Robert J Sawyer - Flashforward

Physicists at CERN's Hadron Collider fail to create the elusive Higgs-Boson particle, but everyone on the planet collapses and for two minutes experience their lives 21 years in the future. After recovering from the worldwide destruction a number of scientific and philosophical questions are raised. What is the nature of time and consciousness? Is the future fixed? What about free will?

It took me several months to finish this book. While the philosophical concepts that drive the book are interesting, the characters were, while not one-dimensional, boring. The protagonists had to deal with the loss of loved ones as well as the dilemma of living their lives with the knowledge of where they were going to end up in 21 years. With possibly the exception of Theo, who had to deal with a 'certain' future of being murdered, there was no dramatic tension because we really didn't care what happened to anyone.

Sawyer's Calculating God, also work of science fiction with a strong a philosophical depth, was a much more compelling read. The protagonists were sympathetic creations of some substance. Through these characters we were full participants in the discussion -- does god exist, why is the universe set up the way it is -- and enjoyed the story through to the end.

The end of the book takes the a sharp turn from the plodding action interspersed with dense scientific exposition to a 'high-speed' chase followed by a 2001 Space Odyssey-esque journey into the future.

Overall I think, despite finding the book so easy to put down, the story would have been more compelling if it had been a little bit longer. We would have been better served if Sawyer had given us the opportunity to have more of an emotional attachment to the characters before he launched them into this scientific thought-experiment.

Still, the ideas expressed in the book can be found nowhere else in popular literature. It will stick with me for years. For that alone it is worth the read.

The TV series shares the Flashforward science, but the vision is only 6 months into the future. The main storyline involves FBI agents, secret cabals, alcoholism, infidelity, gunfire and explosions. I don't know if the show would benefit from being more cerebral, but I'm sure the book would've benefited from adding (not replacing) the TV show's action and melodrama to existing scientific-philosophical what-if story.

Martin Amis - Time's Arrow

Time's Arrow is a peculiar book from Martin Amis. This is the strange story of a 'person' who lives inside of a man. He can see out of the man's eyes, hear, feel physical sensation, and to some extent the emotions of his 'host.' The 'person' cannot act or in any way affect his environment in any way. The peculiar thing about this co-residency is that the 'person' experiences the host's life backwards.

Beginning with an old man in an old-age home being shocked with paddles, this character, with basic knowledge of the world already present, must learn to understand people talking backwards (he springs to life already knowing English).

Amis masterfully describes this character's life as it tries to make sense of things appearing whole out of a fire, eating, and using the bathroom. His descriptions of interactions with people is incredible: from making sense of a single conversation, to long term relationships with co-workers and lovers.

In particular, since the host is a doctor, we find a bizarre world where hospitals are places where the injuries are created, dead come to life, and babies disappear.

We clue in, to some extent, as to why this has happened, by the time the host character becomes a vigorous middle-aged man and his 'career' in Europe during world-war II is revealed.

Definitely the kind of book that deserves re-reading. Both entertaining and thought provoking.