Um baita livro, embora bem pouco conhecido, de Alex Garland, escritor do sensacional "A Praia". A premissa de "histórias que se interligam" pode parecer um pouco batida à primeira vista, mas é sensacional a maneira como os personagens de "O Tesseracto" parecem ter vida própria, parecem ser totalmente de carne e osso, mesmo com poucas páginas dedicadas a cada um. Está nos detalhes econômicos de Garland o grande trunfo do livro: ele não precisa de uma centena de páginas para tornar os personagens críveis, faz isso em um punhado de magistrais parágrafos. Esses personagens, tão bem construídos, somados ao peculiar universo que dá cenário ao livro - Manila, nas Filipinas, retratada com assustadora precisão, ainda que de maneira levemente onírica - fazem dessa leitura algo que foge ao lugar-comum e nos dá a sensação de termo descoberto uma joia secreta.

I didn't love this book as much as I loved The Beach, but in the end everything came together so nicely that I would recommend this for people who want to read a story with a different kind of writing style.

Set in the Philippines, the story focuses on three very different groups of people from different walks of life, and who probably should never in real life have any reason to meet each other, but do here through a bizarre set of circumstances. Throughout the narrative, I got the feeling that each of these people have no way to understand why these things are happening to them; they just are -- and it's just a matter of timing and circumstance, with no rhyme nor reason -- and that even at the end, the whole "unraveling" if you will, I was still left with the notion, as one of the characters was so fond of quoting, "that's just the way it was." So really, if you're looking for some kind of explanation of it all, my advice is not to.

As in his first book, "The Beach," Garland starts his story in a run-down hotel room, where the character Sean notices that the peephole has been covered over. He also notices that he is in a room where the sheets have bloodstains, the phone is decorated with perfectly made circles made by cigarette burns and he deduces that he's staying in a room where a torturer once stayed. As he ponders all of the reasons why he's making this conclusion, and what scenarios may have occurred to make the bloodstains, he's also thinking about the meeting with Don Pepe, who runs some kind of Mafia-type piracy ring where he deals with merchant marine sea captains. Don Pepe arrives early and Sean jumps to the conclusion that he's going to be killed and tries to stay ahead of the game by being prepared to shoot first. He succeeds in killing Don Pepe and his right-hand man, but this leaves two more of Don Pepe's men, who chase him through the streets of Manila. His path will intersect with that of two street kids, and it will also intersect with that of Rosa, a doctor with two children, a husband and a mother, who live in a quiet upscale suburb there.

The story flows very well even though the narrative is not exactly linear; everything intersects and the chapters weave in and out of narratives of the various characters' stories. The characterization is excellent, making it possible for the readers to get into the characters' lives.

Very tense at times; recommended .

I found this book really disappointing. I was looking forward to reading it because I love The Beach so much, but this book was written in a completely different, non-linear way. If you're looking for another book like The Beach, this isn't it.

Interesting book.

What I liked: the momentum/pace (of the first section especially), the details of the characters, the loose ends/non-sequiturs in the plot, the fact that the book takes an action-movie-esque setup and deconstructs it as a sort of literary character study/metaphysical musing on meaninglessness.

What I didn't like: the pacing is uneven, the characters are often too pat and don't have realistic rough edges (and they felt very 'Western' in some of their speech/thought, most especially Vincente, which, while I can 'get' the point about individualism, I simply did not buy that this street kid was waxing so philosophical and SO eloquent so often, whereas the rest of the characters seemed to speak much more in line with their backgrounds and environments), the philosophical 'points' were sometimes a bit too on-the-nose, sections were over-written, and the typeset.

This book feels like it should've been a character-sketch novella that was stretched into a 'novel.' I would've liked it to stay shorter and focus on the elements of character *essential* to the story (though one could argue none are in a way, but that's too pretentious for me) or go a bit longer and delve further into some of the characters beyond mere coincidences (e.g., for me, Rosa's husband was someone interesting whose backstory was nearly completely ignored).

The tesseract was an unnecessary device, and it just felt pretentious. It would've worked exactly the same, in terms of emotional impact/philosophical point, if it had been left out entirely. I would've enjoyed the black dog for all the depressive connotations which aren't explicitly alluded to in the book, but that for me would've felt more 'authentic' than the tesseract in a book where the religion and the philosophizing felt ... forced.

Overall though the writing was pretty good and I like what he did, I just feel like it could've been executed more messily to be a bit grittier not in tone but in the character explorations.

I liked the idea of the multiple characters having individual stories which then cross over but I never really got absorbed by any of them. I loved The Beach so was a little disappointed by this one as it lacked atmosphere and did not grasp me as much.

Published in 1999, The Tesseract is a novel written by then-young author Alex Garland, a writer who has since gone on to become one of the most renowned Hollywood screenwriters and filmmakers of his generation (Ex Machina, 28 Days Later, Annihilation, and the upcoming Civil War).

I read Alex Garland's debut novel, The Beach, and thoroughly enjoyed it, but The Tesseract was a little more difficult for me to wrap my head around. Set in Manilla (over what appears to be a 30-minute time period), The Tesseract follows various characters who intersect during a particularly violent encounter. Divided into four parts, the first three sections read as short novellas told from different POVs, and the final section is the conclusion of the event and recounts the fates of all the characters involved.

I'm being very vague in my description here because there's not much to tell without spoiling the novel. Basically, the action kicks off with Sean, a British smuggler, who's awaiting the arrival of a Filipino gangster in a seedy hotel. A foot chase ensues that ropes in a couple of street kids and ends at the home of a family that lives in the city's suburbs.

The Tesseract feels very experimental, and it's easy to tell that Garland is shifting away from being a novelist to a more visual storyteller. This novel is short, and — in my opinion — would probably work better as a short film. The "visual language" of the novel is really great and kinetic, especially in the scenes involving gunfire.

However, by the end, I think the "point" of the novel went over my head. Either that, or the "everything is connected" theme — while possibly fresh in 1999 — feels overdone 25 years later. A quick read, I'd recommend The Tesseract to anyone interested in Garland's evolution as a writer and filmmaker.

“Tesseract” – a four-dimensional hypercube with all equal sides and right angles; the author includes in the definition the “unraveling” of same. This book is three separate tales, taking place over the span of both a few hours and several years. The first involves an emissary for a smuggler who is behind on his protection payments, awaiting the arrival of an unhappy enforcer in a Manila hotel room. The second deals with a young doctor, a happily married mother of two who, nonetheless, mourns a lost love from her youth. The third is about a psychology student preparing his thesis on Manila’s street children while he grieves his wife’s suicide. The creation of the tesseract is achieved through the development of each character’s past, and the deft interweaving that connects their present lives. The unraveling is a bit trickier; the reader must decide if it is in the conclusion of the book, the final chapter, in which the author reveals to us the ultimate fate of each character. Or, if, in fact, the entire story represents a sort of unraveling, as the characters’ lives shift and change, as they relinquish the past and come to terms with the present. Interesting book, enjoyable read.

Recommended to me by a lovely young lady, “The Tesseract” encompasses fast paced storytelling, which coupled with interchanging character dynamics and juxtaposed lifestyles within the city of Manila (Philippines), allows for “The Tesseract” to offer a Woody Allen -esque climax whereby; contrasting lifestyles blend together (albeit somewhat unexpectedly) to offer a rich and satisfying pinnacle. Highly recommend this book and throughly enjoyed reading it! :) i have also had 4 beers and i’m feeling sentimental about it ngl

Interesting read since Garland has a pretty good grasp of some elements of culture here. The lack of a conventional western ending was also in line with local culture. The overlapping stories were engaging.

This one is hard to judge..

While I enjoyed it I thought it was confusing to read with all the jumping back and forth. The characters aren't really deep enough to connect with meaningfully apart from maybe the two boys who are quite well written.

I think 3 stars is fair. By no means a bad or boring read but wouldn't necessarily recommend

The Tesseract by Alex Garland.

I am a big fan of Alex Garland's work. First time i saw any movie he had writen was with some early Danny Boyle movies, The Beach, 28 Days Later and Sunshine. All amazing, later on other scripts with Dredd in particulair, then with his own movies, Ex Machina, Annihilation, and the recently Civil War, he makes very original great stuff ! He also made a fantastic underrated series with Devs, long story short i love the writing from Garland but never read one of his books until now. The book reads easy, but the story was really hard to follow at times.