Reviews with content warning for Cursing - Dark Matter

Clever sci-fi thriller with a dash of spousal romance :) It started off blazing but lost quite a bit of steam and got a little convoluted but overall was good enough to keep me turning the page.

Explores themes of regret, what ifs, is the grass greener on the path not travelled?, identity, ego and what makes a life meaningful and fulfilling.

The only issue I had was the way

all the Jasons' seem to view/treat Daniela like she was a piece of meat that they could manipulate, muck about and be dishonest with in order to suit their own needs and the choices they made = choices they made without her say (the end being the exception when she is finally included). It was all THEIR road not travelled they were exploring. They also all tricked her and slept with her - even the "good Jason", before telling her the truth. Made my skin crawl. Actually all the Jason's were varying degrees of icky to me. Still, I don't have to like the main character to appreciate an otherwise good and thought provoking story.

The narrator is fine but not my fave and ended up borrowing the book from my library instead.

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abbiechron's review against another edition

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challenging dark emotional mysterious reflective sad tense fast-paced

Strong character development? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

This book WRECKED me. Incredible.

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tabea1409's review against another edition

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adventurous challenging informative mysterious tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

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micaelamariem's review against another edition

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adventurous dark emotional informative reflective tense fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? It's complicated
Loveable characters? It's complicated
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

4.0

This book was mind-blowing. I’ve always been interested in string theory on a very basic level and that’s what this book plays around with. What if there’s a version of us for every decision we make? What if there is an infinity of universes out there? I loved the thrill of watching the character grapple with this. The characters were multifaceted. And there’s a word limit on here now so I guess that’s it.

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tyras_bookshelf's review against another edition

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adventurous challenging dark emotional hopeful mysterious reflective tense fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Character
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? No

4.0

I really liked the book, fast paced and entertaining even if the science felt like nonsense at times.

It’s mostly sci-fi but the overall theme of the book is like “choose love” but also “life is full of choices and we have to be okay with ours”.

*spoilers ahead*

The ending was too open ended to be enjoyable to me. Knowing the elements of the box (and the rules that the book set up), I don’t trust that they are just safe at the end. Charlie came back around to be such a central part of the ending when he barely felt like a character throughout the book so that didn’t feel realistic either. I think it would have been more poetic for Daniela to have chosen the world. Ryan should have been a bigger part of the story too.

The book was actually pretty violent and weirdly sexual at times- or like too focused on it. I thought it was interesting that Daniela could only tell Jason1 was the real one by having sex with him.

Crouch kinda wrote himself into a hole with the Jason’s outthinking themselves because if they’re the same then why wouldn’t all the Jason’s have come to that same conclusion? but I’m choosing to believe that jason1 was so fundamentally attached to his world that he was the only one who could think that way to outsmart the others.

Some of the plot points weren’t explained away well enough like letting all the other Jason’s get to v1 world was too easy and I didn’t track how that happened. And the ending was like “and they all lived happily ever after”. Yes, there was a bunch of murder at the end but we don’t get to see the new world they walk into? After all that build up, the payoff didn’t feel as sweet.

I liked it, I recommend but much of the science and prose was quickly skipped over so I could stay with the plot. Overall, pretty good read and very creative.

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dev921's review against another edition

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adventurous dark emotional mysterious sad tense fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? Yes
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

5.0

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marayzex's review against another edition

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adventurous dark hopeful mysterious reflective tense fast-paced

Plot- or character-driven? Plot
Strong character development? No
Loveable characters? No
Diverse cast of characters? No
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

4.25

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shanaepraystoo's review against another edition

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adventurous emotional hopeful informative inspiring mysterious tense medium-paced

Plot- or character-driven? A mix
Strong character development? Yes
Loveable characters? N/A
Diverse cast of characters? N/A
Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

4.25

Dark Matter is not my typical read. The book is sci-fi, a thriller with a mystery component. Blake Crouch may have introduced me to a new genre because I absolutely loved Dark Matter. The characters are well written plus the story is cohesive and thought provoking. Dark Matter will have you thinking about life in a whole new way. I’ve got to get an Apple TV subscription so that I can watch the television series. I highly recommend Dark Matter for anyone looking for an engaging thriller, mystery or sci-fi book. The audiobook is also really good!

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