Recursion

"He who controls the past controls the future. He who controls the present controls the past". - George Orwell, 1984 Mindboggling, thought-provoking, innovative, convoluted. This is one of those books where I had to sit back and mull on what I just read. Every time I think Blake Crouch has achieved his magnum opus (Dark Matter) he raises the bar another level. Imagine if you will if you could have a "do-over" of your life. The majority of people would jump at the chance but not so fast! It seems like an easy question with a simple answer but it is more complex with a multitude of possible implications that we cannot even comprehend. What would happen if your memories could be replaced by new ones and you could live your life over and over again? Where do the original memories go? How would it affect the people around you and possibly the world at large? Blake Crouch tackles this conundrum beautifully in this masterpiece. Helena Smith is a brilliant neuroscientist who is trying to preserve memories to help people like her mother whose memories have been taken away by Alzheimers. Barry Sutton is a New York City policeman who is dealing with his own regrets of the past and the choices he made. Sutton is called in to try to talk down a woman who is suffering from "False Memory Syndrome" and is threatening suicide. Next to nothing is known about FMS and whether it is contagious or where it came from. What follows is an incredible combination of a time travel/alternate dimension/groundhog day type of story. I found myself pulled in from the beginning and was unable to put the book down. I had to go back and reread certain pages because the people, places, and things literally changed so rapidly. It was an intriguing and not to mention mentally exhausting read but oh so worth it. In short, I loved "Dark Matter" but I love Recursion even more. Definitely, a must-read for SciFi fans who love speculative fiction and others who enjoy reading books that make you think outside the box.