Review: Cloud Atlas
Cloud Atlas by David Mitchell
My rating: 5 of 5 stars
At one point in David Mitchell’s amazing Buddhist science fiction novel “Cloud Atlas,” a character in the past comments on a character in the future he might or might not reincarnate into which you, the reader, knows is true (the action and the reincarnation) because you already read that passage about the character in the future because you’re reading from the future to the past and your brain explodes all over the wall in a big greasy lumpy mess you say “Maybe this is a good book.”
Six sections all written in the style of the section’s time period (the Canticle for Lebowitz section is arguably the strangest to read);
Six different stories from a South Pacific Travelogue to the transcript of a futuristic TV show all referring back to the events in the stories backward _and forward_ in time;
At least four character reincarnating with one ascending to Buddhahood and returning to suffering to help usher in a new era;
Big themes of the novel hidden in the structure of the novel itself;
A big puzzle of nesting stories where actions in one story impacts the others;
And an awesome science fiction novel for 33% of the story.
You might not bother to see the movie but you should read the book.
View all my reviews
Originally published at /project/multiplexer. You can comment here or there.