Inverted World (1974)

The Inverted World is choke-full of big ideas for a relatively short book. But the real problem with this book is, towards the end, Priest turns unconvincingly realistic with his approach and hence it seems a bit rushed and a lot of things are left unexplained.

I think Priest wrote himself into a corner and then seeing no way out, rushed towards a more realistic and thus an anti-climatic end. But in retrospect, I think that might have been the only way as he himself was not sure how to end the book convincingly enough the message he wanted to convey was drastically different than I had expected while reading the book.

My suggestion to anyone who is interested in reading this book would be to start it without reading any reviews anywhere, and that’s the reason I am not even going to summarize the plot here.

The book will hold your attention right till the end as something weird and/ or amazing is always happening, but don’t expect to get all your questions answered as the ambiguity about certain scientific phenomena is never going to be elucidated in the context of the plot.

But even with its rather dull ending, this book is not likely to disappoint as the rest is pretty good.

3.5 stars. ( )

What a wonderfully executed book! The structure of the book, its pace, how it negotiates between first-person, third-person, and a more distanced narrator in one section, are all handled superbly and lend a cadence to the episodes in the novel as well.

I did almost give up halfway through Part 1, and I assume many readers might find the detailed pages—and pages and pages—of track-laying laborious. But, just as it is laborious for Helward, so, too, must it be for the reader; this is the crux of the "inverted world" and having this background allows what happens to make sense... as well as nonsense.

What I really found interesting here was how Priest handles gender and class in this seemingly organized world of the city. The social commentary here, aimed right back at late-1960s and early-1970s Britain, is unabrasive but it is also unrelenting, proving that speculative fiction can speak to social and cultural issues "on the ground," as it were.

Having not really read around much in the genre of speculative and/or science fiction apart from Atwood and some of the more canonical titles, I will say that Priest's ease at handling this material—and his talent at making it resonate and be of such immense interest—has me very eager to explore this genre in some more depth. ( )

This was a bit of a mind bending read, but I enjoyed it. Learning what's going on slowly as the character did heightened the suspense.

The main character was sympathetic and I enjoyed following his travels. ( )

Books Read in the Past:

I remember the premise, which given its failure to deliver is still enough, about 40 years later, to keep me from picking up Mieville's [b:Railsea|12392681|Railsea|China Miéville|http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1321409808s/12392681.jpg|17373771], which may be a fine and unobjectionable volume but shares with this one the idea of life lived unendingly on the rails. I remember understanding the [b:Flatland|433567|Flatland A Romance of Many Dimensions|Edwin A. Abbott|http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1328868256s/433567.jpg|4243538]-like component. Of the plot, I recall only that the beginning and end were confusing, which surprised me because the middle made a certain amount of sense. It was the first book to make me wonder if I could ask for my money back because the story was unsatisfying. ( )

Inverted World is an exercise in world building. Through an apprentice we are introduced to the guild system that runs the city of Earth and then to the truth about the city and why it must always move forward.

I don't normally go in for world building novels but this one is really interesting. The world is complex and interesting and there are enough twists to keep you reading even though the main character falls a little flat. ( )