The Fold

Peter Clines

Completed 5/11/2019, Reviewed 5/13/2019

4 stars

I read this book after a very dense, intense novel.  Fortunately, it was mostly a fun, exciting mystery about a device that lets you travel several hundred feet in a few steps by folding dimensions, sort of like a wormhole.  However, something is wrong with the device and only one man has the ability to put the pieces together to solve the mystery.  It’s an easy read with lots of dialogue and a little science.  It’s not a profound novel, but it hit me just right at just the right time for me to give it a good review.

The man with the abilities is Mike Erikson.  He’s got an eidetic memory.  He can recall everything he’s ever seen.  He can pull that data and arrange it complex combinations to put pieces of puzzles together.  That’s why his best friend keeps on calling on him to join his projects.  So far, he’s never been able to get Mike to give up his job as a high school teacher to work for him.  This time however, his project is the aforementioned device, called the Albuquerque Door.  He wants Mike to review the project on site and make sure that everything is copacetic, and that all the money being poured into it is not being wasted.  Mike is intrigued and agrees to work on this project on his summer vacation.  It soon becomes evident that something is amiss and nobody on the project is helping Mike get to the bottom of things.

Mike is a very interesting character.  He likens his memory gift to a colony of ants, thousands of individual creatures all working in concert together.  At first the references to the ants are confusing, but it begins to make sense that that’s how he analyzes and compiles all the information in his head.  As a result of being different, he struggled with his gift most of his life, which is why he likes being a teacher rather than being a star researcher on government projects.  He also has trouble with interpersonal relationships, keeping people at a distance. 

The rest of the cast of characters begin a little one note, with everyone hostile towards Mike, thinking he’s there to shut them down.  They soon become more colorful, but why they do adds to the mystery surrounding the Albuquerque Door, as nothing seems to prompt their changes in attitude.  So at first, the characters all bled into each other, but as their personalities diverged, they became more distinct and a lot more fun. 

The mysteries of the Door encompass the first two-thirds of the book.  This is the best part.  It’s fun and exciting and pretty well written.  The last third was a little bizarre for me.  I can’t really explain why because that would be a major spoiler.  Suffice it to say, I found myself not quite as engrossed as I previously had been.  The end, though not a cliffhanger, leaves it open for numerous sequels. 

This is no profound piece of literature.  What it is is an enjoyable, readable romp through the concept of teleportation.  Actually, it’s not quite teleportation, but that’s defined in the book, and I’ll let you read that.  I give the book four stars out of five because I highly enjoyed the book, and wasn’t deterred by the last part.