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Review
'Charles Yu is a tremendously clever writer, and How to Live Safely in a Science Fictional Universe is marvellously written, sweetly geeky, good clean time-bending fun.' AUDREY NIFFENEGGER
Product Description
With only TAMMY - a slightly tearful computer with self-esteem issues - a software boss called Phil - Microsoft Middle Manager 3.0 - and an imaginary dog called Ed for company, fixing time machines is a lonely business and Charles Yu is stuck in a rut. He's spent the better part of a decade navel-gazing, spying on 39 different versions of himself in alternate universes (and discovered that 35 of them are total jerks). And he's kind of fallen in love with TAMMY, which is bad because she doesn't have a module for that. With all that's on his mind, perhaps it's no surprise that when he meets his future self, he shoots him in the stomach. And that's a beginner's mistake for a time machine repairman. Now he's stuck in a time loop, going in circles forever. All he has, wrapped in brown paper, is the book his future self was trying to press into his hands. It's called How to Live Safely in a Science Fictional Universe. And he's the author. And somewhere inside it is the information that could save him.
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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
6 of 6 people found the following review helpful
Format:Hardcover
I had no idea what to expect from this book. I knew nothing about it except that the author was also the main character, and I thought that would be an interesting concept. Having new read the book I can say that if someone asked me "Should I read this book" I'd say yes, but if someone asked me "Name a good book to read", this one would be somewhere in the middle of the list.
It starts off quite slowly, and didn't really capture my interest until I'd worked through a few chapters. The chapters are relatively short, so I did find that I would say "Ok, one more chapter" but only after checking how many more pages that would entail.
Toward the far middle/end is really where it starts to get interesting and the concept becomes more clear. I don't want to mention any specific points in the book but if you read it you'll know the point in the story to which I am referring here. At the very end of the book it becomes even more clear and actually turns out to be a very good story and, not just that, but makes you look at the physical book itself in a new light. What's more, it was only toward the end that I realised the main character is not necessarily the character that the book is about.
My experience of this book was that, whilst reading it I was interested but not completely absorbed. The final quarter was very good and given enlightenment on the previous sections of the story that may have be bit of a slog when you don't see the bigger picture. The best way to describe it is that it gets better the more retrospect it allows you to have, and the more it expands on the seeds it plants in previous chapters. For a book about time travel, I wouldn't want it any other way.
It starts off quite slowly, and didn't really capture my interest until I'd worked through a few chapters. The chapters are relatively short, so I did find that I would say "Ok, one more chapter" but only after checking how many more pages that would entail.
Toward the far middle/end is really where it starts to get interesting and the concept becomes more clear. I don't want to mention any specific points in the book but if you read it you'll know the point in the story to which I am referring here. At the very end of the book it becomes even more clear and actually turns out to be a very good story and, not just that, but makes you look at the physical book itself in a new light. What's more, it was only toward the end that I realised the main character is not necessarily the character that the book is about.
My experience of this book was that, whilst reading it I was interested but not completely absorbed. The final quarter was very good and given enlightenment on the previous sections of the story that may have be bit of a slog when you don't see the bigger picture. The best way to describe it is that it gets better the more retrospect it allows you to have, and the more it expands on the seeds it plants in previous chapters. For a book about time travel, I wouldn't want it any other way.
5 of 5 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
From all the critical acclaim I read about this book, I was expecting great things. However I was sadly disappointed, the writing is overly verbose for no justifiable reason, which interrupts the flow of the prose giving it the impression of being stilted. The plot again promised much from the blurb on the cover, but never seemed to expand beyond it, its a great concept but not very well fulfilled. Maybe if I hadn't had such high hopes for it I would have enjoyed it more.
All in all, this is a very clever book, and I can see why it received such attention from critics, but it wasn't an enjoyable book to read and left me with the impression that it was trying too hard to be a critically acclaimed book.
All in all, this is a very clever book, and I can see why it received such attention from critics, but it wasn't an enjoyable book to read and left me with the impression that it was trying too hard to be a critically acclaimed book.
17 of 19 people found the following review helpful
Format:Hardcover|Amazon Verified Purchase
But that's what Charles Yu, the narrator of this book by Charles Yu, author, did. Fiercely self-referential, Yu (the narrator) writes the book itself inside his time machine after he (the narrator) shoots himself (also the narrator, but an earlier version. Or do I mean a later one?)
Confused? Don't worry, just go with the story. It is gripping, funny, moving and sad. Yu (the narrator) lives in minor universe-31, which never got finished: the physics isn't complete, with the result that some parts - the poorer areas - aren't well rendered. Narrator Yu's father is an engineer, an immigrant to the science fictional world from Reality, whatever that is, a disappointed man (disappointed in his job, his marriage, in his relationship with his son) who fails to get the recognition he deserves and takes to his garage, where he invents the time machine, goes off in it and loses himself. Narrator Yu takes a job with the company that spurned his father, fixing recreational time machines. A kind of Dilbert crossed with Doctor Who, he lives in his TM-31, accompanied by TAMMY, an operating system with a poor self image, and Ed, the imaginary dog, working for Phil ("Microsoft middle-manager 3.0"). Yu's mother meanwhile lives for the hour - a repeated hour of her choosing, on permanent loop.
There are shades of The Hitch Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy: A Trilogy in Five Parts here - not just the unfortunate TAMMY but also in the loopy metaphor-made literalness of it all, continued in some of the layout of the book (which is after all the book that narrator CY wrote... I think) as well, as oddly, another recent book, The Terrible Privacy Of Maxwell Sim - whose protagonist also has issues with his father and takes to the road with only an automated companion (in that case, a satnav. And that's another book in which the author appears as a character). Yet Yu (the author) manages to keep on top of this zaniness, managing a superb fusion of the science fictional with the troubling, touching story of narrator Yu and his father. There are some big themes here summed up by the title, to which a triumphant answer is given: "Enjoy the elastic present... Stretch it out, live inside of it."
It is difficult to give a fair description of this book, it's one of those you really, really just have to read.
Confused? Don't worry, just go with the story. It is gripping, funny, moving and sad. Yu (the narrator) lives in minor universe-31, which never got finished: the physics isn't complete, with the result that some parts - the poorer areas - aren't well rendered. Narrator Yu's father is an engineer, an immigrant to the science fictional world from Reality, whatever that is, a disappointed man (disappointed in his job, his marriage, in his relationship with his son) who fails to get the recognition he deserves and takes to his garage, where he invents the time machine, goes off in it and loses himself. Narrator Yu takes a job with the company that spurned his father, fixing recreational time machines. A kind of Dilbert crossed with Doctor Who, he lives in his TM-31, accompanied by TAMMY, an operating system with a poor self image, and Ed, the imaginary dog, working for Phil ("Microsoft middle-manager 3.0"). Yu's mother meanwhile lives for the hour - a repeated hour of her choosing, on permanent loop.
There are shades of The Hitch Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy: A Trilogy in Five Parts here - not just the unfortunate TAMMY but also in the loopy metaphor-made literalness of it all, continued in some of the layout of the book (which is after all the book that narrator CY wrote... I think) as well, as oddly, another recent book, The Terrible Privacy Of Maxwell Sim - whose protagonist also has issues with his father and takes to the road with only an automated companion (in that case, a satnav. And that's another book in which the author appears as a character). Yet Yu (the author) manages to keep on top of this zaniness, managing a superb fusion of the science fictional with the troubling, touching story of narrator Yu and his father. There are some big themes here summed up by the title, to which a triumphant answer is given: "Enjoy the elastic present... Stretch it out, live inside of it."
It is difficult to give a fair description of this book, it's one of those you really, really just have to read.
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Most Recent Customer Reviews
destined to be cult.
"When it happens, this is what happens: I shoot myself. 'Not, you know, my self self. I shoot my future self. He steps out of a time machine, introduces himself as Charles Yu. Read more
Published 2 months ago by Frank Wetzig
It could be so much better...
A warning first: this review was written after reading around a third of this novel. At this point I got bored with it. Read more
Published 5 months ago by A. J. Poulter
Frustrating
God that was hard work... Here's my review:
Man over-describes things to the Nth degree.
Man does something to his future self which makes you think things are... Read more
Man over-describes things to the Nth degree.
Man does something to his future self which makes you think things are... Read more
Published 6 months ago by Spills
Funny and poignant, but too much technobabble
This book is very, very funny in places. This book is very, very poignant in places. Unfortunately, there are also places where the technobabble stops being funny and stops being... Read more
Published 6 months ago by Dr. Amanda Kear
This book stole an hour of my life
Perhaps fittingly for a book that is apparently about time travel, this book stole an hour of my life that I'll never get back. Read more
Published 7 months ago by Joe
OK, but not as good as the blurb
This book was OK, bit no where near as good a story as the blurb had led me to believe.
It was a story where the plot didn't really seem to have a purpose and I found it... Read more
It was a story where the plot didn't really seem to have a purpose and I found it... Read more
Published 8 months ago by CoolJules
my brain hurts (but in a good way)
As I just said my brain hurts, this is not the easy read i expected. It is far too laden with unnecessarily complex language. Read more
Published 8 months ago by inkyfingers
Great Start but flagged after the free sample
I liked the sample on the Kindle and on the strength of that bought the book. But, a bit like movie trailers, I found I had already seen the best the book could offer. Read more
Published 9 months ago by Robert
There's a good story in here
I love a good time travel story but there is more to this than just the time travel, it's about the main characters relationship with his parents, his mother who is now living in a... Read more
Published 9 months ago by Nathan Chantrell
Needs More Development
The worst thing that could have happened to Charles Yu is to have his book "How to Live Safely in a Science Fictional Universe" compared to Douglas Adams. Read more
Published 10 months ago by Dave_42
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