Blake CrouchBesprekingen

Not a bad story, but it never completely grabbed my interest. The audiobook wasn't a bad way to pass the time, though.

I read this book in 2 days, which I never do. All the while I was thinking “The science is wrong. Decoherence doesn’t need a conscious observer”, “The so-called super-intelligent protagonist is an idiot. I knew what was going on by chapter 3. Why doesn’t he?”, “Too much drinking and getting drunk. Is the author an alcoholic?”, “Not ANOTHER sex scene (yawn)”.
Despite the above, I enjoyed it. I cared about the characters. It is very well written. Some say the ending is lame. I couldn’t think of a better way to end it.

Like 3.5 stars. More well-written than a lot of other books of this genre I've read. Not horrible. Some of the explanation of science and anatomy felt excessive. Good storyline though — I'd probably read another book by him as long as I didn't have to pay for it.½

A good read though a bit scary at times, rather unique and I look forward to reading more of his work.

This just didn't have the same pull other books by the author have had-- didn't engage me, mind and soul. I even checked to see if this was an earlier novel. Turns out, it was originally published in 2009 and now re-released. Mr Crouch has definitely improved in his writing abilities since this one. When I put in the search on Libratything to find this book for reviewing, it struck me as ironic to read "abandon blake crouch". I won't abandon him, but will be very careful what I pick up of his in the future and make sure to check publication dates.½

Disappointing sci-fi novel of the year. Great premise, mind-boggingly lame ending. In the middle, some fun and tons of wasted occasions.

"What do you call a heart that is simultaneously full and breaking? Maybe there's no word for it, but for some reason, it makes me think of rain through sunlight."

Upgrade makes us consider the future of humanity. Do we need an Upgrade?

The novel's strength lies in its moral quandaries. It's a race to improve society, but at what cost? While the writing is strong, I feel like the character development isn't as strong as in the author's other books. The plot centers on a sibling rivalry for the sake of humanity, with a lot of medical terms thrown in. Sometimes, it feels like there's too much technical info, but the balance of science and action keeps things interesting.

Protagonist Logan emerges as a flawed yet compelling figure, and I enjoyed following his internal and external changes as he 'upgrades'. His relationship with his sister Kara adds another layer of tension.

Although I enjoyed Dark Matter and Recursion better than Upgrade, I would still recommend this book if you enjoy a well-written sci-fi novel.

This book was well-written, but the characters were flat and the premise of the book itself wasn't all that original. In particular, the women in the story felt more like objects than people, although this may be true of all the characters in the story.

This book lives up to its hype! It’s a relentlessly fast-paced and nerve-wracking time travel and alternate reality thriller that explores memories and identities.

Recursion has a lot of similarities with Dark Matter. They both explore the concept of space and time but presents different methods of how we might traverse them in the future.

I adored Helena. She’s strong, brave, and kind. However, Marcus Slade is the most memorable character for me. I think he’s the smartest of them all.

There’s a lot to keep track of with the shifting timelines, and at some point, even feels exhausting, but I still enjoyed the book a lot. Plus points for the tender and touching moments in the book.

“Life with a cheat code isn’t life. Our existence isn’t something to be engineered or optimized for the avoidance of pain. That’s what it is to be human – the beauty and the pain, each meaningless without the other.”

Great read, keeps you enthralled, science fiction but believable, I loved it

The beginning wasn't great. It started off with the vibe of a crappy cable TV movie. It got really good at around chapter 7 or 8 though and I flew through the rest of the book. There was a lot of points where I felt like logic was abandoned for plot.

TBR

I couldn’t put this down. He is a very romantic writer, in the best sense of the word.

Jason teaches college physics who gave up his chance to do ground-breaking research in his field in favor of starting a family with his beautiful artist wife. Both gave up promising careers for middling ones in order to put their marriage and raising their now-teenage son first. And both are happy with the decision with essentially no regrets beyond the occasional, casual ‘what if’ thoughts. Jason goes out one night to meet some old friends at a bar (a former college roommate has just won a prestigious physics award), and he doesn’t come back. He’s kidnapped, drugged, and wakes up in an alternate universe version of his life, one in which he never married and instead did the ground-breaking work he gave up in his own world. That research? Inventing a box that allows one to travel through the multiverse. He spends the rest of the book running from his colleagues in that world and searching for a way back to his own universe, his own version of his wife and son.

Meh. Typical first-person Capable White Man Doing Impressive Things While Running from Bad Guys and Fighting for His Best Girl thriller. But with Science! I guess? Not really my cuppa, I suppose.½

Very good book

A book club pick 😉

After two books, I knew what I was getting into with Crouch – a fast-paced sci-fi thriller that is sure to entertain, in one way or another. I really liked Recursion; I liked Dark Matter a lot less; this one falls somewhere in between.

It’s a near future setting, and the climate change is slowly wrecking everything. Also, scientists have been very naughty with genetic engineering, and now this kind of thing is banned, banned, banned. (Me: stupid, stupid, stupid.) There is a Gene Protection Agency in the US, hunting rogue scientists and other disobedient citizens who want to do gene therapy, create new life forms etc. Logan is a GPA agent – one day, he walks into a trap and gets infected with an influenza virus. The virus is carrying stuff that is going to alter Logan’s genome in exciting ways. Don’t you just hate it when this happens?

Logan starts getting smarter, stronger, etc. There is a conspiracy, of course. We get fugitives on the run, secrets revealed, cat-and-mouse games, lots of action. Stuff keeps happening!

The books asks some interesting questions. What does humanity deserve? Or doesn’t deserve? What price would you pay to “save everyone”?

“Being smart doesn’t make people infallible. It just makes them more dangerous.”

But we don’t go very deeply into these themes. So I think I would have preferred less philosophy and more sci-fi thriller candy.

The body count is high, people die in gruesome ways. It’s all very “technical”, like a video game. It bothered me.

Also, this is the third book by Crouch featuring a man forcibly separated from his family/loved ones. This is getting old…

By the end of the book, the plot moves too fast to make sense at times. Maybe Logan had gotten so smart that I couldn’t keep up?

I liked the ending, but I am not sure how I feel about it.½

Ark - Veronica Roth, read by Evan Rachel Wood - 4.5*
Summer Frost - Blake Crouch, read by Rosa Salazar - 3.5*
Emergency Skin - N.K. Jemisin, read by Jason Isaacs - 5.0*
You Have Arrived at Your Destination - Amor Towles, read by David Harbour - 2.0*
The Last Conversation - Paul Tremblay, read by Steven Strait - 4.0*
Randomize - Andy Weir, read by Janina Gavankar - 3.5*

I loved Dark Matter and several other of this authors books. This one just didn’t entertain me at all. Slow and uneventful.

Really enjoyed the entire trilogy.

I’m not a huge mystery/thriller fan but this was a pretty good book. I didn’t exactly find it terrifying. When I first saw this book at the used bookstore I expected it to be more horror than thriller so I was slightly disappointed with that. I’m used to reading his newer books which are more science fiction types and I really enjoy those. This is pretty good though for a mystery/thriller

Dark Matter is full of twists and turns. It had a little bit of thriller a little horror and lots of sci-fi while still being fast past and immersive. It had a multiverse full of several multi dimensions, doppelgängers and a kidnapping. I was thoroughly entertained. The only bad thing was it ended on a cliffhanger and I want to know more!

A unique, intense story that took the book world by storm. It's a constant shuffle of frantic confusion, mind-bending science fiction, and elaborate cat and mouse play. Hard to put down and well-written, Dark Matter isn't a forgettable book and deserves its reputation. For me, though, it didn't have full chemistry since I dislike plots similar - lives getting lost, losing sense of reality, the person isn't believed, extreme sci-fi type stuff - but I enjoyed the story's overall focus. The ending offered a little rating redemption, too.

This is not my usual genre but I found it an exciting and somewhat frightening look into the futuristic advances in science and technology. Logan Ramsay is an agents who work for GPA, Gene Protection Agency. He becomes involved in an effort to amend the sins of his mother, Miriam Ramsay, a scientist involved with a genetic modification project. He feels compelled to correct his family's horrific legacy which explores the limits of humanity. He wants to protect his wife, Beth and daughter, Ava. While leading a raid on a suspected gene laboratory Logan is fortunate to survive an explosion. Or is he? Just as he begins to feel better he realizes that he is almost feeling "too good" in that his thinking is clearer and sharper than it was before the accident. Logan eventually realizes that he has been taken to a lab as a subject for a gene altering project on humans. Although his mother died, he can't help but think that he is being used to advance his mother's trials on altering human genomes. It is a thought provoking journey about the capabilities that might exist and the questionable moral responsibility attached.

Very slow. Read about half the book. Tried to give it a chance. It was like the author did not know where he was going with the plot.

Even for what it is, which is an accessible, roller coaster, sci-fi thriller, this wasn't as good as Dark Matter. I still enjoyed it, and the plot moved well enough that I was interested to see it through, but the story and sci-fi elements in particular don't hold up well upon close inspection.