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The Tesseract

alex garland

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Gripping from the first pages, Garland's new novel is set over three hours during one night in Manila. With the pace and suspense of "The Beach", this novel intertwines three the shady dealings of gangsters, the tautly and emotionally drawn tale of a Phillipino family and the violent lives of a gang of street kids, until their different lives collide in a shattering finale. It is beautifully written and unputdownable. 'Is Alex Garland the new Graham Greene? After "The Tesseract" the question needs to be asked ...a powerful narrative drive, exotic locations that unfold like a corrupt and mysterious flower, and a moody intelligence that holds everything together' - JG Ballard.

335 pages, Paperback

First published January 1,1999
Places
philippines, 

This edition

Format
335 pages, Paperback
Published
January 1, 1999 by Penguin Books
ISBN
9780140258424
ASIN
0140258426
Language
English

More editions

About the author

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alex garland

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Alex Garland (born 1970) is a British novelist, screenwriter, and director.

Garland is the son of political cartoonist Nick (Nicholas) Garland. He attended the independent University College School, in Hampstead, London, and the University of Manchester, where he studied art history.

His first novel, The Beach, was published in 1996 and drew on his experiences as a backpacker. The novel quickly became a cult classic and was made into a film by Danny Boyle, with Leonardo DiCaprio.

The Tesseract, Garland's second novel, was published in 1998. This was also made into a film, starring Jonathan Rhys Meyers. In 2003, he wrote the screenplay for Danny Boyle's 28 Days Later, starring Cillian Murphy. His third novel, The Coma, was published in 2004 and was illustrated with woodcuts by his father.

In 2007 he wrote the screenplay for the film Sunshine—his second screenplay to be directed by Danny Boyle and star Cillian Murphy as lead. Garland also served as an executive producer on 28 Weeks Later, the sequel to 28 Days Later.

Garland also wrote the first screenplay for Halo, the film adaptation of the successful video game franchise by Bungie Studios.

He made his directorial debut with Ex Machina, a 2014 feature film based on his own story and screenplay.

His partner is actress/director Paloma Baeza.

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Community Reviews

Rating(4 / 5.0, 100 votes)
5 stars
31(31%)
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33(33%)
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36(36%)
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100 reviews All reviews
Profile Image for Kimberly .
Hypokrites
★ ★ ★ ★ ★
April 26,2025
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I love all things Alex Garland, and this was the one piece of work solely by him I had yet to read/watch. (After - The Beach, The Coma, Ex Machina, Annihilation, Devs) and I have to say I was extremely disappointed. I came into this book really wanting to enjoy it but only managed to get just about half way through. Bar one exciting moment, the book just laboured on confusing time frames, and frankly dull characters. The short sequence and flashback/flash-forward style of writing was somewhat jarring - and meant I didn’t really know what I was reading most of the time. There were subplots layered onto subplots and it just all seemed to disappear into tangents that were unsatisfying to read. Real shame as everything else Garland has touched is gold.
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Sphinxter
★ ★ ★ ★ ★
April 26,2025
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why do they keep making such terrible movies out of his terrific books?
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Suzannes
★ ★ ★ ★ ★
April 26,2025
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Boring. I lost interest after page 20 and should have applied the 100 pages rule, i.e. if it hasn't grabbed me by then forget it. I wish I had.
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tiffanyhng
★ ★ ★ ★ ★
April 26,2025
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I love his movies so I thought I’d try his books, they are not on the same level. The characters were really interesting but nothing happened, the story was missing completely and the “same event told from 3+ perspectives” conceit didn’t really work. I kept hoping there would be a twist somewhere in there but it ended with an unfinished whimper.
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Vimhhh
★ ★ ★ ★ ★
April 26,2025
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Set in the Philippines, this novel contains three distinct non-linear narratives that portray three groups of people who would not normally interact, but whose storylines eventually converge in a violent fashion. It begins in a hotel room, where a man waits for a mob boss. It is a book best read with little knowledge of what will happen. It may seem disjointed at first, but the separate threads eventually converge. Backstories for the three groups are woven into the narrative. It is told in a fragmented manner in very short chapters. It is written in a way that keeps the reader’s attention through trying to piece together what is going on. The tone is dark and gritty. It is a short book but a little too gruesome for me. This is the first time I have read Alex Garland’s works and I liked it enough to read another.
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Arashi_Tempesta
★ ★ ★ ★ ★
April 26,2025
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The Tesseract suffers from the case of the infamous sophomore jinx simply because it is in no way like Garland's fabulous debut novel The Beach.
The voice is completely different. The Beach was linear, almost cinematic in scope, a rather conventional novel; The Tesseract is experimental, and the writing dry, sparse and moody. The novel is set in Manila, and through three separate, non-linear narratives it shows the story of three groups of people who would normally never met, but whom fate has connected in a most violent way.
There are good bits in The Tesseract, but as a whole the novel falls rather short. The characters aren't particularly memorable and the concept of the tesseract is thrown in almost desperately, as a bit of novelty could shed an entirely new light on the familiar concept of the same incident being related by different people. Garland offers us a bunch of quick, skilfully drawn sketches and fluently switches between them, much like Quentin Tarantino did in Pulp Fiction.
While not as spellbinding as The Beach, The Tesseract is fast paced and has its moments (The Filipino love story, the man who buys dreams) but as a whole the novel feels like a concept that wasn't entirely fleshed out. It feels more like a transitional piece, of a writer in-developement, who has estabilished himself in one field and doesn't fear trying new things. It is sad that Garland seems to have abandoned writing novels and now concentrates on adapting them for the screen. Maybe he only had one great work in him? The Tesseract unfortunately offers no answer.
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