Book Log 2014 #7: Cloud Atlas by David Mitchell

Six stories, told in advancing - and retreating - order make up this novel about the human civilization and how our drive to learn, explore and conquer may lead us to places we'd rather not take ourselves.

Not that all the stories are about warfare and strife. Really, all of the stories are personal, looking at one person and their experiences within the civilization. There is some linkage between stories, but it's generally not central to the stories (though the author did state that all of the main characters, with one exception, are reincarnations of the same person, as seen in a shared birthmark).

Five of the six stories are split in two, so you get the first halves of the first five stories, then the whole sixth story, and then the second half of the other five stories in reverse order (so the first story makes up the first and last section of the book, for example). It's an interesting device, and I did find it helpful in seeing how each of the stories led to central, uninterrupted story.

Oddly enough, it's that story that I had the most trouble with. Not sure why; could be that the structure of the book made me less able to stick with the one longer story. Or the use of a local dialect was just that too distracting. Whatever the problem, it wasn't significant, and mostly manifested itself as a desire to get to the conclusions of the other five stories.

I do recommend the book, though I think it's one I'll have to revisit at some point to see if what I've taken away from it has changed.