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3.8 AVERAGE
3.8 AVERAGE
adventurous
funny
lighthearted
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
No
adventurous
challenging
emotional
mysterious
tense
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Plot
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Complicated
Fellow readers, I don't normally read 742 page books, but the concept behind this one intrigued me. It was good. It was fun! It was maybe 100 to 120 pages too long. There was a stretch (I only read one book at a time...) where I felt like I could gloss over things a bit and still know what's going on. That said, totally a worthwhile read and I will read the sequel, just not yet.
This book of good but a little longer than it needs to be. It's but funny but it's not NOT funny either... Interesting concept, ok writing
adventurous
mysterious
fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Complicated
Perfect escapism for the pandemic: funny, involving, snarky & smart. There are physicists, polyglots, witches, government idiots (and heroes), Vikings, Walmart (!), historical goofery and wheels within wheels. Though I got a bit turned around in some of the convolutions at the end, I thoroughly enjoyed this. On every strand.
Part science fiction, part fantasy, and part amusing satire of American government bureaucracy, The Rise and Fall of D.O.D.O. is great fun at its best, even if it becomes a bit tedious and eye-rolly at its weakest. Its central conceit is that magic - good old-fashioned magic as performed by witches - died out in the 1850s due to the advance of technology, and now a secret government agency has discovered a technological way to revive it, with certain limitations on where and how it can be performed. They begin by using it exclusively for time travel, with the intention of subtly shifting the course of geopolitical events. This plan leads to adventures in the earliest colonial Massachusetts settlements, Elizabethan London, medieval Constantinople, and a few others.
The pseudoscience handwaving that goes on to explain the death and revival of magic is unsatisfying, but on the other hand it isn’t the point, and so it doesn’t interfere much with enjoyment if technical depth is not what you are looking for. (If it is, Stephenson’s Anathem covers similar ground around the many-worlds interpretation of quantum mechanics, much more thoughtfully and thoroughly - what D.O.D.O.’s witches do when they manipulate “strands” of space-time is not unlike what Anathem’s Incanters and Rhetors do when they move around in configuration space.)
There is no shortage of clever ideas in The Rise and Fall of D.O.D.O., but the execution is spotty. There are many seeds planted that are never given a good chance to bloom, like certain modern characters whose latent witchiness is hinted at, and later revealed without much direct examination. (These characters are present in the book’s final scene, which feels so blatantly like the foundation for a sequel that perhaps I am to expect these rushed-over revelations to be backfilled later.)
In some places, the writing feels as though it’s trying too hard; for example, there are segments written in the jaunty voice of Grainne, an Irish witch ca. 1600, and aren’t her folksy locutions laid on a little thick? It’s overdone to the point of annoyance they are. If sentences structured like the last two occurred one-tenth as frequently in Grainne’s sections of the book, they would have added a pleasant and evocative flavor, but as they are, they quickly become grating.
In others, though, the writing is almost phoned in. The alleged sexual chemistry between D.O.D.O.’s two principals, the ancient languages scholar Melisande Stokes and the straight-laced military operative Major Tristan Lyons, is weakly convincing at best; instead, Melisande herself, and nearly every other character who takes a turn at the narration, insist over and over again how strongly attracted they are to one another and how awkward it is that they won’t acknowledge it.
Indeed, a surfeit of telling rather than showing is the main weakness in the book’s structure, a narrative knitted together in the form of diaries, email messages, chat-log transcripts, bureaucratic reports, and other scraps of fictional primary sources, even including a 10th-century Scandinavian epic poem about a Viking band sacking a Walmart. It’s a cute idea, but it means that too much of the story is narrative summary, while not enough of it is narrative. I think part of the reason I rushed through the book is that this summary style evades immersion; it’s a rushed way of telling a story that doesn’t really invite one to settle in and watch events unfold.
I don’t know how much of the choppy storytelling and inconsistent voice is due to the way Stephenson and Galland divided up the work - I don’t know anything about their process - but the end result is a little disappointing, just not as much fun as it could have been.
The pseudoscience handwaving that goes on to explain the death and revival of magic is unsatisfying, but on the other hand it isn’t the point, and so it doesn’t interfere much with enjoyment if technical depth is not what you are looking for. (If it is, Stephenson’s Anathem covers similar ground around the many-worlds interpretation of quantum mechanics, much more thoughtfully and thoroughly - what D.O.D.O.’s witches do when they manipulate “strands” of space-time is not unlike what Anathem’s Incanters and Rhetors do when they move around in configuration space.)
There is no shortage of clever ideas in The Rise and Fall of D.O.D.O., but the execution is spotty. There are many seeds planted that are never given a good chance to bloom, like certain modern characters whose latent witchiness is hinted at, and later revealed without much direct examination. (These characters are present in the book’s final scene, which feels so blatantly like the foundation for a sequel that perhaps I am to expect these rushed-over revelations to be backfilled later.)
In some places, the writing feels as though it’s trying too hard; for example, there are segments written in the jaunty voice of Grainne, an Irish witch ca. 1600, and aren’t her folksy locutions laid on a little thick? It’s overdone to the point of annoyance they are. If sentences structured like the last two occurred one-tenth as frequently in Grainne’s sections of the book, they would have added a pleasant and evocative flavor, but as they are, they quickly become grating.
In others, though, the writing is almost phoned in. The alleged sexual chemistry between D.O.D.O.’s two principals, the ancient languages scholar Melisande Stokes and the straight-laced military operative Major Tristan Lyons, is weakly convincing at best; instead, Melisande herself, and nearly every other character who takes a turn at the narration, insist over and over again how strongly attracted they are to one another and how awkward it is that they won’t acknowledge it.
Indeed, a surfeit of telling rather than showing is the main weakness in the book’s structure, a narrative knitted together in the form of diaries, email messages, chat-log transcripts, bureaucratic reports, and other scraps of fictional primary sources, even including a 10th-century Scandinavian epic poem about a Viking band sacking a Walmart. It’s a cute idea, but it means that too much of the story is narrative summary, while not enough of it is narrative. I think part of the reason I rushed through the book is that this summary style evades immersion; it’s a rushed way of telling a story that doesn’t really invite one to settle in and watch events unfold.
I don’t know how much of the choppy storytelling and inconsistent voice is due to the way Stephenson and Galland divided up the work - I don’t know anything about their process - but the end result is a little disappointing, just not as much fun as it could have been.
I liked this take on the goings on within a government run time travel organisation.
It is a Neil Stephenson novel so it goes into tangents, but not as much as some (possibly due to the coauthor).
The format is that of a modern epistolary novel, so there are letters, chat chains , journal entries etc. I like this narrative style but it does make it harder to empathise with the characters.
The communications are very well written and don’t overdo the realism (like including addresses, codes etc). The book is worth reading for the “Lay of Walmart” alone!
As a physicist I have some objections to the quantum mechanics… but it is handled better than most
I didn’t like the openness and abruptness of the ending. It is almost like this is the pilot episode of a tv series (it would work well as such tbh)
It is a Neil Stephenson novel so it goes into tangents, but not as much as some (possibly due to the coauthor).
The format is that of a modern epistolary novel, so there are letters, chat chains , journal entries etc. I like this narrative style but it does make it harder to empathise with the characters.
The communications are very well written and don’t overdo the realism (like including addresses, codes etc). The book is worth reading for the “Lay of Walmart” alone!
As a physicist I have some objections to the quantum mechanics… but it is handled better than most
I didn’t like the openness and abruptness of the ending. It is almost like this is the pilot episode of a tv series (it would work well as such tbh)
Content Warnings
Slight butchering of quantum mechanics
Unexpectedly funny and weird. Loved the different voices and quirky characters. I can’t wait to read the second book!
The authors could have used a stronger editor- text should have been cut quite a bit. Or maybe should have been two novels? Not sure, but there was something off about the plot structure.
The authors could have used a stronger editor- text should have been cut quite a bit. Or maybe should have been two novels? Not sure, but there was something off about the plot structure.
Pretty fun book and interesting concept. Oh the play on the bureaucracy! So fun. Warning for sexually explicit content.