it on Netgalley. Ugh. I am definitely going to see if the library has it. 🙌🙌🙌
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Oh yes! I remember you mentioning the Dark Matter conundrum… but also defo, unless the book is on sale, I would recommend you get it rom library 🙂 I would be super intrigued to get your thoughts/take on the book!
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I really enjoyed this book! Recommended it to all my friends as soon as I finished it.
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It’s quite captivating, that is true! 🙂
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Fab review. I disliked this book -probably minority- and it’s exactly because of the sappiness you mentioned! Erk.
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Thank you 🙂
Aye, I think this book was either a like or a dislike kind of read – the sappiness was really too much but ah well 😀 I think if I hadn’t of read it, I would have itchy fingers for it because a lot of people hyped about it… at least it’s ticked off the list, hey?! 🙂
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