Book reviews
This review is spoiler-free, as any plot points discussed can be learned from reading the inside of the book jacket.
What would you do if you woke up surrounded by strangers who were welcoming you back from a journey you have no memory of taking? That’s exactly what happens to Jason Dessen in Dark Matter by Blake Crouch. Jason Dessen teaches university-level physics, a career he reluctantly began after he and his girlfriend (a talented artist) decided to put their dreams on hold to get married and raise their son. Now, fifteen years later, they’re both somewhat stuck in jobs that are mere shadows of the greatness to which they once aspired. At least, that’s the life Jason’s always known. After leaving a friend’s party one night, Jason is kidnapped and drugged. When he wakes up, he finds himself surrounded by strangers outfitted in hazmat suits. They’re all excited to see him, congratulating him on his success and welcoming him back. But none of them mention Jason’s wife or his son. And the more Jason discovers about these people and his own supposed accomplishment, the more he begins to realize something terrifying: This is not his world. I can’t give more plot information without some major spoilers, so I’ll stop summarizing now. For about the first half of Dark Matter, I had mixed feelings about the novel. On one hand, I’m a sucker for “what if” stories. What if Jason and his girlfriend hadn’t had their son? What if they’d never met in the first place? What if they’d gotten married, but put their ambitions before each other? This book explores all of those scenarios, as well as many more. On the other hand, science is so far outside my wheelhouse it has a different zip code. While the scientific explanations are kept fairly brief, the ones included made me go a little blurry-eyed and I would occasionally just skim past them to get back to the story. (I did feel a little sense of accomplishment when I understood the reference to Schrödinger's cat, though.) The second half of the novel, after Jason figures out what happened to him, reads like a sprint. He jumps into action in an attempt to win his life back from the people who stole it and Crouch’s writing carries the reader along at a can’t-put-the-book-down-for-a-minute pace. If you like science, I highly recommend Dark Matter. Or, if you’re like me and left science behind in the dust of high school but you’re still a sucker for a good story, trust me, you’ll enjoy Dark Matter.
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Jacinta M. CarterProfessional Book Nerd Archives
March 2017
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