Vectors

Someone else mentioned staying up all night to read Vectors. I found myself once again getting far too little sleep because I just wanted to read "one more chapter!" Other reviewers have been more eloquent than I but I agree that one of Kube-McDowell's strength's has always been making science interesting to a non-scientest like myself. However, I'd say that what I love best about all of Mr. Kube-McDowell's writing is the way he takes an interesting subject, presents all sides of it, and writes characters you really care about to play out the story. I'd highly recommend this book, especially to anyone curious about the blending of science and spirituality.

This is a story that explores the unknowable and tries to put the lie to the phrase "the country from which no traveler returns". Do we have a soul? Can it be measured?The background and texture of the very near future is well crafted. I was impressed by his vision of our society's development under "Homeland Security". The on-going issues of university politics, and the general tendency of science to be more reactionary than many would expect make this believable and real.I very much look forward to any future books in this universe.

I am perhaps not the most objective of sources, as Mike is an old friend of mine. We met our first day of college at Michigan State University (mumble mumble) years ago and have been close friends ever since.However, what I lack in objectivity, perhaps I can make up for with scope. I've read pretty much every piece of fiction Mike has ever published, a few that he hasn't published, and some of his non-fiction as well.The story is well enough described in the cover blurb and other materials, so I won't go into that.All of Mike's books and stories are good, but this is the best yet. In it he combines all his numerous strengths as a writer and human being. Mike has always been able to make the science part of science fiction intelligible to non-science types like me, without talking down, and he weaves the needed explication into the narrative far more seamlessly than most. He was an unusually thoughtful and inquisitive college freshman, and has become an unusually thoughtful and inquisitive mature writer. Without simply falling into credulity, he manages to make the topic of reincarnation, if not yet scientifically respectable, then worthy of cautious inquiry.More than in most "hard" SF, his characters are fully human and fleshed out, warts and all. The all-too-common "tell the readers what they need to know about quantum mechanics for the story to work, why don't you" kind of dialog is replaced with real conversation between believable human beings. Humor and tragedy interweave in the lives of his characters, just as they do in real life.I could effuse a lot more, but you get the point.Do yourself a favor and buy this book. Do some of your friends a favor, and buy them copies, too.

Sometimes, things just seem to come together. A brilliant scientist meets a creative pioneer. Science meets philosophy. And a mystery meets a mystery.When was the last time I stayed up all night reading a book, even when I didn't really have the time, even when I had things to do the next day, because I simply could not bear to put the book down? When was the last time a book beat sleep? When was the last time I finished a book and then had to keep it with me the next day so I could go back and start reading it all over again?Well, these days, that doesn't happen for me all that often, but it happened with Vectors. I stayed up all night reading Vectors (the first time; I'm halfway through the second reading), because I could not, would not, not even at the promptings of family and friends--not even when I knew where we were going and no one else in the car did--put it down. Everything else paled when placed next to my engagement with this book. Vectors is full of unlikely meetings, seeming coincidences and risks. Kube-McDowell breaks every rule in the hard science-fiction author's canon. There's spiritualism, having tea with neuroscience. There's a respectful nod to the neopagan community, dallying over questions of evidence and data. There's a sweeping love story that encompasses everything else and makes this story sweet and real without being cloying or predictable.Everything is vivid, from the science to the characters to the descriptions of a not-too-distant future Ann Arbor. Kube-McDowell's prose is gorgeous, lush without being purple, almost romantic. The characters are alive. You want to know them. The story itself is a roller coaster ride that will engage you from page one. I wasn't able to put it down. I'm having trouble putting it down for the second time. I put it down to write this review, because I don't want it to end again. It's going on the reread-every-year-or-so shelf with books like Stranger In A Strange Land and Jitterbug Perfume. Michael Kube-McDowell has taken some risks, writing a book like Vectors. And Vectors is a risk worth taking.

I have done something that I never do. I have ordered three copies of this book. One is a Yule gift for friend. The second I'm keeping to read over again. The third I'm tucking away for when my first copy falls apart.It takes amazing courage for a respected SF author of Kube-McDowell's reputation to tackle a subject like reincarnation. That's usually the venue of New Age crystal clinkers or East Indian guhrus. Vectors succeeds at examining this concept from the unusual juxtapostion of both neuroscience and spiritualism. The protagonist/scientist must find more than Empirical evidence of something no person on the planet has ever discovered, that life goes on after death. The writer's other equally brave challenge is that he's embraced the tale in the arms of an amazing love story.Kube-McDowell is one of those authors whom I respect and trust. He transmits the spark of life to full-bodied, intelligent, passionate characters, and he's no slouch when it comes to the science. Arthur C. Clarke of 2001, A Space Odessey fame has collaborated with this man on a recent project, so you know there will be no fudge factor for fuzzy logic in his work. And that integrity lays Vectors' firm foundation. There are no ignored thought trails, no easy outs or do-overs. Dr. Jonathan Briggs must get the science right, and this character proves true to his intellect and to his emotions.Vectors does something else that I rarely ever see in science fiction. This novel acurately portrays Wiccan and Pagan people in their environs of a spiritual gathering. Kube-McDowell grants these major and minor characters grace and dignity without falling into dogma.There is nothing... I repeat NOTHING lax about this book. It held my curiosity captive for the entire read. I found myself sneaking paragraphs at stop lights, reading in slow traffic, sitting in my car in my driveway turning pages, and not putting it down until 3 a.m.