Customer Reviews

Zig Zag: A Novel

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

 

 

It is always a wonderful feeling knowing you are reading a book without even thinking about the actual reading. You feel immersed in the book. You're standing there alongside the characters, contemplating the issues at hand. Waiting, wondering, hoping that they succeed in their tasks. Zig Zag will have you forgetting where all the pages went.

A non-stop, adrenaline-rushing novel from start to finish. The book gravitates around physics, but does not require any knowledge of supersymmetry, branes, or any other terms you are probably not accustomed with. The details are in the book, and the details are mouth-watering. The implications the characters face are serious. Extraordinary, even. Zig Zag is translated from the Spanish, but you would not guess it. The writing is superb and spot on. The suspense is mind-numbing. The 500+ pages are gone before you know it. Fortunately, it's a novel that will stay with you. Once you close the book, you'll smile knowing that Zig Zag is one you're going to be recommending.

ZIG ZAG by Jose Carlos Somoza is one of the most unusual works I've read this year. Part thriller, part science fiction and part horror novel, it dips and swirls through and around these genres, creating a modern morality and cautionary tale.

Though in his acknowledgments Somoza denies wanting to write a scholarly work on string theory, he does such an excellent job of explaining this fascinating branch of physics that even someone like me, whose knowledge of that science is limited to the effects of gravity, can understand what's happening. What kept me reading, even through the occasional and relatively rare obtuse periods that run through the book, was the fact that, almost from the beginning, it scared the pants off me without producing a real live bogeyman until close to two-thirds of the way through.

ZIG ZAG moves back and forth in time, covering a 10-year period beginning in 2005 and ending in 2015. The focal point of the novel consists of a complicated but intriguing physics experiment dealing with time. Time travel to the past, at least at this point, is considered to be impossible. What a team of scientists attempts to do is to view events of the past in real time rather than visit them, utilizing the string theory. The experiment, known as Zig Zag, is financed by a somewhat shadowy, not entirely benevolent child of the so-called military-industrial complex, which is interested in the results for possible national security applications.

There is also a strong interest in keeping the scientists under observation because of the concern that viewing the past in real time may well result in some sort of unfortunate after-effect upon the observers. And indeed, that is exactly what happens, though not precisely for the reasons originally under consideration. The scientists implementing Zig Zag find themselves dealing with the sudden manifestation of a dark, deadly apparition of unknown origin.

Suffice to say that the members of the team suddenly and inexplicably find themselves marked for death. Over a 10-year period they are horrifically and, as we shall see, impossibly slaughtered one by one. Somoza perhaps is not a literary writer, but he is a riveting storyteller and his plot is the work of genius. Just when one thinks that things can't get worse, they do. And don't think for a minute that things are going to get better.

Somoza writes like the product of a mad collaboration between Shirley Jackson and Michael Crichton, with a bit of Thomas Harris thrown in for good measure. After reading ZIG ZAG, you won't know whether to sleep with the lights on or off. You won't know precisely what I mean by that until you read this tale of the ultimate fruit from the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil.

--- Reviewed by Joe Hartlaub

This book still has me contemplating the themes addressed. It is very fast-paced with plenty of mystery and thrilling situations! I highly recommend this book. Jose Carlos Somoza has you wondering at every turn of the page how the story could unfold. At each turn you find the story unfolding in unexpected and delightful ways! This is a must-read for anyone who enjoys astrophysics, science fiction, mystery and thrillers.

This here's a hybrid mash up of mainstream thrillers, SciFi and horror (with a monster movie bent). It doesn't really succeed in breaking any new ground in any of those genres. The first 1/3 of the book is pretty plodding and when the action and plot get going by the final 1/3 of the book, I was feeling pretty disenchanted. I'm sure this book will please some folks, but as a fan of SciFi and Horror, it didn't work for me.

As it has been said in other reviews here, the book starts with a great premise dealing with Time Strings and the way they work. The buildup to the moment when the scientists see the past is great but when it actually happens it's not really satisfying. Things are not really described well or with enough detail, this amazing discovery is now a terrible thing but we don't get much information why until later, which is a let down.

Then the horror aspect of the book kicks in and we spend too much time reading about the imminent danger the characters are in but get no payoff, even a small one, to keep us interested. This situation repeats over and over again, danger is coming, tension builds, and then we get something like "...and then things went terribly wrong." We have to wait a while to get to any of it. This way of building suspense just didn't work for me after a while.

I have to also agree with the criticism of the use of the "italic" font. It's not a good choice and hard to read.
Overall the concept of Time Strings is fantastic and it would have been great to explore it more, but the constant references to the main character's "hotness" and the constant "cliffhangers" every time the action picks up just made want to find out the mystery of the story and move on.

Zig Zag follows the Michael Crichton school of technological thriller - Think up an interesting concept, use it to stir fear and doubt toward science and progress. While admittedly a lot of what science offers us can be used for harm - Hiroshima, massive tanks, anthrax - science does a lot of good, as well. Of course, that hardly makes for a suspenseful thriller. Jose Carlos Somoza weaves his (very) long tale of suspense and murder, constantly ratcheting up the stakes, constantly blowing out of proportion the problems of science and technology. Scrape away the physics, though, and what Somoza has written is a competent if slightly ridiculous thriller, that has enough titillation and gruesome details to satisfy readers.

Ah, the titillation. It comes in the form of Elisa, a young, beautiful physicist. Somoza describes her as having 'long, wavy black hair and the face and body of a model.' That doesn't exactly tell us what she looks like, but it's all we are given to work with. All throughout the novel, Somoza has Elisa strip down to her panties, showing off her 'hourglass figure', or she becomes naked - often without realising it! Yes, it is the tragedy of Somoza's world that all of the beautiful, hyper-intelligent females tend to remove all of their clothes without actually realising they ever intended to become naked. Did I say tragedy? Excuse me. Coupled to that are constant references to her own 'hotness', a shocking level of examination on the status of her breasts and thighs, and, unbelievably, in the last third of the novel, three of the female characters actually become short skirt and tight dress wearing, heavy makeup using, fast talking nymphomaniacs who spend each and every night preparing themselves (without wearing underwear, no less!) to 'serve' the unknown killer in his every sexual fantasy and desire. Readers, I only wish I was making this up.

To the plot. Elisa is, as noted, a brilliant physicist. She and others have been selected to travel to a remote island with David Blanes, world famous physicist whose mathematical and theoretical constructs about string theory are so far above everyone else's head he is simply stratospheric. They learn, to their amazement, that Blanes' string theory allows the ability to watch events that have happened from another time. The implications of this are very interesting, but unfortunately, Somoza seems afraid to explore the possibilities. Very briefly, the concept of watching the Crucifixion surface amongst the assembled island-goers, but something very strange happens when the attempt to view Jerusalem, and from there, everything goes haywire.

It seems that when something from the past is observed, not all of the 'strings' that make up a person's spatial and temporal (that's space and time, folks) definition is able to come along for the ride into the future. Thus, we have a flat plain cratered like the moon, or a woman's face rotted and collapsed, without a mouth or nose. Even worse, it seems that once a person has observed an item from the past, that item seems to stay with them, to hover randomly in front of their vision. The harrowing implication of this is - what happens when you look back in time to someone who is still alive, say, and they start to appear in front of your eyes?

Somoza answers this, though he answers none of the other million questions which spring from such a fabulous premise. Consider the range of possibilities that could be done with a device that sees back in time, but also carries with it difficult moral weight. Now consider that Somoza turns Zig Zag into a standard, run of the mill murder mystery, and that it runs along for over half a thousand pages.

Throughout, Somoza repeats two techniques, one of which is irritating, one of which is really quite good. The former is a technique whereby we are privy to all of the information contained within a character's minds, and everything they experience, except for the very thing which allows us to remain in suspense. We may be traveling inside Elisa's mind, learning of her theoretical hunt for sense in the world of strings, or her moral dilemma regarding observing living and dead people throughout time, and then, suddenly, absurdly, we are cut off just as she receives a phone call that 'changes everything', or she opens a door to see something that 'makes her blood run cold'. The scene changes, we lose our focus, and later have to suffer through whatever problem or plot point by a series of dull conversations. Why not show us the action? Why not reveal your hand?

The latter technique is more interesting. Somoza likes to go off onto little tangents, mini-essays on subjects such as mystery, time, physics, morals, God, Heaven, Hell, and so forth. When he does this, he is generally measured, reasoned, interested and interesting. One wonders why he does not continue along in this vein, but instead he invariably opts for a stunning plot twist, or a depraved murder - which, unfairly, Somoza never details except to point out how even thinking about the murder sends people mad. All smoke, all mirrors.

A final word on, of all things, font. The ordinary font for the novel is quite good, very readable and clear. But the italics font, however, presents a problem. The s and r letters are so twisted that they become almost gibberish, and a number of other letters are extremely similar to one another. Long stretches of italics become difficult to decipher, which does not bode well for a text covered with internal thoughts presented as italics.

Zig Zag is José Carlos Somoza's latest and twelfth novel. Considering his prolific output, it is perhaps understandable he was unable to give what is admittedly an interesting subject matter its deserved respect. With a little more time and a lot more effort, Somoza may have crafted a fine, intelligent, genuinely suspenseful thriller. Unfortunately, he did not, which means we are left with a novel filled with interesting ideas that are never given their due, and one very generic, very boring idea that is stretched out into five hundred plus pages of tedium.

I have to admit that I usually don't find science thrillers an enjoyable read. However, I thoroughly enjoyed Somoza's _Art of Murder_, so I decided to give this novel a try. I'm glad I did. Somoza has clearly become a master at plotting a story. He maintained a sense of suspense for most of the novel, making for an engrossing read. It is one of those books that makes you go to bed very late because you want to find out what comes next. He explains the scientific concepts very clearly, so you are never lost. The novel is an interesting examination about good and evil and the ways both aspects define us. Highly recommended.

Scientist Elisa Robledo put on a mask of being normal. She did her job, taught her students, went through the motions of being a member of the University community. But something set her apart. The others recognized this--but thought the beautiful woman was simply shy or cold. Only the surviving members of the Zig Zag community knew that she was different for another reason. She had seen things that humans were not meant to see.

As a new graduate, Elisa had been chosen to attend a special seminar dealing with practical applications of string theory. A scientist had proposed that relatively low energies could allow scientists to open one of the many extra dimensions string theory is certain exists--specifically, time. Using special equipment, scientists could capture photons and unwrap them, viewing anything that photon had seen throughout its history. A photon captured at the Pyramids of Egypt could, possibly, reflect not only the current pyramids, but their entire history, even their construction. Project Zig Zag is designed to explore this possibility--with a look at the crucifixion of Jesus high on the list.

Author Jose Carlos Somoza starts off his story with a bang. I enjoyed the mix of mystery and dramatic tension as Elisa realized that her carefully constructed and artificial reality had shattered and as she attempted to come to terms with the new reality. For me, though, the story slows dramatically when Elisa relates her history to her semi-friend Victor. We already know that Elisa survived the mess on New Nelson, which dramatically reduces any sense of tension during the flashbacks that constitute the bulk of the book.

Although authors are certainly allowed to take liberties with science to make a good story, I had a hard time suspending disbelief over Somoza's photon theory. I'm prepared to believe that a photon could carry, in some dimensional sense, its entire history with it. Even with this, imagine a photon generated by the sun's energy a few minutes ago, hitting Jersulem this instant, bouncing off (say) calgary hill and captured in a video camera, In what sense would this photon contain in it any history of some other photon that hit the same calgary hill two thousand years previously, was never captured by camera, and is now, presumably, some two thousand light years from earth (unless it was absorbed in some object, sucked into a black hole, or otherwise destroyed?) The science part of the story has a lot of potential, but it just didn't jell for me.

Somoza delivers a high-potential SF thriller that, I think, falls short of its promise. Too bad because this guy clearly can write.

I thought that the book did it's job, as soon as I started reading, I was hooked. I finished this book within 24 hours since I couldn't put it down after THE phone call, and was questioning who "he" was the entire time. I thought that the writing was great and the mix of suspense, science fiction, and terror was perfect. A great read that I will be recommending!

I liked the beginning and ending of this book but not the middle. The time-travel video viewing idea is original and spooky. However, the middle of the book started to behave like mystery, but did not give sufficient hints for the reader to help solve the riddles. The pace picks up at the end of the book, and kept me jumping. The secrets revealed at the end of the book should have had more hints in the middle of the book, so that reader would have had some more satisfaction with guessing a few of the riddles.