From the Bookshelf of The Sword and Laser…

Flashforward

Robert J. Sawyer

Start date: August 29, 2011

Finish date: September 19, 2011

Discussion: 2011 Reads

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2011 Reads

GO: Good Omens coming to TV
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last updated Mar 06, 2019 08:32PM

Ready Player One Casting
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last updated Sep 24, 2015 09:43AM

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What Members Thought

Sep 22, 2011 Jenny (Reading Envy) rated it liked it

Shelves: sci-fi-fantasy, sword-and-laser, read2011

Interesting concept but frustrating to get taken out of the story for thinly veiled science lectures that didn't make sense for the characters having those conversations. An interesting application of quantum theory though, and I was intrigued by the immortality concept that gets mentioned in passing. Also, I'd be fine never reading the phrase "time immutable" ever again. He must use it 50 times. ...more

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Sep 06, 2011 Jlawrence rated it liked it

Shelves: sword-and-laser

Intriguing set-up - a particle-smashing experiment at CERN somehow jumps everyone's consciousness on Earth foward 30 years, giving them a 2-minute glimpse of their (inevitable?) future before snapping them back to the present-day. The climax especially has some very cool aspects, and the book raises interesting free-will vs determinism questions throughout, but its less-than-engaging characters and some other issues keep it from realizing the full potential of the premise. Still, an interesting ...more

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Sep 05, 2009 Carla rated it really liked it · review of another edition

Shelves: portuguese, own, 2010

Since last summer, when I saw the television series being announced, that I become curious about this book. Unfortunately I haven't been able to follow the show but was happy to see the book published in Portuguese and couldn't wait to pick it up and read it.

Though it's different from the television series, as I've been told, the book starts in a similar way, with a global blackout in which every person in the world has a glimpse of their future, for 2 minutes, into 21 years time. But not everyo Since last summer, when I saw the television series being announced, that I become curious about this book. Unfortunately I haven't been able to follow the show but was happy to see the book published in Portuguese and couldn't wait to pick it up and read it.

Though it's different from the television series, as I've been told, the book starts in a similar way, with a global blackout in which every person in the world has a glimpse of their future, for 2 minutes, into 21 years time. But not everyone has such visions. Theo Procopides, one of the main characters, doesn't see a thing... since 21 years from now he'll be dead. Does this mean that the future is already written? Don't we have free will? It's around this questions that the story evolve, showing different theories (like Shrödinger's Cat, Minkowski’s Cube and the Block Universe), to justify the different opinions and views on the future.

As far as characters are concerned, they're pretty basic, stereotyped, but perfect for such book. It was easy to relate to them, even if I thought Simcoe was arrogant. I liked how some future events were shown, such as the end of monarchy in England, and it was curious to watch the action taking place in 2009 when the book was written in 1999, specially because it was in 2008/2009 that the CERN's LHC started to work (I remember my brother telling me there was to come a new Big Bang... fortunately nothing happened :P ). And finally, the writing was very accessible even when it went on about Physics. I don't know much about that, I'm more of a History girl, but subjects as Higgs Boson were easy to understand. Even the more philosophical part was nice to follow, as I think everyone had the same doubts before. I was surprised to see the position I defend explained in the book, using the example of Ebenezer Scrooge. I know we can't see into the future, but one can have a vague idea of what will happen if he makes the choices he usually does. When we do something extraordinary, may it be because we took a different path of that we usually follow or because something out of the ordinary happens to us (after all there are things out of our control), we're possibly changing the future. I at least have the notion that if I hadn't made some choices I wouldn't be where I am today...

But getting back to the book, I didn't like the ending that much but it was a nice second incursion into science-fiction, after my experience with Scott Westerfeld. I was positively impressed and can't wait to read more books of this genre and of this author. I'm particularly curious about his Neanderthal Parallax series. ...more

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Aug 31, 2011 Tom Merritt rated it really liked it

An excellent thought-provoking book. It takes a lot of risks by trying to predict two futures as well as explain a lot of science, but overall I think the issues it raises and discusses around free will far outweigh whether Sawyer made a mistake predicting Windows 2009.

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Aug 27, 2013 M. D. Parkhurst rated it it was amazing

If I am to be honest I read this book because I wanted to know the ending…to the TV series. How did the one hundred thirty seven seconds change everyone's life? Is this future avoidable? How did this all happen?

I found out (but, I'm not giving away any secrets).

I was pleasantly surprised to find that the book had no aliens. Parts of the book had to be read two and three times. Not because the text was convoluted or poorly written but because there was, so much data compacted into a few sentences ...more

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Apr 30, 2009 Adam rated it it was ok

This book was OK but not nearly what I was expecting. Between the fact that it's the basis for the upcoming Lost replacement show on ABC and what people have said to me about it I was expecting a large scale novel about global events.

In fact, this book is incredibly small scale. It's focus rarely extends outside of 3 of the scientists working at the collider. It does a well enough job rounding them out but the novel constantly suffers from having such a narrow scope. We hear mention of global or ...more

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Apr 02, 2010 Steph rated it it was ok · review of another edition

What an interesting idea, and what a sort of clumsy way of going about it.

A friend mentioned reading something about the author wherein he was described as being "an idea man." That he is. Personally, though, I found his writing awkward, and the characters two-dimensional and hard to care about. The ending had a lot of promise that I thought Sawyer wasted.

If someone else had written this book, I may have loved it. As it stands, it was just a fun airport read.
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