Customer Reviews

Mysterium

5 star:		(10)
4 star:		(5)
3 star:		(4)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

Mysterium_ by Robert Charles Wilson is a very well done, engrossing earlier work of the author's, one that I don't believe has gotten anywhere near the attention of his later works (such as _Darwinia_, _Bios_, and _The Chronoliths_). It is also unfortunately out of print, though there are a great many used copies out there at relatively cheap prices.

_Mysterium_ is a book one could place in the "island in the sea of time" sub-genre of books on alternate history and parallel universes, one made famous recently by of course _Island in the Sea of Time_ by S. M. Stirling (1998), _1632_ by Eric Flint (2000), and _Weapons of Choice_ by John Birmingham (2004) and their sequels, the premise being that some little corner of the modern day world (or a whole fleet instead of an island or a town in the case of _Weapons of Choice_) of our Earth gets sent into the past (which becomes from that point on a parallel universe, when those people from our time interact with the rest of the world). _Mysterium_ differed in two respects; first, this story came first (for whatever that is worth), as it is copyright 1994, and second, the town of Two Rivers, Michigan found itself in is a parallel universe from the beginning, contemporaneous with our Earth but with a history that diverged from our own close to two thousand years ago. But I get ahead of myself.

An archaeological team working in a remote area of Turkey on what was believed to be a rather unremarkable prehistoric site came across what looked like a bit of jade embedded in the soil. Remarkable in its own right, further digging revealed that what was assumed to be a small piece was actually part of a much larger item that was not actually jade but some strange substance with extremely unusual optical properties. Of great interest - and unfortunate to its discoverers - the item was also extremely radioactive, many of those who discovered it dying quickly of radiation sickness. Obviously an item not of this Earth, with Turkey's permission the United States government removed it under heavy protection to a new research facility built just to study it, one set up on an old and largely abandoned Indian reservation near the quiet town of Two Rivers, Michigan. The base, very much aloof and apart from the town, at first piqued the curiosity of the locals, wondering what the meaning of the new base was in an era of declining defense spending and also hopeful of new jobs. When the new jobs don't really materialize to any great degree and the base stayed extremely quiet, they quickly forgot about it.

One night though - a mere twelve pages into the book I would like to add - mysterious bright lights and an explosion at the facility, just visible to those in the town, heralded a bizarre event, one that removed the entire town and the military base to a parallel universe, the exact same spot on the globe on a world with a totally different history, in an alternate Michigan. Fully aware that there was some accident at the base, the townspeople awoke to find the power, water, and phones out, and those few with battery powered radios not able to get any stations except for a very distant one, one that seemed to be putting on some quasi-religious radio play of all things. Most just went on with life for a bit as best they could, hopeful that the utilities would be restored, though several tried to leave town and made an amazing discovery; all roads and trails out of town just stopped, ending in a cut as sharp as if a laser had made it. So sharp was the divide that trees were split right down the middle along the line, bare heartwood exposed for all to see. The other side of the line, inches beyond the road, was virgin forest, deep dark woodlands that had never known an axe.

One of the locals who possessed a floatplane took off, hoping to uncover more of this mystery. He found that the town was now deep in the wilderness, all nearby other roads and towns long vanished, and what should be Detroit had completely different architecture, odd-looking cars, and even horse-drawn wagons. Heading back home, his flight apparently attracted the attention of the authorities of this world, who moved in with aircraft, tanks, and soldiers, putting the town under martial law.

The startled locals learned that they were in an alternate reality; they were not in the United States of America, but in an entity called the Consolidated Republic, a French-English nation that ruled most of North America and was regrettably run by an authoritarian religious theocracy. What's more, it was not a Christianity as the townspeople knew it; it became apparent later in the book that the Christianity in this world was a intolerant descendent of Gnostic Christianity, this world's history having diverged considerably during Roman times, as the Roman Empire never became Christian and indeed even to the present Apollo and other Greco-Roman gods were still worshipped in many countries of Europe (ones at war with the Consolidated Republic). The locals privately derided this world's Christianity as being practically polytheistic, while the Proctors (much feared Gestapo-like religious police of the Bureau de la Convenance Religieuse) despised the Two Rivers Christians as worshipping a "stick figure Christianity," one unbelievably crude and simplistic.

Regrettably, the conflict between Two Rivers and the authorities was much more severe as that, as the Proctors had dire plans for the town, for they believed it to be both incredibly useful as source of advanced technology and weaponry (being about roughly 50 years ahead of them) and as a blasphemous and dangerous threat to their social order. The remainder of the book dealt with the ugly plans of the Proctors and the secret resistance lead by several townspeople and their sympathizers.

Robert Charles Wilson is a writer that never totally disappoints the reader. He is one of those rare science fiction writers that isn't afraid to tackle the big ideas - and this book is no different. That is why giving this book only 3 stars hurts so much.

Basically what we have here is almost "Blind Lake" version 1.0 - a small community that is cut off from the world as we know it and has to deal with mysterious events inside it's borders. From there the two diverge.

First off, let's talk about the good points of this book. It's really epic in scope. This book is about creating universes and delves into Gnostic religious thought with wild abandon. At some points I almost felt I was rereading "Valis" by Philip K Dick - the religious overtones are that strong. And that is not a bad thing - mixing religious philosophy with science fiction is a fertile ground and opens up a much wider vista to play in for the author. And the last 50 pages go by at a brisk pace. The book builds it's tension slowly and does not disappoint in that regard.

But the bad points are also numerous. At no point do the characters really break out of the quick sketches Wilson gives us at the beginning. I have grown accustomed to Wilson presenting fully fleshed out characters and this book fails in that respect. I also have a mild problem with the predictability of the end. Wilson has always been somewhat of a 50/50 chance when it comes to endings and this one falls squarely into the bad 50%. It feels rushed and predictable.

There is more to say, but I don't want to write a book here. So I will wrap up by saying that the book is eminently readable for fans of Wilson's work. But it might not be first on your list if you have never read anything by him before.

Mysterium was a bit of an unusal book in that I found the majority of the characters to be extremely rich and vividly drawn for such a short book (similar to many of Orson Scott Card's characters)...but I found the overall plot to be somewhat shallow, almost like the book needed another 100-150 pages to fully flesh out the storyline (unlike Card...who also tends to write shorter books, but most of his feel more "fleshy"). This being said, I rather enjoyed Mysterium. Especially, Wilson's tendency in the book to try and cram a lot of ideas into a small space (even if he doesn't always succeed). Wilson covers everything from Gnostic Christianity to theories on the origin of the Universe. He then links all of his ideas with a thread that at times seems somewhat tenuous, but not so much so that it does not get one "pondering the imponderables" about the nature of our existence. Are we the dreamers or are we part of someone else's dream? This was (roughly) a question posed by Shakespeare in one of his plays...at least I think it was Shakespeare. But whomever said it, the question seems very apropos to the heart of this book. Mysterium is the first work of Wilson's that I've read and even though the story itself could have been a bit better written, Wilson's ideas were extremely intriguing...I look forward to reading more of his work.

After reading BIOS by Wilson, I wanted to find more from him because I liked his writing. Mysterium was as good as I had hoped.

The plot was well developed and the characters were interesting. Also, as I found in BIOS, Wilson is very good at letting you get important information about the setting through the plot instead of having to explicitly describe things. I also liked that the author at least made mention at the beginning of the book about how the world that was left behind reacted to the disappearance of the town. In other similar stories I've read, I've wondered about this, but it was never addressed.

One thing that I think could have made this book better was if the author had written more about the town and the characters before the event took place. I think this would have given the reader a better idea about who the characters were before this happened to them. Something like what Stephen King did so well in The Stand.

In any case, I enjoyed Mysterium and would recommend it. I will continue to look for more from Wilson in the future.

This book is great. Well realized characters, a very interesting story-line that poses some interesting questions. The books ending will have you on the edge of your seat. The parallel world is brought vividly to life. My only quibble with the book was that there seemed to be so much of the story compressed into just a few pages. The book's timeline skips a few months, and some explanations. Aside from that I'd recommend this to anyone looking for something interesting and thought provoking.

The books of Robert Charles Wilson, while cloaked in the familiar trappings of science fiction, are without exception quiet novels of character, of people forced to adapt to new situations and to remake themselves in a new world where the rules have been turned upside down. His work contains many of the same qualities of Roger Zelazny's ealy short stories, which were often considered weak on ideas but were written with such vigor and style that they forged his reputation back in the late 1960s.

In Mysterium, a possible alien artifact is taken to the small town of Two Rivers, Michigan, where a mysterious explosion somehow transports the entire population of the town into an alternate dimension. While keeping the tension running, Wilson sets a languid pace, affording us the opportunity to get know his characters, not just through the various problems they must now confront, but by examining how their past experiences dictate their responses to their present dilemma.

There are many things that work about this book and it's weaknesses are not particularly significant. The premise is compelling and fleshed out without as much action filler as Wilson's Spin series. The characters are a bit thin and the plot could be stronger, but they function reasonably as vehicles to explore a few possibilities suggested by gnostic thought and notions of parallel, seeded and propagated universes. These concepts are handled elegantly if somewhat superficially. The book is fairly short, fast read and I probably would have enjoyed it even more as a novella. Although this is not young adult fiction, it strikes me as what young adult fiction should be. Most of it is fairly easy to digest, but the deeper aspects are not contrived.

By halfway through the book, I found myself skimming, and there were almost no characters I cared about. Of all the possible alternate realities they could have wound up in, why that one? I just found it dismal. Spin was much better. Two stars, maybe.

A mysterious artefact is discovered in the Turkish desert. Lethally radioactive it does not appear to be constituted of normal matter. The small town of Two Rivers, Michigan USA is the site of the R&D establishment set up to study it under the direction of Theoretical Physics laureate Alan Stern. With the townsfolk we experience the night the scientists decide to bombard the artefact with high-energy beams, the night when everything within two miles of the lab is transported to a parallel universe.

Two River's new world is one in which the Roman Empire never became Christian and Gnostic Christianity triumphed. It's perhaps fifty years technically behind the world Two Rivers left. There is no America: an independent Anglo-French theocracy occupies the continent, warring with the Spanish empire to the south: the race is on for the first nuclear bomb. The Inquisition soon arrives in Two Rivers to purge heresy and investigate both the advanced technologies to be found there and the strange events which led to its incursion. The resulting conflicts drive the plot.

I wonder why Robert Charles Wilson wrote this book. It's a reprint of something he did in 1994 so perhaps it was an apprentice piece? The characters are stock; the narrative lacks focus as we struggle to understand what we should be caring about while the resolution at the end is both contrived and unsatisfactory.

What stands out above the blandness are a couple of ideas. At one point one of the bad guys, a religious inquisitor comments on the practice of religion in Two Rivers: "Their theology is impoverished too. Like a line drawing of Christianity, all the details left out," (as compared to Gnosticism - p. 287). Something interesting there which is never developed.

Earlier the novel's guru, Alan Stern poses this question (p. 49, I have précised slightly).

"Think about Albert [the family dog]. He functions in every way normally, within the parameters of his species. He can learn, do tricks and recognise you. But despite all that, there's a limit to his understanding. If we talk about gravitons or Fourier transforms he can't follow the conversation. His mental universe can't contain such concepts.

"We're sitting here asking spectacular questions about the universe, how it began, about everything which exists. And if we can ask a question then sooner or later we can answer it; we assume there are no limits to knowledge. But maybe the dog makes the same mistake? He doesn't know what lies beyond the neighbourhood but if he found himself in a strange location he would approach it with the tools of comprehension available to him. And soon he would understand it doggie-fashion, by sight and smell and so on. For him there are no limits except the ones he can't comprehend. So what about us? Are there questions about the universe we can't ask? Things we can't know? Are there real limits to our comprehension as invisible to us as they are to Albert?"

This is a good question which deserves some thought but it's not explored in this novel.

In summary this book barely kept my attention: it's slow and sprawling; the characters are cardboard and we just don't care about them; the plot is unfocused and unengaging. The best thing about it is the title and the cover art. Wilson has written better novels subsequently and has carved out a minor place in `literary SF' so I'd recommend sticking with those.

Great beginning and ending. While the work lags somewhat in the middle the nuance of characterization and skill in exploring the small individual choices that people face in this scenario. The wide cast and non-judgmental ambiguity helps ground the surreal premise in an effective human narrative.

This, combined with the uniqueness and skill in crafting the alternate world's politics and religion make this a highly engaging work. Not as good as Robert Charles Wilson's Darwinia or The Chronoliths, but a fine addition to the field of scifi.