Recursion

by Blake Crouch
326 pgs

For the past couple of years, anytime anyone asked me for a book recommendation, the first book I've thought about has been Dark Matter, by Blake Crouch. It's the first and only book by him I've read, and I loved it. It's a mind-bending science fiction book that's hard to describe, and to even try to, runs the risk of spoiling the experience for whomever I recommend it to. So, I simply tell them to read it. Recursion is just as mind-bending, just as enjoyable, and I'll be recommending it just as often.

Like its predecessor, Recursion is a difficult book to describe, so I won't say much. But at its core, it's about memory, and the role memory plays in time. The book begins in 2018 with a NYPD detective responding to a suicide call. The "jumper" is a woman who tells him she suffers from False Memory Syndrome--a new condition that has recently begun to afflict people, suddenly giving them a new set of memories of a life they never lived.

The book then jumps back to 2007, to a scientist named Helena Smith, who is approached by one of the wealthiest men in the world, who offers her his unlimited resources to fund her research in to memory and curing Alzheimer's. As the book continues to jump back and forth between the events of 2007 and 2018, Crouch slowly unfolds the scope and magnitude of the story he's written...and it's impressive.

★ ★ ★ ★ ★