Cloud Atlas, by David Mitchell, is a book that got quite a bit of attention after it was published. It falls into that category of book that straddles the line between literary and science fiction sensibilities. I decided to pick up this book now that things have cooled down and give it a read just to see what all the fuss was about. The book is a series of six stories nested within each other, each covering a different historical period. We start in the early 19th century where the book tells the tale of a passenger on a sailing ship in the Pacific. About halfway through the story, and this will be a recurring concede and all the other stories, the narrative pauses and a new story begins with a different character in a different setting and different genre flavor. There’s a twisted romance set in early 20th century Europe, a mystery-thriller in 1970’s San Francisco, a coming-of-age tale in a future clone society, and finally a post-apocalyptic survival story in far-future Hawaii. After the post-apocalyptic story, the book finishes the earlier tales in reverse order finishing back where it started. So the story structure is rather like those Russian nesting dolls, each loosely connected to to each other, and you really don’t get a sense of how it all fits together until the very end.
While this sounds confusing, it really isn’t. I think in an age of media where we have movies telling stories out of chronological order and television series telling longer story arcs episode-to-episode, this is a very accessible book that people can pick up and read through without being overly confused. That said, when you get to the more science fiction-ish aspects, some words and concepts will necessarily be foreign. (But figuring out what they mean is part of the fun on sci-fi!)
As a writer, I feel the interesting about this book is the structure allowed Mitchell to switch not only times but genres seamlessly. The main character of each short is in some way a reincarnation of the character in the previous story which isn’t the strongest thread to hold it all together but there are enough other details linking one story to another that I can let it slide. While the nested structure got the attention, I would be hard-pressed to say the same stories told in strict chronological order would have lessened my enjoyment.
So should you read it? I would say yes. It’s a enjoyable read, with some upsights into how people act and react to each other. There are also some fun things if you’re into literary motifs like how the post-apocalyptic story mirrors the opening, or the social commentary implied in the clone society buillt around enforced consumerism with a human under classes serving as machine labor. Or as pure escapism, the story gives you tortured romance, action, adventure, revolution, idealism, and rising above human pettiness.
