Version Control

Version Control, by Dexter Palmer

This book is an excellent example of why I value my book group! I'm a time travel and dystopian fiction fan, so I was intrigued to dive into this one...especially with such an intriguing premise.

It moved a bit slowly for my taste, and at times I thought he had too many details about science, religion, and the Causality Violation Device (the time traveling machine that is "not a time traveling machine"). Palmer's commentary and reflections on race, alcoholism, and our blind reliance on technology were spot-on. Some of the book was speculative fiction rather than pure sci-fi, because I could actually imagine many of the things happening.

But the characters were wholly unlikable (which is often a problem for me). My book group friends helped me uncover brilliant strategies and nuances of Palmer's as we discussed it, and I grew to appreciate it much more.

I'm not much of a sci-fi fan, though, so that probably turned me off a bit. I'd describe this as literary sci-fi. The book grew on me during our discussion, so much so that I was tempted to re-read it. But life's too short!