A reluctant voyager crossing the Pacific in 1850; a disinherited composer blagging a precarious livelihood in between-the-wars Belgium; a high-minded journalist in Governor Reagan's California; a vanity publisher fleeing his gangland creditors; a genetically modified 'dinery server' on death-row; and Zachry, a young Pacific Islander witnessing the nightfall of science and civilisation -- the narrators of Cloud Atlas hear each other's echoes down the corridor of history, and their destinies are changed in ways great and small. In his captivating third novel, David Mitchell erases the boundaries of language, genre and time to offer a meditation on humanity's dangerous will to power, and where it may lead us.
Was expecting something much grander than what I ended up getting, based on the overwhelmingly enthusiastic reviews. I found it curious and interesting but not exactly compelling. The impression I was left with was that so much time was spent on the cleverness of the structure that not much was done with it, content-wise. I liked some of the individual stories much more than the others, and thought it was unfortunate that the beginning was such a boring slog - I really dreaded looping back around to the second half of that one at the very end.
Reading updates
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Started reading
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29 June, 2015:
Finished reading
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29 June, 2015:
Reviewed