Version Control

The only book to deal with the need to account for Earth's movement through space when traveling through time. (Sorry. I just needed to acknowledge that, because it's something that has bugged me for decades.) This is one of those books which, in addition to having an engaging plot, offers up lots of little observations about life and people which should bear remembering. (The downside of audiobooks is that it can be hard to mark those tidbits when listening while doing other things. So I don't have any examples to offer up.)
[Audiobook note: January LaVoy is a magnificent reader.]

God, I loved this book, and Palmer is an unequivocal genius, along the same lines as Liu Cixin.

A couple of quotes that I connected with: "...there were few things in life more captivating than goofing off online while drinking. Intoxication mixed well with the way the web provided chains of distractions nested within other distractions. Even just a drink or two could suppress that need for information to be fulfilling in some way, the desire that made browsing such an unsatisfying time-waster sometimes-- without that, you could get into a groove and see the larger shape of things, see the internet the way it's saw itself. With diminished inhibitions you could leave yourself open to its suggestions, letting it show you things that'd show more tickle your hind brain or give you a nice surprise. You could let it try to Divine your wants from the trail of data you left behind as you bounce from site to site." p.78

"Online dating makes you jaded really fast, even if you're not serious about it. You go on enough dates where you find out within 10 seconds that the guy you've been messaging has lied about his age, or his height, or his number of chins, and it starts to wear you down. And then if you can get past that, there are all the little nasty human things about a man that could never be captured in the profile photos or the questionnaires: his wheedling, lisping voice, or the way he insists on splitting the bill even though you're only going out for coffee, or the light film of spit he leaves smeared across your face after what will be his first and only kiss." p.104

The causality violation device has somehow made it into our own world, even though we would never have heard about it, and has changed history, sometime back in the 80s, so that now we have presidents that would never have been able to be presidents in our previous history. For example, Reagan? A former B-actor? President? He started the whole thing with crapitalism, where, for example, the animal agriculture industry became unregulated, and animals could Whiz down factory lines, getting bonked in the head, or not, because they're going too fast, and end up having their throat slit fully conscious. Or where pigs could end up being thrown in the boiling water where their bristles are supposed to become loose, fully conscience. Or where somebody like Donald Trump, for Christ sake could become president and our country can begin to look like what Germany looked like when Hitler took over. these are things that make me wonder, that I never would have wondered before I read this book. show less

Version Control features a woman named Rebecca, who works for an online dating service; her husband, Philip, a brilliant physicist who has devoted his life to attempting to create a Causality Violation Device (which he would much prefer you didn't refer to as a "time machine," thanks); and their young son Sean, who, although he is gone by the time the story starts, remains an important presence. Also, to a lesser extent, various of their friends and co-workers.

It's an odd hybrid of a novel. It's partly literary fiction, complete with explorations of relationships and characters' interior lives, family tragedy, alcoholism, marital issues, and so on. And partly science fiction, featuring time travel, scientists doing science, and a show more near-future version of America in which the Dakotas are trying to secede from the union and everyone is constantly interrupted by personalized video chats from the President. There are also lots and lots of nerdy ramblings, about everything from religion, to Big Data, to scientific progress, to how dating sites work, to the social problems of Millennials, to the novels of Octavia Butler, to the music of Rush.

With all of that, it often feels like a weird grab bag of a book, but while it bemused me a little, and while I may have felt a tiny bit impatient with it here or there, mostly I found it reading it an enjoyable experience. But then, I think I may be just about the ideal audience for whatever this is. I like a good literary novel, am a science fiction fan from way back, and am capable of surprisingly high amounts of enthusiasm for nerdy ramblings. Also a Rush fan. Not to mention the fact that I've always found the whole idea of time travel fascinating, and this story does do some clever and creative things with the concept. Not things that necessarily make huge amounts of sense when you stop to think about them, admittedly, but they fail to make sense in ways that are interestingly different from the ways that time travel stories usually fail to make sense. And in the end, however shapeless it might sometimes feel when you're in the middle of it, the novel as a whole does take on a satisfying overall shape -- and not precisely the one I expected it to, either. show less

This is a novel about time travel, but not in the sense one expects. There are no madcap adventures in the past or future. This is a conversation about time travel, and a novel in which time travel occurs, but the packaging is subtle and more thoughtful than that.

Set in the near future, Version Control tells the story of an ordinary and likable woman named Rebecca, who is married to a physicist who heads up a lab that is working on what they call a causality violation device. She likes some of the scientists working in the lab more than others. She has a wild best friend. She works for a dating website that is quite a bit more advanced than the dating sites of today. And the world is similar to our own, but also different, with show more self-driving cars outnumbering the autonomous variety, civil unrest in the Dakotas and a president who frequently pops up on screens everywhere to give pep talks.

It's hard to discuss this novel without giving important events away, so I'll just say that this is the most interesting exploration of time travel that I've read. It explores several theories and ideas about time travel. My new favorite idea is spouted by a security guard who likes the sound of his own voice and my previously favorite theory is cut to shreds in a satisfyingly convincing way. But the discussions don't get in the way of the story Palmer is telling. Yes, there is a long scene with people discussing their working theory over breakfast that goes on for pages, but by that point I was invested in the story. The final chapters were a let-down, especially given the preceding section, but this was a book that I'm very glad to have read. show less

A very smart, fresh, and emotional twist on the time travel story: a couple struggles with grief, technology, and obsession in this clever combination of human drama and scifi thriller. If Jonathan Franzen and William Gibson collaborated on a novel it might be something like this.

“The Time Traveler's Wife” is the title of another book. In Dexter Palmer's brilliant “Version Control,” it is the wife who steps into the time machine made by her physicist husband. But Philip objects to the term time machine. He prefers to call it a causality violation device, and his experiments involve placing a robot inside and using instruments to try to measure movement through time. The results prove inconclusive.

The true focus of Palmer's novel is not Philip, however, but his lonely wife, Rebecca, who feels shut out of the part of his life, his lab, that occupies most of his time and attention. It is, she realizes too late, his one true love. Things really turn interesting when Rebecca, after catching her husband in bed show more with his lab assistant, gets drunk and, as an act of vengeance or just frustration, spends a few moments in his CVD. She is unaware that anything has changed, yet everything has changed. Readers will rush ahead eagerly to discover what will happen when she steps into it again, as we know she will eventually.

The story occurs just a few years in the future. We already have self-driving cars, but in this future such cars are commonplace, and one of them lies at the novel's turning point. Rebecca can step into a clothing store and, thanks to cameras and computers, dresses that will fit her perfectly are ready to be shown to her on a screen by the time she reaches the counter. No changing room is necessary. The president of the United States, or at least computer simulations of the president, can pop up on screens in any home or business at any time and join in the conversation. The only people who still use Facebook live in retirement homes.

Palmer fills “Version Control” with fascinating ideas about the future, about time travel, about science fiction (he calls it "a fantasy in which science always works"), about history (perhaps, he suggests, this is only a rough draft) and about human relationships. At nearly 500 pages, it seems too long, but what should he have left out? show less

Intelligent and provocative; as much about humans & our institutions as the space-time continuum.

(Full disclosure: I received a free ebook for review through Edelweiss. There's a clearly marked, mild spoil warning near the end of this review.)

Version Control is a difficult book to review, if only because it's so damn smart: complex, richly layered, and filled with nuance. The time travel sure complicates matters - if a character travels back in time and picks at a thread that undoes his very existence, how does he go back in time to begin with?; paradoxes, yo! - but the real backbone of this story is Palmer's insight into humans and our relationships with one another.

To be perfectly frank, there was more than one moment, early on, when show more I nearly gave up on Rebecca and Philip (or, perhaps more to the point, Philip's causality violation device; he'd greatly prefer you not call it a "time machine," okay). The story starts out very slow, with Palmer going off on multiple, seemingly unrelated tangents. While his writing is both skilled and lovely - Palmer has an especial knack for explaining complex scientific concepts in a way that's easily accessible to the layperson - I was itching for action: this is supposed to be a book about time travel, is it not? While the plot unfolds with the speed of molasses, unfold it does; things escalate rather quickly once you hit the second act. Hang in there; your patience will be rewarded tenfold, I promise!

While it was the time travel aspect that initially drew me to the story (and eventually captured my imagination), ultimately it was Palmer's astute cultural observations and social critiques that won me over. He tackles a multitude of social issues, armed with keen insight and a wry sense of humor: the politics (and business) of science; the effect of technology on social interaction; racism and sexism in academia; racial identity and black authenticity; the perils of online dating; microaggressions; alcoholism; the scourge of mansplaining; grief and the performance of bereavement; food deserts; big business and Big Data; and the continued erosion of privacy, from both private and public sectors.

Some of my favorite scenes involve the President's interruption of our protagonists' everyday activities, such as dinner out or phone calls with family members, to butt in under the guise of providing helpful, personally tailored advice. ("Muriel Fox, from the great state of Utah: you definitely want to use bleached flour for your angel food cake, not unbleached.")

Ditto: Rachel's foray into a barren shopping mall in search of a party dress. Instead of trying garments on in the fitting room, the store's cameras surreptitiously take her measurements, so that the computer system can recommend a few dresses specially specifically selected for her body. Even as I shuddered in disgust, I could also see the allure of such a system. The nerve! The convenience! (Clothes shopping, yuck!)

Palmer is also quick with pop culture references - everything from Octavia Butler (Parables FTW!) to The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air and Jill Swing merit a mention. These familiar anchors - coupled with a plethora of technological advances, such as self-driving cars and robotic lab assistants - confuse the reader's sense of time and place: is this our world, a few decades in the future, or another version of Earth entirely?

I also love how Palmer tells the story from the disparate perspectives of a wide range of characters (some of them seemingly minor). Every time you think have a handle on a character - her personality, motivations, etc. - insight from another observer threatens to upend your judgments. And then a third POV will send you right back to square one!

That said, I'm not a huge fan of the ending. I don't want to spoil anything, so suffice it to say that this particular flavor of self-sacrifice leaves a sour taste in my mouth. Also, it sticks in ye old craw to see two people who behaved so horribly end up together, and happily so.

** spoiler alert **

(To be fair, this was in alternate timelines; and perhaps the point is that they were meant to be together all along, and it was the feeling of wrongness that caused them to ... misbehave. But this interpretation absolves them of all responsibility for their actions, which seems a little too generous for me. Also, I don't think it's so cut and dried; Alicia's attitude toward Sean tacks a niggling little question mark onto the "final" version of history.)

** end spoiler alert **

As hard as Version Control is to review, it's even harder to rate: while I loved the bulk of it, a few minor issues in the beginning and the end compelled me to dock it a star. Reluctantly so, since this is a book I'm sure talk up to strangers in the coming year.

http://www.easyvegan.info/2016/02/22/version-control-by-dexter-palmer/ show less