Alternate Universes Are Big Business

Stories about alternating universe of discourse always get stuck on the big things — the Nazis gain , the South wins — so it ’s refreshing to take Paul Melko ’s universe - hopping novel , which sweats the small stuff .

In Paul Melko ’s The wall Of The Universe , out in February from Tor Books , an entrepeneur visits a universe where the Rubik ’s Cube was never invent , or at least never select off , and tries to make a luck selling intellectual property from another cosmos . ( He also tries to write The Shining , which Stephen King never wrote in this population . ) The novel becomes at various times a murder / suspense thriller , a taradiddle of inter - universe refugees and war crimes , and a get along - of - age saga . But it never really bequeath behind its brilliant central construct : If you may plunder ideas from other universe , unlimited wealth will be yours .

The Walls Of The Universe is expanded from a novella that look in Asimov ’s Science Fiction . ( you may read a chunk of ithere . ) you may sort of tell it used to be a novella , because it reaches a sort of stop breaker point — and then commence to get more and more insane and voluminous from there on out . The first half is harbor as anything , but probably around the time Melko play out of novella , it starts to get really in force because he stretches the assumption a lot further .

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That premise , by the way , is that there ’s a gadget that can atomize you from one universe to the next , with each universe mark in numerical growth . We gossip creation where Alexander Graham Bell invented an galvanic auto and now all car are battery - powered ; a universe where World War I was a minor skirmish and World War II raged for three decades ; and a universe where the 1950s never quite ended and the Internet and other technologies never developed . The novel ’s main lineament is John Rayburn , and we meet several versions of him .

At the startle of the novel , the “ master ” John Rayburn gets visit by another John Rayburn from an alternate macrocosm , who testify him the universe of discourse - hopping gadget . The new John ( “ John Prime ” ) convert John Rayburn to go traveling to another population , while John Prime takes his place . It ’s only after John Rayburn leaves his home universe that he make the gadget is faulty , and each journeying is one - way only . He can confabulate unnumerable numbers of other existence , but he can never return to his own home universe .

Eventually , John Rayburn settles down in the 1950s - esque universe , while John Prime goes about ruining Rayburn ’s living in his home creation . They both fall in sexual love with the same woman , Casey , in two unlike universes , but their relationships take very dissimilar turns . About midway through , the novel becomes a story of trying to make a biography even though you be intimate this is n’t really your world . John Rayburn can impart his adopted universe any metre he wants , because he still has the travel gadget , but he pick out to persist . Meanwhile , Prime feels trapped , and has to live with the memory of the manner he ’s mistreated dozens of Caseys in other world in the past .

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Eventually , we discover the two Johns are n’t the only traveler between universes , nor are they the only single who ’ve had the estimation of spell melodic theme through the wall of realness .

The Walls Of The Universe is a really fast , entertaining read , with nice , crisp prose . ( At one point , Rayburn strike a guy with a tyre iron , and he go down “ like a suit off a rack . ” ) The piddling character touches , and the parallel between the two Johns ’ story in the two substitute universes , add a peck to the canonical idea . But it ’s also fresh to see a book about travel between universes where nobody ’s essay to change the course of study of history or work up an empire — just make a fast buck . Highly , extremely recommended .

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Lesdilley