Rating: 4/5I love good mind-bending, time-turning stories, movies such as Inception and Interstellar for example. And for the most part, Recursion does not disappoint.
The book begins with great promise -- NYPD detective Barry Sutton is called to prevent a possible suicide by a woman suffering from FMS or False Memory Syndrome, an affliction in which the person suddenly wakes up one day with extremely detailed memories of an alternate life that she has led. The extreme vividness of those memories and the conflict with memories of the current life can often drive a person insane. The second chapter, set about 11 years earlier, features Stanford neuroscientist Helena Smith, whose sole mission in life is to find a possible cure for Alzeimer's that he mother suffers from. And there is billionaire visionary entrepreneur Marcus Slade, who employs Helena with the promise of changing the world.
As the plot unfolds, we learn about the demons plaguing the minds of Barry and Helena -- Barry struggles with coming to terms with his daughter's death (an event that he blames himself for) and the subsequent break-up of his marriage while Helena is consumed with making her mother's life better. Barry can't get the FMS suicide off his mind and sets to explore that. Meanwhile, Marcus Slade appears to have his own motivations for hiring Helena and it becomes clear that he will go to any length to achieve them.
The book moves along at breakneck speed with key elements of the plot being revealed within the first 100 pages. But, after that, as the book stretches to its 300+ page length, parts of it seem repetitive and new plot elements make the book somewhat bewildering. I give 5/5 for the first half of the book and 3/5 for the second. The other issue is that time manipulation is always a tricky subject. At one point in the book, Barry is told that "time is an illusion, a construct made of human memory ... there's no such thing as the past, present, or the future". Barry finds it difficult to process it and so did I at the end of the book. But with books or movie of this genre, one needs to accept this inherent issue and enjoy the ride!
Pros: Unique and fascinating plot, page-turner
Cons: Repetitive at times, unresolved plot points inherent in this genre
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