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barb4ry1's review
4.0
4.25/5
Surreal. Unpredictable. Wild. These are the words that come to mind when I think about this book. How do I even describe it?
Entropy has won the war and undone The Universe. Bizarre creatures, both human and inhuman, live in Testament, the last, half-ruined, outpost of life. Under a sky with no stars, amongst angels, demons, and dreamers. And dreams have the power to reshape reality. Or destroy it.
Heironymous Xindii, a dremurlurgy professor, investigates the case of a murder and a missing soul. Together with his friend, the Neanderthal Solomon Doomfinger, they discover the unsettling truth about the future of the Testament. Or, rather, its lack of the future.
It’s a trippy trip through a bizarre world that somehow resists creeping entropy. A spark of a unique creative thought makes it unlike every other novel out there. Watson invents a vivid, surprising world that abounds in mystical characters and fantastic ideas.
The concepts of dremurlurgy, genetic architecture, reverie prisons, sentient gospels, xelofremanine (a drug giving access to reality-shaping dreams. A HUGE oversimplification on my part) felt new. Dreamurlurgy allows to create and mould from the subconscious and project it into reality. People die from phantom bullets, or get lost in never-ending reveries. Characters include the Neandertal with IQ above 4000, a hard-boiled cop with stone skin (named Brick), Krakens, and even god himself. Xindii is a drug addict prone to flights of sociopathic fancy. We get to know parts of his story, but I can’t say I understand him.
The author proves many times his imagination is wild and untamed. He chucked the rulebook out of the window and drove over it. His work is genuinely innovative and bewildering, but also perplexing. It demands concentration and the right mood; otherwise, casual infodumps and non-linear plot-progression risk to discourage the reader. Especially if they expect straightforward answers. Spoiler alert - they’re not coming.
Though immersive and fascinating, this book is not without flaws. Initially, it feels directionless and the storyline’s unconventional structure may add to the feeling of confusion. It moves in vignettes, through shifting points of view and moments in time. Fear not, though. The storytelling soon smoothes out, and things start to make sense. I needed around 100 pages to get drawn into Watson’s narrative, but not everyone has the patience for it.
Watson’s stylistic choices will divide readers. Some will love his sophisticated vocabulary. Some will loathe it. And his passion for adjectives and overly dramatic lines (“Her cheeks turned red. Eyes like target marks in a sniper’s sight.”) will drive them mad. Violence, horror, and death suffuse the book, and it portrays many forms of abuse some readers will find disturbing. Ultimately, though, it’s the book about the power of friendship and stories. It becomes clear the closer we get to the mind-blowing ending.
Despite flaws, the ideas introduced in The Boy Who Walked too Far are deeply thought-provoking and fascinating. Those who enjoy intellectually challenging and conceptually unique novels will be thrilled. Dom Watson’s imagination is awe-inspiring, and his storytelling skills are sound. I will definitely follow the series.
Surreal. Unpredictable. Wild. These are the words that come to mind when I think about this book. How do I even describe it?
Entropy has won the war and undone The Universe. Bizarre creatures, both human and inhuman, live in Testament, the last, half-ruined, outpost of life. Under a sky with no stars, amongst angels, demons, and dreamers. And dreams have the power to reshape reality. Or destroy it.
Heironymous Xindii, a dremurlurgy professor, investigates the case of a murder and a missing soul. Together with his friend, the Neanderthal Solomon Doomfinger, they discover the unsettling truth about the future of the Testament. Or, rather, its lack of the future.
It’s a trippy trip through a bizarre world that somehow resists creeping entropy. A spark of a unique creative thought makes it unlike every other novel out there. Watson invents a vivid, surprising world that abounds in mystical characters and fantastic ideas.
The concepts of dremurlurgy, genetic architecture, reverie prisons, sentient gospels, xelofremanine (a drug giving access to reality-shaping dreams. A HUGE oversimplification on my part) felt new. Dreamurlurgy allows to create and mould from the subconscious and project it into reality. People die from phantom bullets, or get lost in never-ending reveries. Characters include the Neandertal with IQ above 4000, a hard-boiled cop with stone skin (named Brick), Krakens, and even god himself. Xindii is a drug addict prone to flights of sociopathic fancy. We get to know parts of his story, but I can’t say I understand him.
The author proves many times his imagination is wild and untamed. He chucked the rulebook out of the window and drove over it. His work is genuinely innovative and bewildering, but also perplexing. It demands concentration and the right mood; otherwise, casual infodumps and non-linear plot-progression risk to discourage the reader. Especially if they expect straightforward answers. Spoiler alert - they’re not coming.
Though immersive and fascinating, this book is not without flaws. Initially, it feels directionless and the storyline’s unconventional structure may add to the feeling of confusion. It moves in vignettes, through shifting points of view and moments in time. Fear not, though. The storytelling soon smoothes out, and things start to make sense. I needed around 100 pages to get drawn into Watson’s narrative, but not everyone has the patience for it.
Watson’s stylistic choices will divide readers. Some will love his sophisticated vocabulary. Some will loathe it. And his passion for adjectives and overly dramatic lines (“Her cheeks turned red. Eyes like target marks in a sniper’s sight.”) will drive them mad. Violence, horror, and death suffuse the book, and it portrays many forms of abuse some readers will find disturbing. Ultimately, though, it’s the book about the power of friendship and stories. It becomes clear the closer we get to the mind-blowing ending.
Despite flaws, the ideas introduced in The Boy Who Walked too Far are deeply thought-provoking and fascinating. Those who enjoy intellectually challenging and conceptually unique novels will be thrilled. Dom Watson’s imagination is awe-inspiring, and his storytelling skills are sound. I will definitely follow the series.
rowena_m_andrews's review
4.0
This was a challenging review to write, not because I didn’t love the book – because I did – but because The Boy Who Walked Too Far is a book like no other. This is a book that has looked at the rulebook and laughed as it gleefully threw it out of the bathroom window, which has resulted in a book that refuses to be limited by rules or any form of constraint. It is new, quirky to the extreme, perplexing in places and utterly captivating.
This is a book that demands your attention and your focus because if it's weird and wonderful, it can, might and will be somewhere in this book, and if you blink, it feels like you can be lost somewhere between dream and reality. It’s not hard to be caught up in this weird story though, and in the fascinating world of Testament which is an intricate melting pot of races on the brink of an ending universe, both sanctuary and cemetery for all that remains beyond Entropy. I liked that this ending place wasn’t a Utopia in any sense of the word, because it makes sense that those still clawing to survival in this world, will make for a dark, often savage world, and I will say that this certainly is not a book for the fainthearted. It is brutal, horrifying in places and touches on many sensitive topics as it explores a universe in its death throes, and life turned savage in an attempt to exist a little longer. However, while it can be a difficult read in places, it felt entirely fitting for the world that Watson had created.
The worldbuilding beyond Testament was equally fascinating and innovative. I particularly enjoyed the idea behind Dreamurlurgy, which allows things to be created and moulded from the subconscious and brought into reality, but there were so many concepts and ideas in this, adding to the melting pot feel of this world at the end of the universe. I liked how Watson has taken science and magic and faith, and smelted it all together into something new, continuing to break those rules and boundaries, and in such a way that works and creates a truly memorable book.
In terms of characters, Xindii and Doomfinger make for a commanding central duo as they are called upon to solve the mystery at the centre of this story, they are well-written, magnetic, and are the perfect guides for the unfolding story; and personally, I enjoyed the exploration of Xindii’s past although it was dark. The supporting cast is not left behind though, well-characterised and just as pivotal to the narrative, although be warned that this world is not kind to the female characters, and it would have been nice to see that as one of the things that was thrown out of the window.
This book won’t be for everyone, and I would say that it’s not an easy read – it’s brutal, it’s perplexing – but it is a fantastically weird book, and I loved it and look forward to seeing what will happen next in the Xindii chronicles.
This is a book that demands your attention and your focus because if it's weird and wonderful, it can, might and will be somewhere in this book, and if you blink, it feels like you can be lost somewhere between dream and reality. It’s not hard to be caught up in this weird story though, and in the fascinating world of Testament which is an intricate melting pot of races on the brink of an ending universe, both sanctuary and cemetery for all that remains beyond Entropy. I liked that this ending place wasn’t a Utopia in any sense of the word, because it makes sense that those still clawing to survival in this world, will make for a dark, often savage world, and I will say that this certainly is not a book for the fainthearted. It is brutal, horrifying in places and touches on many sensitive topics as it explores a universe in its death throes, and life turned savage in an attempt to exist a little longer. However, while it can be a difficult read in places, it felt entirely fitting for the world that Watson had created.
The worldbuilding beyond Testament was equally fascinating and innovative. I particularly enjoyed the idea behind Dreamurlurgy, which allows things to be created and moulded from the subconscious and brought into reality, but there were so many concepts and ideas in this, adding to the melting pot feel of this world at the end of the universe. I liked how Watson has taken science and magic and faith, and smelted it all together into something new, continuing to break those rules and boundaries, and in such a way that works and creates a truly memorable book.
In terms of characters, Xindii and Doomfinger make for a commanding central duo as they are called upon to solve the mystery at the centre of this story, they are well-written, magnetic, and are the perfect guides for the unfolding story; and personally, I enjoyed the exploration of Xindii’s past although it was dark. The supporting cast is not left behind though, well-characterised and just as pivotal to the narrative, although be warned that this world is not kind to the female characters, and it would have been nice to see that as one of the things that was thrown out of the window.
This book won’t be for everyone, and I would say that it’s not an easy read – it’s brutal, it’s perplexing – but it is a fantastically weird book, and I loved it and look forward to seeing what will happen next in the Xindii chronicles.
nick_borrelli's review
4.0
I don't think I've ever read a book quite like THE BOY WHO WALKED TOO FAR. There are so many different elements and influences fused into the story that it really makes for a multi-textured and fascinating read that keeps you guessing throughout. At times it felt like a murder mystery SF story, it also had moments of unrelenting dark fiction, futuristic SF, and fantasy. So to say that this story really makes your head spin (in a good way) is an understatement.
I don't want to get too much into specifics about the plot because I feel like describing anything in further detail from the book blurb will give away too much. I will say that the I couldn't help but be reminded of Isaac Asimov's Robot series, most specifically The Caves of Steel, as the mystery of Felstrom's death was being investigated. As the circumstances begin to get revealed gradually, the parallels to that series by Asimov were inescapable in my opinion. Yet THE BOY WHO WALKED TOO FAR has a lot more going on than just a SF Noir tale in a futuristic world.
I will say that this is not an easy read that you can just pick up with a lot of distractions happening around you and still be able to follow it. Quite the contrary, as there are so many subtle things that occur which if you miss, will make it really hard for you to reconnect with what is happening. So you really need to focus on every aspect of the plot because events occur early on in the book that are important for later on.
The world-building is out of this world great (no pun intended). Dom Watson has created such a deep and wondrous setting with Testament and its environs that this book is such a pleasure to read almost based on that alone. When you add to that some terrific characters, a wickedly dark and brutal story line, and a mystery that is incredibly intriguing and keeps you hooked to the very last page, the result is a genre-traversing story that both entertains and horrifies at the same time. I look forward to reading more books by Dom Watson and also to seeing where he takes this series in particular. If you are looking for a different and challenging read that is far from the usual fluff variety, pick up a copy of THE BOY WHO WALKED TOO FAR.
I don't want to get too much into specifics about the plot because I feel like describing anything in further detail from the book blurb will give away too much. I will say that the I couldn't help but be reminded of Isaac Asimov's Robot series, most specifically The Caves of Steel, as the mystery of Felstrom's death was being investigated. As the circumstances begin to get revealed gradually, the parallels to that series by Asimov were inescapable in my opinion. Yet THE BOY WHO WALKED TOO FAR has a lot more going on than just a SF Noir tale in a futuristic world.
I will say that this is not an easy read that you can just pick up with a lot of distractions happening around you and still be able to follow it. Quite the contrary, as there are so many subtle things that occur which if you miss, will make it really hard for you to reconnect with what is happening. So you really need to focus on every aspect of the plot because events occur early on in the book that are important for later on.
The world-building is out of this world great (no pun intended). Dom Watson has created such a deep and wondrous setting with Testament and its environs that this book is such a pleasure to read almost based on that alone. When you add to that some terrific characters, a wickedly dark and brutal story line, and a mystery that is incredibly intriguing and keeps you hooked to the very last page, the result is a genre-traversing story that both entertains and horrifies at the same time. I look forward to reading more books by Dom Watson and also to seeing where he takes this series in particular. If you are looking for a different and challenging read that is far from the usual fluff variety, pick up a copy of THE BOY WHO WALKED TOO FAR.
davramlocke's review
4.0
Originally reviewed for the SPFBO over at http://fantasybookcritic.blogspot.com.
Defining fantasy, as a genre of literature, is one of the trickiest things in this industry. There are so many sub-genres now, as well as decriers of genre who insist that everything should simply be called literature, that to enter a contest like the SFBPO is to hope that whoever reads your work will see it as you see it. Dom Watson claims that THE BOY WHO WALKED TOO FAR is a fantasy novel, an implicit fact in his entering this contest, but there might be some who would disagree. This novel is set millions of years into the future, the year 11,234,097 to be precise, and imagines a world in which humans have survived until the end of time.
It is a book about dreams, and a “magic” system called Dreamurlurgy that is mastered by only a select handful of beings. There are different species of humans in this book and ancient, demonic gods - possibly even God him- or herself. There are DNA-engineered elephants in Watson’s vision, shrunk to trot around at peoples’ feet like dogs. This is a complicated novel that likely defies genre, and while some might not see it as the cut-and-dried sword-and-sorcery fantasy that we are used to when we browse our local library shelves, in some ways I believe that Dom Watson’s work embodies the spirit of fantasy as much if not more than most of what we know. This is a work of imagination, unlimited by time and space, and for that I think it is not only a worthy entry into this contest, but possibly one of the best.
Xindii Heironymous is a Mapper - one of the best Mappers living or dead. He is able to infiltrate dreams, control them, and even trap people into their own Reveries - states of perpetual dream that they are unable to escape from unless the Mapper wills it. Xindii’s home is Testament, the last bastion at the edge of civilization. Time is ending, and Testament stands as the spot where living creatures will make their stand. But it is a city, and cities must function as they do, and so in Testament, Xindii serves not only as a professor in the most prestigious university in town, but as an investigator into potential dream-related crimes. When Godrich Felstrom is devoured by a supernatural horror in the middle of a bar, Xindii, along with his lifelong friend and half-ape hyper-genius Solomon Doomfinger, is called upon by the Auditors, a group of mathematical rulers who seek to record every living thing’s number into their grand algorhythm that allows them to predict the future, to figure out how and why Godrich was killed.
If that paragraph feels like a very large and confusing info dump, welcome to THE BOY WHO WALKED TOO FAR. This book can be incredibly confusing, particularly at the onset. Watson is not shy about throwing his readers terms that he never explains, or only subtly explains via context clues and careful reading. One of the book’s many flaws, in fact, is this inability to convey what the hell is actually going on. This can be a strength, however, in the right hands, and Dom Watson very nearly succeeds in wielding those hands.
What begins as a seemingly standard Doyle-esque murder mystery, albeit set far into the future, quickly evolves into the kind of adventure that would make a Doctor Who episode look boring. I would be remiss if I didn’t mention Xindii in the same sentence as a Doctor or a Sherlock Holmes or even a Gregory House because he is of this same ilk. His addiction to a violent and horrible drug, along with a dark and tortured past, are offset by a personality infectious in its zest for life and the ability to fling himself headlong into adventure. Xindii’s charm is balanced by Solomon Doomfinger’s austerity and poise, and while some might accuse Watson of taking too much formula from Doyle and Steven Moffat, these types of pairings work and to great effect in this author’s hands.
Xindii and Doomfinger are but two in a wide cast of characters. They are joined by Brick, an inspector who brings the hard-boiled trope to life and whose skin is made of literal stone. Bliss, a seemingly innocuous woman who is actually the very first of her kind to exist, and a cast of villains that range from the blackest evil to the ones we feel can be saved if we just love them enough. Watson plays with morality in this novel like a philosopher who has studied it for decades, and no one comes in or out with a clean slate.
The Boy Who Walked Too Far takes place almost entirely in the city of Testament - the last stand of humanity. It is here that all the races, human and sub-human alike have to attempt a life against the backdrop of civilization’s end. In humorous fashion, Watson is perpetually detailing aspects of this town that are both laughable and unbelievable. Starbucks is still around, for instance, and LED lights are still somehow in fashion. God, the ultimate creator of reality, has his own district and house that would make Doctor Strange jealous. But thankfully, Watson’s humor is ingrained in the very nature of his writing, and he manages to make this novel both deadly serious and out-loud funny at the same time. Few novels can even do one of these properly, but Watson weaves them in the most human and authentic way.
The Boy Who Walked Too Far’s plot does follow the murder-mystery trope in its initial stages, but it does not take long to blossom into a full-fledged world-ending saga. Watson does a beautiful job weaving Xindii’s past into the current narrative. He does so purely in italics, which I found jarring and unnecessary, but as with many aspects, this book needs an editor’s eyes to correct such potential mistakes. Without getting into the spoiler-weeds too far, there is one aspect of The Boy’s plot that I feel needs to be praised above others. Well into the novel we are introduced to the idea that stories burrow into the mind and stay there. A tale we heard as a child never leaves and only needs the right cue to call it forth. This is a lovely idea and one we are all probably familiar with. Dom Watson ruins this. He creates of storytelling a literal monster, and it is a brilliant accomplishment that I have never seen in any other narrative medium. Watson makes a story an evil thing, and despite my overwhelming love of story, I’m not even mad about it. In a book full of the kind of creativity all authors should aspire to, it is this one portion in particular that I will never forget
It is frustrating that The Boy Who Walked Too Far is so riddled with errors. Some of these are commonplace mistakes, a plethora of sentence fragments or a name spelled differently in multiple places. Some are more egregious, like an entire scene replicated twice that spans several pages - a situation particularly frustrating in a novel about dreams and experimentation where one might not realize that they are reading a mistake until they have pored over it several times.
CONCLUSION: The truth is, I’m not sure that this novel can win SFBPO with the sheer amount of editing that it needs, and this is a tragedy to me because I truly love this book. Whether or not Dom Watson makes it past the first round or into the finals is irrelevant to me (though certainly not to him!) because he has found himself at least one reader who will evangelize his flawed masterpiece to anyone who will listen. The Boy Who Walked Too Far is far and away my number one choice for advancement into the SFBPO semi-finals.
Defining fantasy, as a genre of literature, is one of the trickiest things in this industry. There are so many sub-genres now, as well as decriers of genre who insist that everything should simply be called literature, that to enter a contest like the SFBPO is to hope that whoever reads your work will see it as you see it. Dom Watson claims that THE BOY WHO WALKED TOO FAR is a fantasy novel, an implicit fact in his entering this contest, but there might be some who would disagree. This novel is set millions of years into the future, the year 11,234,097 to be precise, and imagines a world in which humans have survived until the end of time.
It is a book about dreams, and a “magic” system called Dreamurlurgy that is mastered by only a select handful of beings. There are different species of humans in this book and ancient, demonic gods - possibly even God him- or herself. There are DNA-engineered elephants in Watson’s vision, shrunk to trot around at peoples’ feet like dogs. This is a complicated novel that likely defies genre, and while some might not see it as the cut-and-dried sword-and-sorcery fantasy that we are used to when we browse our local library shelves, in some ways I believe that Dom Watson’s work embodies the spirit of fantasy as much if not more than most of what we know. This is a work of imagination, unlimited by time and space, and for that I think it is not only a worthy entry into this contest, but possibly one of the best.
Xindii Heironymous is a Mapper - one of the best Mappers living or dead. He is able to infiltrate dreams, control them, and even trap people into their own Reveries - states of perpetual dream that they are unable to escape from unless the Mapper wills it. Xindii’s home is Testament, the last bastion at the edge of civilization. Time is ending, and Testament stands as the spot where living creatures will make their stand. But it is a city, and cities must function as they do, and so in Testament, Xindii serves not only as a professor in the most prestigious university in town, but as an investigator into potential dream-related crimes. When Godrich Felstrom is devoured by a supernatural horror in the middle of a bar, Xindii, along with his lifelong friend and half-ape hyper-genius Solomon Doomfinger, is called upon by the Auditors, a group of mathematical rulers who seek to record every living thing’s number into their grand algorhythm that allows them to predict the future, to figure out how and why Godrich was killed.
If that paragraph feels like a very large and confusing info dump, welcome to THE BOY WHO WALKED TOO FAR. This book can be incredibly confusing, particularly at the onset. Watson is not shy about throwing his readers terms that he never explains, or only subtly explains via context clues and careful reading. One of the book’s many flaws, in fact, is this inability to convey what the hell is actually going on. This can be a strength, however, in the right hands, and Dom Watson very nearly succeeds in wielding those hands.
What begins as a seemingly standard Doyle-esque murder mystery, albeit set far into the future, quickly evolves into the kind of adventure that would make a Doctor Who episode look boring. I would be remiss if I didn’t mention Xindii in the same sentence as a Doctor or a Sherlock Holmes or even a Gregory House because he is of this same ilk. His addiction to a violent and horrible drug, along with a dark and tortured past, are offset by a personality infectious in its zest for life and the ability to fling himself headlong into adventure. Xindii’s charm is balanced by Solomon Doomfinger’s austerity and poise, and while some might accuse Watson of taking too much formula from Doyle and Steven Moffat, these types of pairings work and to great effect in this author’s hands.
Xindii and Doomfinger are but two in a wide cast of characters. They are joined by Brick, an inspector who brings the hard-boiled trope to life and whose skin is made of literal stone. Bliss, a seemingly innocuous woman who is actually the very first of her kind to exist, and a cast of villains that range from the blackest evil to the ones we feel can be saved if we just love them enough. Watson plays with morality in this novel like a philosopher who has studied it for decades, and no one comes in or out with a clean slate.
The Boy Who Walked Too Far takes place almost entirely in the city of Testament - the last stand of humanity. It is here that all the races, human and sub-human alike have to attempt a life against the backdrop of civilization’s end. In humorous fashion, Watson is perpetually detailing aspects of this town that are both laughable and unbelievable. Starbucks is still around, for instance, and LED lights are still somehow in fashion. God, the ultimate creator of reality, has his own district and house that would make Doctor Strange jealous. But thankfully, Watson’s humor is ingrained in the very nature of his writing, and he manages to make this novel both deadly serious and out-loud funny at the same time. Few novels can even do one of these properly, but Watson weaves them in the most human and authentic way.
The Boy Who Walked Too Far’s plot does follow the murder-mystery trope in its initial stages, but it does not take long to blossom into a full-fledged world-ending saga. Watson does a beautiful job weaving Xindii’s past into the current narrative. He does so purely in italics, which I found jarring and unnecessary, but as with many aspects, this book needs an editor’s eyes to correct such potential mistakes. Without getting into the spoiler-weeds too far, there is one aspect of The Boy’s plot that I feel needs to be praised above others. Well into the novel we are introduced to the idea that stories burrow into the mind and stay there. A tale we heard as a child never leaves and only needs the right cue to call it forth. This is a lovely idea and one we are all probably familiar with. Dom Watson ruins this. He creates of storytelling a literal monster, and it is a brilliant accomplishment that I have never seen in any other narrative medium. Watson makes a story an evil thing, and despite my overwhelming love of story, I’m not even mad about it. In a book full of the kind of creativity all authors should aspire to, it is this one portion in particular that I will never forget
It is frustrating that The Boy Who Walked Too Far is so riddled with errors. Some of these are commonplace mistakes, a plethora of sentence fragments or a name spelled differently in multiple places. Some are more egregious, like an entire scene replicated twice that spans several pages - a situation particularly frustrating in a novel about dreams and experimentation where one might not realize that they are reading a mistake until they have pored over it several times.
CONCLUSION: The truth is, I’m not sure that this novel can win SFBPO with the sheer amount of editing that it needs, and this is a tragedy to me because I truly love this book. Whether or not Dom Watson makes it past the first round or into the finals is irrelevant to me (though certainly not to him!) because he has found himself at least one reader who will evangelize his flawed masterpiece to anyone who will listen. The Boy Who Walked Too Far is far and away my number one choice for advancement into the SFBPO semi-finals.
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