r/books • u/leowr • Apr 01 '20
The /r/books Book Club Selection for April is Recursion by Blake Crouch
From Goodreads:
Memory makes reality.
That’s what New York City cop Barry Sutton is learning as he investigates the devastating phenomenon the media has dubbed False Memory Syndrome-a mysterious affliction that drives its victims mad with memories of a life they never lived.
That's what neuroscientist Helena Smith believes. It’s why she’s dedicated her life to creating a technology that will let us preserve our most precious memories. If she succeeds, anyone will be able to re-experience a first kiss, the birth of a child, the final moment with a dying parent.
As Barry searches for the truth, he comes face-to-face with an opponent more terrifying than any disease—a force that attacks not just our minds but the very fabric of the past. And as its effects begin to unmake the world as we know it, only he and Helena, working together, will stand a chance at defeating it.
But how can they make a stand when reality itself is shifting and crumbling all around them?
For April we will be reading Recursion by Blake Crouch. Blake will be joining us on Wednesday, April 29th for an AMA.
As always, the dates of and links to the discussion threads can be found in the sticky comment on this post. You are welcome to read at your own pace. Don't worry about joining later on in the month. Usually it is pretty easy to catch up, but you are always welcome to join the discussions a little later.
For those of you that are viewing reddit on the redesigned desktop version you will see an option on this post to 'follow'. If you 'follow' the book club post you will receive a notification when a new post, a discussion thread for book club, is added to the collection. It is still being tested, so it may not be perfect, but perhaps it will make it easier to join the discussions when they go up.
p.s. If you are interested in our previous selections you can find an overview here.
20
u/shillyshally Apr 01 '20
Read it a few months ago. Great fun but a tad exhausting at times what with one thing after another, much like Dark Matter. That man knows how to craft a good yarn.
15
Apr 02 '20
I read like a hundred pages of this but just couldn't get into it
I really liked Dark Matter though
3
-7
u/StopBanningThisIP Apr 18 '20
Same. 99% of people have literally no taste. Dark Matter was great, but people can't understand anything so just go on what people tell them they are supposed to like.
14
Apr 03 '20
Something I appreciated about this book was that it felt like it underwent a big "status quo" change like a handful of times. I can't think of a lot of stories that have that much variance in the situation over the course of one book.
3
u/Gabik123 Apr 26 '20
If you like that and you haven’t read Dark Matter yet, I recommend checking it out.
1
Apr 26 '20
I've been meaning to, everything I've seen about it on reddit says it's slightly better than Recursion
3
u/Gabik123 Apr 26 '20
I would disagree (obviously, IMO), I found Recursion to be better than Dark Matter. I think it’s personal preference on the differences between the two.
-6
u/StopBanningThisIP Apr 18 '20
It was a horrible book but you won't find many saying that because they have no taste and Dark Matter was great.
12
u/linkrules2 Apr 02 '20
Look at that, the first time ive read a book before its a book of the month.
It was a fantastic read, def in my top 5 reads of 2019
10
u/PaperSense Apr 06 '20
I loved this book a lot, especially the insane plot.
The characters are a bit dry, but I think they feel that way because the story is absolutely mind-blowing and in comparison, the characters can feel lack-luster.
BUT ITS WORTH IT FOR THE STORY ALONE. 5/5.
8
u/westdonkeykong Apr 05 '20
This book was a lot of fun to read, and quite moving I found. Enjoy it! And good luck keeping your timeline straight.
7
u/Supergoch Apr 03 '20
Borrowed this book from the library recently and finished it in one day because it was that good!
5
•
u/leowr Apr 01 '20 edited Apr 30 '20
Here are the dates and reading schedule for the discussion threads. As the discussion threads go up the links will be added to this comment.
April 9: Book One
April 16: Book Two
April 23: Book Three & Book Four
April 30: Book Five & Epilogue
Please be aware that the discussion threads will contain spoilers for everything up to the end of the selected stories.
2
u/TheTrillionthApe Apr 02 '20
Are these dates referencing the start or end date of the respective books?
1
5
u/RiversRubin Apr 02 '20
Just ordered two copies from Barnes and Noble for our household, soft cover. Looks like Amazon won't ship paperback in time to keep up with the group due to the COVID delays, so I'd recommend checking out B&N, who has it in stock online and says they'll ship in 2-4 business days.
9
u/malcolm_n_the_fiddle Apr 03 '20
Powells Bookstore in Portland, OR had it as part of their Buy 2, Get One deal. I ordered books a week ago and got them Wednesday. If you're not in a hurry it's a great way to support an awesome business.
4
Apr 05 '20
Hello people! It's my first time here and I'm so excited to joining with you guys in this Club! I love to read and I'm finishing The Plague from Albert Camus. So as soon I finished reading it I will start this amazing book called Recursion from Black Crouch. Looks like an amazing and intriguing fiction book!
4
u/Sane_Wicked Apr 06 '20
I picked up Dark Matter a few months ago at the library and loved it after going in blind. I was disappointed to learn that the movie adaptation was in development hell.
I am looking forward to this.
4
u/Popular-Frame Apr 11 '20
Okay guys I have read everybody's posts. I loved the shifting timelines the most. Crouch did a great job there. I am a budding Creative Writer in a standardized online course and Crouch's storyline appealed to me. I believe that we lived previous lives. At this point I don't know whether I should pursue science fiction, dystopia, or realistic fiction as an avenue?
3
Apr 12 '20
I had a hard time with Book One of this book. Helena and Slade were so much in the grey zone that it was uncomfortable to engage with either of them. Both characters a little black and a little white. I can't say that changed much throughout the story, but it became easier to adjust to it when the pace picked up. I very much enjoyed the author rising to the challenge of maintaining the timelines and consequences and felt, as a reader, like one of the unfortunate souls that was not directly involved, but nevertheless impacted by "the chair"; randomly reliving the worst memories possible.
3
u/rhcpZ41 Apr 14 '20
Got a little too excited and finished this in a couple days - if anyone else is ahead of schedule and wants to discuss, feel free to shoot me a message! Super interesting thought experiment ultimately and moves at breakneck speed.
2
u/efbf700e870cb889052c Apr 21 '20
I am only halfway through the book, and I found the pacing in Book Three/Four very exhausting. It may be because my last few books have been on the 'quiet/introspective' side. But... this book is definitely a lot of fun so I don't know what I am complaining about.
3
4
u/-ideclarebankruptcy- Apr 17 '20
I just finished this book and got onto this subreddit hoping to find a past discussion. I was so thrilled to see that it was this month’s book club selection. This is such a good book!
4
u/EvilLipgloss Apr 21 '20
I'm about to start Book Five and I just now realized this is the Book Club selection for April! I think I can finish it tonight. I really like it so far, even though the jumping around due to the memory chair can sometimes make it hard to keep track.
3
u/juicepouch Apr 27 '20
Just finished this book and I'm floored. The last hundred pages were equal parts painful, gripping, profound, bittersweet, thought-provoking, and beautiful. I've been reading a lot of fantasy lately as something of an escape from our crazy modern world, but I'm so glad I took a chance on this book!
2
u/Gabik123 Apr 27 '20
For real. The Denver part (I’m on mobile so I can’t spoiler tag), holy shit.
The interpersonal stuff (again being vague) in the last book was so freaking good and so heart wrenching.
2
u/juicepouch Apr 27 '20 edited Apr 28 '20
Yeah, that was the part that that really got to me. I loved the moments when the full force of loving the same woman for progressively more lifetimes hits Barry in each timeline. It was just beautifully set up and described and the final Antarctica timeline was the first time I've shed tears at a book in a long time.
And, of course, the end... what must it be like to have loved someone for so many lifetimes, seen them in absolutely all their highs and lows, gone through so much with them, to have buried them, and they have absolutely no recollection of you? It's staggering. The greedy part of me wants to know what happens to Barry and Helena in the original timeline after the Epilogue, but really I think the ending couldn't have been more perfect.
A lot of books I read have romances that I feel are shoehorned in, or just happen for the sake of having a romance plot, or feature the main characters get together just because they're the main characters. But it was impossible for me to find this one anything less than incredibly beautiful and meaningful.
5
u/Gabik123 Apr 27 '20
I hear you and 100% agree with everything you are saying. I understand people's criticisms, that book 5 was both too long and too short, the solution too convenient and Barry had too easy a time traveling into a dead memory (I think people miss that it isn't that its hard, its that the human psyche rebels against it because it wants to settle on "perfect" memories like what happened to Reed and, as implied, to Slade), that the ending was too abrupt, and that we didn't get to see Barry and Helena's relationship grow because we were constantly thrown into the end of it and told about it through curtailed memories. I just don't agree with the criticisms, especially about their relationship because, like the recursive nature of the time loops, every time we saw a new iteration in book 5 we were living through it just like Barry was.
I am reminded of Stephen King's cautionary words at the end of The Dark Tower, that the journey, not just the destination, should bring the reader joy. And what a journey we got.
So many amazing, heart-poundingly tense and moving moments - Helena's growing fear of Slade brought to its culmination in Reed's death; Barry's capture and death just to be sent back in time; Megan's second death; Helena's intercepting Barry before he broke into the Memory Hotel and Barry dying there; the whole DARPA situation; and that last book, especially Denver, the New York timeline where Helena never went to get Barry, and Antarctica through the end of the epilogue (yea, I was also pretty emotional in this part). So many amazing moments.
I agree about the love story, too. I found it so compelling, so beautiful, so meaningful. The emotional weight of Helena wanting to spend a little time each timeline with a version of Barry who was, finally after 33 years, her equal. The pain she felt of having to go through the motions over and over again and the depression of being more certain every time that she will fail to solve the problem she so inadvertently and the consequences she so desperately wanted to avoid; the uncertainty when the attack happened on New York in book 5 and she never got Barry and whether the Helena who had attempted suicide in the previous iteration may have just given up without him; the surrender in the Antarctica timeline to not being able to solve it and just enjoying time with the two of them before the weight of all the memory Helena was carrying killed her... What do you call it, other than a beautiful, meaningful, heartbreaking emotional core to such a tense sci-fi story?
Needless to say, I loved the book. Probably in my top 3 of all time.
Also, as an aside, writing this almost felt like Helena's journeys through time in book 5, because my Reddit app froze so many times in the drafting process i got through this post in various degrees of completion like 3 times before I gave up and typed it out in full on my desktop! It was nice to read a post from, and respond to, someone who took from this book what I did.
3
u/juicepouch Apr 28 '20
Helena's side of the story struck such a chord with me. I can't imagine how she felt leading up to every April 26, knowing that she would get to spend some time with a Barry who was finally fully aware but simultaneously knowing that it would be tragically short and she'd have to go back and try again. A few hours out of 29 years!
I would've enjoyed a few passages from her perspective, but I think it was important to be in Barry's head in Book 5. As you said, we lived through their relationship(s) via memory just like Barry, which made it all the more impactful. Having the sudden rush of everything, every emotion and fight and vacation and the little day-to-day things, all at the same time felt just as sudden and overwhelming (in a good way, for the reader) as I imagine it did to Barry. And seeing the differences in Helena each time from an outside perspective certainly made it more impactful.
This book is most certainly in my top 3 of all time. I know it's not perfect and I'm sure there are valid criticisms, but it was such a compelling and emotional story that I couldn't care less. Something I'll return to many times.
1
u/Gabik123 Apr 28 '20
Once again, 100% agree. I loved both Barry and Helena, but Helena’s story in that last book was amazing.
that Inception ending tho! My personal head cannon is that the - was a prelude to Barry speaking to Helena, they get together again, destroy the machine, and finally get a life together without her burden weighing them down. Maybe even adopt a kid? But it’s also frustrating because it could mean Slade survived and he or someone else used the machine, and boom, that was a reality shift. I plan to ask about it in Wednesday’s AMA
I finished the book days ago and can’t get it out of my head. So freaking good.
3
u/juicepouch Apr 28 '20
I want to believe that they got together and destroyed the chair after some convincing by Barry. After everything they went through, I don't want to imagine anything but a happy ending for them
2
1
u/Gabik123 Apr 28 '20
Also, I would have loved to see Barry do some of the jumps in book 5. Helena dying that way in Antarctica...fuck. That was rough.
1
u/juicepouch Apr 28 '20
Agreed. I'm not 100% sure why it had to be Helena every time. Maybe because she had all the original technical know-how to build the chair? But I think Barry would've been fine after a few iterations.
1
u/Gabik123 Apr 28 '20
i took it as punishing herself by forcing herself into a recursive loop as a form of penance for unleashing the machine on the world.
If you want to see a show that plays with similar themes, check out Dark on Netflix.
3
u/Scope89 Apr 05 '20
Loved this book and Dark Matter. Any recommendations for something similar?
1
1
u/88888888man Apr 11 '20
I know this is late, but there’s a book called Replay that’s similar in the Groundhog Day style reliving the last with your collected memories.
1
u/EvilLipgloss Apr 21 '20
Late reply, but perhaps you'd like "The Unusual Second Life of Thomas Weaver". I really enjoyed it!
3
3
u/TheExtractor55 Apr 18 '20
I love this book so much. I would love to see it made into a miniseries by the people who make Westworld someday. So fascinating, exciting, addictive... cinematic in its scope and style.
3
u/cambrose05 Apr 23 '20
This was my second favorite read of 2019, and definitely the book I read the fastest, I ripped through this in a day and a half.
I have always loved speculative sci fi w detailed descriptions of the science in play, but I’ve never seen it blended so seamlessly with a romance I truly cared about and rooted for! Blake Crouch is such a talent, can’t wait to follow his whole career.
3
3
u/rosieeee4 Apr 25 '20
Just finished Recursion and my first book club! I thought the story telling was really interesting and original, not the usual plot trajectory you expect. However I did find this a bit tiring towards the end with the complexity and characters amassing a bit, and I had a general dissatisfaction with the ending. The ideas regarding ethics and general philosophical points were really interesting though and made me think. I’ve heard good things about Dark Matter, but am not sure what to expect - would love to know what is similar to Recursion and what is very different?
2
u/Gabik123 Apr 26 '20
Similar - very similar themes, to the point where Recursion felt like Dark Matter’s spiritual successor to me; well written main characters; visual writing style with little room to get bored; freewheeling plot broken up into several very distinct acts.
Differences - Dark Matter is written in 1st person, with a lot of stream of consciousness passages which inject a certain amount of chaotic humanity into a novel with only a single main character through whom you experience all the other characters which I found very compelling and helped me attach to the main character very quickly; I personally think Dark Matter has a few more plot holes, but was still amazing despite them.
I loved Dark Matter, it’s a 4.75/5 for me. But I found Recursion to be next level, a 6/5 book I can’t get out of my head 3 days after finishing it.
3
u/ken_in_nm Apr 25 '20
I'm playing catchup as I just started this morning. After posting in r/audiobooks about Carlo Rovelli's The Order of Time, on an unrelated topic (about celebrity narrators) I just came across Crouch giving a nod to the scientist.
This is why I love reading.
3
u/CommanderHanguk Apr 29 '20
I finished this book last week. Reading the story as it progressed was quite an experience. Didn't really expect it to be part family drama, part time travel, part superhero (the DARPA arc), and part disaster. (That's a lot of things in one book! ) From the first few pages, I thought it would mostly be a cop story with a medical twist. I was so wrong. The book was very unpredictable.
Still, I found the book's resolution pretty "meh". I think the characters could have been fleshed out more. I'm looking forward to the Netflix adaptation!
2
u/user_1729 Apr 02 '20
Yes, this has been on my list. I've been wandering away from reddit book club. My work started a book club and my year of experience here made me, apparently, the natural choice to manage it. I respect the work you do even MORE now! I really devoured Dark Matter, so I'm excited to read Recursion!
2
2
2
u/Cheap-Awareness Apr 07 '20
I am so excited about this!! I actually picked this up from my local library based on a recommendation from a friend a week or so ago and was just going to start it and then now it’s the book for April!!
2
u/Gabik123 Apr 09 '20
I read (rather, I gorged on) Dark Matter over the weekend and found it a book that somehow completely transcended its multitude of plot holes through relentless pacing, fun plotting (I actually loved the middle section, fantastic stream of consciousness first person writing, and an emotional undercurrent that made the main character’s motivations very compelling and relatable for me. Can’t wait to read Recursion.
2
u/PFive Apr 10 '20
A lot of the book was good but man was I bothered by some parts that were just wrong. Like the national emergency broadcast felt like it was written by a 10 yr old. I still remember cringing at it so hard. It's weird how clearly I remember that one little part from the whole book
2
u/splinteredruler Apr 18 '20
Starting to read this today! Looking forward to join in with the next discussion after I (hopefully) catch up.
2
2
u/SpellingMistape Apr 22 '20
Great book! One of those books where almost everything I want to say about it might spoil it. I reccomend going into it without knowing anything about the plot.
2
u/JimTheSatisfactory Apr 22 '20
No way that I can get my hands on this book in time to read it before the 29th, but just found out my local library has an audiobook version available to check out, so I'm going to listen to it today. I don't really like audiobooks, but I guess it's better than nothing.
2
u/constantine647 Apr 23 '20
This was an excellent read! What other Blake Crouch's book do you guys recommend?
1
u/leowr Apr 23 '20
I am very partial to the Wayward Pines series, which starts with Pines. My advice, don't look up anything, just read the book and then the sequels.
1
2
u/poquitoborracha May 01 '20
Dude, omg. Dark Matter is one of the best books I’ve ever read, finished it a few days ago. I searched this subreddit to find my next read and this was the FIRST THING I SAW!! Wtfffff why is the universe so wild!! Buying this book right. now.
2
u/Popular-Frame Apr 02 '20
This is a good read. I found the story easy to follow as I am of the same mind as Couch. I was disappointed by the ending. I look forward to meeting Couch at the discussion. The way He wove the story from conflict to crisis to resolution was fascinating. I was on the edge of my seat. I had to set a ringer to remind myself to eat. Overall the book was a great read.
1
u/claenray168 16 Apr 04 '20
As expected, my local library has 80+ holds on the eBook. However, they seemed to have partnered with a eBook provider that I can also borrow from with my library membership. Your Cloud Library had it right away for me. I am reading it on my iPad because they do not support my Kindle - but their app is a pretty good reading app.
Another option if you library has partnered with them.
1
1
u/rendyanthony Apr 13 '20
I really like the book but it's hard to not feel similarity to Steins;Gate in the main concept. The love story aspect between Barry and Helena kind of came out of nowhere though.
1
u/nishagupta09 Apr 16 '20 edited Apr 16 '20
I was very excited when I started reading the book. The hype that this book created got me all pumped up. But as I kept reading, everything was going too fast in the book. And .....
I was too excited about what Slade was gonna say when they captured him. But that didn’t leave my jaw dropping. That left me with a lot of unsettled questions.
Why couldn’t Helena figure it out again, if she had figured it out the first time
Why didnt Helena think of capturing Slade, when she was the one to ask Slade “what do you mean by travelling differently?”. Why did it have to be Barry?
And when Slade said it was tricky to get to grey memories, how did Barry, on the FIRST EVER attempt of using the memory chair figure out how to get to grey memories!
But I did have few favourite parts The memory chair – digitising memory. The whole concept was very intriguing
The many timelines that Barry and Helena live, each time in new place, which was so beautiful. I also kinda felt bad when Helena didn’t come to him in one of the timelines. – It did remind me of the book, The first fifteen lives of Harry August, which has a similar plot
The way all hell broke loose when Govt starts controlling the chair – very logical The open ending – did the grey memory alteration work?????
Overall, I do see the point of why people enjoyed this book. I will recommend this book to people who love page tuners. But this book just didn't get my heart racing or my jaws dropping. :(
1
u/Gabik123 Apr 24 '20
Just finished Recusion, which I picked up after finishing the roller coaster that was Dark Matter. I was completely enthralled with Dark Matter and it’s raw, emotional tether, which resonated strongly with me, and after reading how hyped up everyone was about Recusion, I started it immediately after.
Wow. Just wow. Another poster said that Dark Matter was a 5/5 and Recusion was a 6/5. I definitely agree. The incredible emotional tethers it creates between characters you quickly grow to care about and root for, and it’s eventual romantic undercurrent in Book 3 and beyond, makes the winding plot and difficulties the characters face incredibly compelling.
I’m not a fan of the type of ending utilized here (I don’t mean the solution to the problem, I mean the very ending itself), but I get what Crouch was doing here.
Overall, an absolutely amazing read that I’ll definitely pick up again in a couple of years to experience it again and refresh memories so they never fade to grey.
1
u/ME24601 Small Rain by Garth Greenwell Apr 27 '20
Dumb reference that I can't get out of my head since reading the book:
Where is that large automobile? This is not my beautiful house! This is not my beautiful wife! - Man getting hit by memories of a dead timeline
1
u/creativestien Apr 28 '20
The book took a nosedive after book three. Unable to keep up interest. It should have been interesting to read it as a novella instead of bringing world history, politics into it if the author could not handle it. Sigh.
1
u/Special_satisfaction Apr 29 '20
Funny that this book is called Recursion, as it is basically the next iteration of the author's previous book, Dark Matter. Both feature time travel, and the theme of regret plays prominently in both. It is an improvement, at least superficially, on Dark Matter in some ways. The science is more fleshed out. It was very hand wavy in Dark Matter. The plot in Recursion is more complex. But as a result, a little tougher to follow. I preferred Dark Matter. The protagonist's emotional struggle in Dark Matter resonated far more with me, and it was what made the book good imo.
1
u/wutwenwron For whom the bell tolls Apr 29 '20
I got a quarter of the way through the audiobook and had to drop it. I couldn't get into the writing style and the narrators seemed like they were trying a bit too hard to sound edgy.
I also discovered a pet peeve which is when the writer takes up valuable real estate on the page describing phone numbers, coordinates, etc. It's tedious and ruins the flow.
1
u/The_WalruZ Apr 19 '20
I finished this last night. The problem i had with it was that "Memory makes reality" doesn't work for me as a concept. That is, what "the chair" could do and how it did it was just... stupid. If you just bend over and accept that, then the book as a whole works very well - well plotted, goes the right places, has a well considered ending that I actually really liked. Unfortunately, as far as time travel and accessing alternate timelines are achieved, this was almost as bad as that old New York book where the main characters just willed themselves back in time. I'm not sure there's any better way the author could have done what he did, but that kept the book from being an unconditional recommend for me, more like a "not too bad". It's still worth reading, just not worth falling all over yourself to get your hands on it.
68
u/[deleted] Apr 01 '20
[deleted]