This one seems to be a love it or hate it for most. I am still considering my opinion. Right now, I believe I liked it. I don’t think the story grabbed me but the writing style was unique and mesmerizing.

A series of events happened around me when I was reading this book. All revolved around death, including a glimpse into my own. I tried so hard to understand them, thought there must be some meaning behind it. If I thought hard enough, I might get some kind of understanding. In actuality, there probably isn't. They are the different surfaces of a tesseract. Rubbed together by an unknown force.

I didn't really understand the point of the book until I read some of the comments here, which made me like the book more. There isn't any point to understand. It's a series of events pieced together, by some unknown force, or pure randomness. Just like our lives.

I’m a huge fan of Alex Garland, and while this book is written very well, it’s just not my type of book. I went in thinking it would have the same writing style as The Beach, but it definitely did not. I found it hard to follow in parts.

One of those multiple convergent plot threads, deal. What unseen factors lead to life changing events? Pretty good, not as good as the Beach, I thought at the time, though it's been ages now, so who knows.

How do you follow up on a hugely successful first novel?

This is the question that must of faced Alex Garland after the success of his book The Beach and on the whole I feel that this book is a fairly successful attempt and in large parts that's down to the differences rather than the similarities.It would have been so easy for Garland to just write another travelogue book based on young backpackers but this is very different in feel despite starting in a run down hotel room as did The Beach.

This book revolves around three people whom on the face of it have nothing in common but whose paths cross on one eventful night. We have a British sailor waiting to meet a vicious gangster, a middle-class doctor at home putting her children to bed whilst awaiting her husband's return from work and a homeless street urchin.

The story is told in three separate vignettes as each main character are fleshed out and in many ways it is a sort of horror story where the monsters are real people,Don Pepe the ruthless gangster and estate owner, the ex-lover who scolds a child with acid out of jealousy and a father/society who has abandoned a child to fend for himself in the middle of a sprawling city.

At first the divergent strands of the book are a little confusing but the author paints such a vivid picture that you feel impelled to carry on reading until the brutal climax. The whole tale takes place over on night in Manila and in many respects this is where the book falls down IMHO. The climax when it comes feels rushed and overly contrived but on the whole it is a very good attempt at a second novel but does suffer in comparison with the first.

As a fan of Alex’s, I was expecting something mind blowing as per his movies/shows, and though I liked the concept, I found it to be somewhat of a slow burn that gets told through too many perspectives at once.
I liked how it wrapped all the viewpoints together in the end, though I wish it maintained a more consistent level of action versus plot.

With great success, comes great contractual obligations which manifested in Alex Garland’s second novel ‘The Tesseract’. Tiptoeing around the Philippines’ mob scene, Garland’s second venture divides the story into three perspectives connecting to the same narrative.

For such a strong narrative voice in ‘The Beach’, ‘The Tesseract’ is a disconnected sophomore slump. There are too many characters crammed into a short novel that compromises its characterisation, though it seems to be more of a conversationalist piece about violence. Nevertheless, I disassociated throughout its entirety.

⭐️⭐️

After The Beach Garland goes experimental tailoring a novel where different stories and paths unravel themselves and collide. I like Alex Garland, also in his works as a screenwriter/director, I like his writing, very smooth and enjoyable, but sadly I couldn't connect with this particular novel.

Alex Garland hat mit "The Tesseract" ein Buch geschrieben, das sich schnell als mittelmässig bezeichnen lässt. Aber Vorsicht, denn hinter der thrillermässigen Geschichte lauert mehr als man denkt.

Garland erzählt in nicht chronologischer Weise das Aufeinandertreffen von Verbrecher, Arbeiter, Strassenkinder und Familien in den Philippinen. Die Handlungsstränge fügen sich nah und nah zu einem grossen Ganzen zusammen, der Tesserakt entsteht. Dem Leser und den Figuren wird erst mit der Zeit klar, in was für einem Umfeld sie sich befinden und wo genau sie angelangt sind.

Der Autor spielt dabei mit den Aspekten des Lebenssinns, der Orientierung und der Frage, wieso sind wir genau jetzt hier, und warum passiert all dies? Obwohl wir solche Fragen wohl nie beantworten können, macht die Betrachtung des Konstrukts viel Spass.

This book starts out from the perspective of a person who I assume is on drugs or something, it's very hard to follow. For some reason I stuck with it, even halfway through I wasn't quite sure what was happening most of the time but any bit of it I did grasp was entertaining enough to keep going. I don't think I would ever recommend this to anyone but if I talked to someone who read it, we would probably have an interesting conversation.

Alex Garland's The Tesseract is a story of layers. Which I'm sure if you knew the definition of the word "tesseract" [also called an 8-cell or regular octachoron or cubic prism, is the four-dimensional analog of the cube; the tesseract is to the cube as the cube is to the square], you may have already assumed as much. I did not know the definition of this word. Nor did I fully grasp this story until the last 15 pages.

There are many things happening at once…a European man killing for his life, a Filipino woman raising her children as her husband tries to make it home from work, street children sharing their dreams with a PhD student collecting research. If you are thinking those story lines sound random, they are. But the end is worth the read.

Alex Garland does a great job of moving these story lines, and weaving a narrative for a lesser author, would be a mess. This was a relatively short & fast read, and satisfying in the end. And a glimpse into Filipino culture, from the perspective of foreigners and locals, which I truly enjoyed.

The Beach is one of my favourite books, and Garland is by far one of my favourite writers (screenplays included). So, I was very excited to read this. It was intriguing enough to keep me enthralled, even when introducing new characters late into the text and narrating through different time periods (this book is not linear).
Unfortunately, I found the story to be anti-climatic. The way it all ties together is wonderfully written, but there was no anxiety or thrill, and little action to make the characters' development worthy of being so in-depth. I often found myself wondering, "how is this relevant?"
In saying all that, Garland weaves an incredibly vivid tale. His writing is the reason this story gets a third star from me, and why I would still recommend it. Also, this book was much more ambitious that The Beach. It seemed as if it should have been a screenplay, though it could have done with a more impactful ending.
Then again, maybe my hopes were too high because of how unbelievably well-written his debut was. Garland will remain a favourite writer of mine, perhaps one of the best of our time, but this story gets 3 stars (I enjoyed, and would recommend, but it is not a standout).