2 or 2.5 stars. this is book is not good. this is not literature. it has typical matt haig garbage. the point of it is repeated painfully and somehow through a Thoreau quote because matt wants you to know really badly that he knows a few philosophers and has heard of the many worlds hypothesis. the comedy in the book gives 2010s big bang theory humor. i can’t explain much it just gives me the vibe of something is said and it’s not funny and the studio audience fake laugh track plays.
the most interesting concept in the book, the idea of other sliders, is mostly forgotten about and any narrative excitement or tension around it just immediately goes away. so why did we include it? like okay. okay.
i cannot stand when people have horrible chess metaphors in books. no, you will not be winning a game with one pawn against an opponent with all their pieces. sometimes you should resign. he can’t say this because that means Nora Seed (do you get it, she can grow and live?) actually should kill herself. And also how exactly was Nora punished in this book for her suicide attempt? she got to see hundreds of lives and i guess just missed out on being married to a surgeon and having a cute kid. which is what everyone is mad at this book for, that she decides to live when she has a kid, but really that’s not true, she had kids in other worlds but didn’t seem to care, she just liked this one because she was cute and her husband was a rich surgeon and she got to teach philosophy and her brother and friend were alive. like that’s all pretty good i would like that life too. i also just do not believe that Nora, even though we’re told is smart and good at swimming and learned piano, would be top of the world in every one of these pursuits if she just didn’t quit them. There are infinite worlds but not that many. like this book was very clearly written for the genre of person who thinks they’re on the gifted child to depressed adult pipeline.
however as he reminds us morality begins in compassion and so does life so i will give him the benefit of the doubt that he really tried here to write a good book and that everyone who loves this book is changed for the better. i don’t know i tried to hate read this but it wasn’t bad for the reasons people said so i didn’t hate it but it’s nothing great i’ve already spent a lot of time thinking about the many worlds hypothesis and didn’t need Matt here. there are infinite worlds where i didn’t read this book. i already forgot about compassion. maybe i need this book.