The Space Between Worlds: a Sunday Times bestselling science fiction adventure through the multiverse (Ashtown series)

This is another of those books I was attracted to after reading about it on Black Gate Fantasy. And thanks to them, I’ve rather enjoyed myself.Here’s the cover blurb:******'My mother used to say I was born reaching, which is true. She also used to say it would get me killed, which it hasn't. Not yet, anyway.'Born in the dirt of the wasteland, Cara has fought her entire life just to survive. Now she has done the impossible, and landed herself a comfortable life on the lower levels of the wealthy and walled-off Wiley City. So long as she can keep her head down and avoid trouble, she's on a sure path to citizenship and security - on this world, at least.Of the 380 realities that have been unlocked, Cara is dead in all but 8.Cara's parallel selves are exceptionally good at dying - from disease, turf wars, or vendettas they couldn't outrun - which makes Cara wary, and valuable. Because while multiverse travel is possible, no one can visit a world in which their counterpart is still alive. And no one has fewer counterparts than Cara.But then one of her eight doppelgängers dies under mysterious circumstances, and Cara is plunged into a new world with an old secret. What she discovers will connect her past and future in ways she never could have imagined - and reveal her own role in a plot that endangers not just her earth, but the entire multiverse.******Interesting eh?And it is. Imagine a post apocalyptic world struggling to recover from a war that all but ruined the planet. And while mankind survived, it’s now a world of division. There are those who live a life of plenty within their walled cities, and those who eke out an existence in the ruined – albeit it slowly recovering – wastelands outside.If you live inside a city, you have everything you could possibly need: security; safety; the best hospitals and medical care; education and employment. (You get the idea). Life is good . . . as well it should be, for the star of their society discovered the means to travel between dimensions to parallel worlds; a secret process by which they ‘datamine’ information and technology and anything else that can be used to improve their own scientific advancement.But travelling between worlds is dangerous. That’s why you’ll never find city-dwellers volunteering for the job. And really, why would they when there’s an endless supply of candidates just waiting for an opportunity to earn decent money – if only for a short while – and the possibility of full citizenship if they do well.Enter Cara, a traverser with a penchant for survival. As the blurb reveals, of the 380 realities discovered so far, she’s only alive in 8 of them. Sheer coincidence? Or is there something more insidious, more duplicitous behind those figures?Well, we certainly find out in an engaging adventure that – although set in a bleak and miserable world – nevertheless lets the sun shine through. It’s a tale about survival. Of love gone wrong and hope for a better future. Of the determination to improve. To see things to a conclusion without giving up. Our characters are human. Flawed and broken. Their interactions are colored by their social, cultural and racial differences, allowing for an engaging dialogue that keeps things real. Well placed plot twists and an easy pace keep the story moving along nicely, until you find yourself at a poignant end that you didn’t quite expect. (Kudos there).This is the first book I’ve read by Micaiah Johnson, and from what I’ve seen, I know it won’t be the last. The Space Between Worlds, a fresh slant on a well-used trope. And a darn good read to boot!

By the end of this book, I was deeply invested in the main characters. I loved it. I delayed reading the last chapter so I could savour being in their world a little longer. I’m so tempted to give to give it 5 stars, especially while my book hangover is still raw. But I have to acknowledge where it didn’t fully hit home.First, a small snippet of blurb as a précis…"Multiverse travel is finally possible, but there’s just one catch: No one can visit a world where their counterpart is still alive. Enter Cara, whose parallel selves happen to be exceptionally good at dying—from disease, turf wars, or vendettas they couldn’t outrun. Cara’s life has been cut short on 372 worlds in total."Cara’s slim grip on life in so many of the parallel worlds makes her ‘Earth Zero’ self ideal to work as a ‘traverser’, gathering intelligence from parallel worlds that are sufficiently similar to Earth Zero. And so the scene is set.The main conflict in the story comes from the two-tier society that has developed on Earth. There is the wealthy, enclosed, Wiley City, where the company “Eldridge” runs everything to do with multiverse travel; and there is Ashtown, in the area outside the city where pollution and poverty have a firm grip. Cara comes from Ashtown, but works for Eldridge in Wiley City. Cue conflict and tension.Wiley City is believable as a community of the elite, with various levels of privilege, but it is in Ashtown where the author’s world building really excels. Here there is a gritty, multi-facetted society with power structures that have evolved around religion, prostitution, and a self-styled Emperor with his fearsome teams of Runners that wield his power. I could almost taste the dirt in Ashtown, and the power struggles were so well crafted that I fully understood the consequences of a wrong word here, or an unintended insult there.And the writing style. I loved the writing style. I could just marinate in it.An economy of words that could be evocative, blunt, eloquent, direct, poetic, or just plain gorgeous. I so often found myself smiling from the little rush of joy I would get from a phrase or paragraph that felt like a little nugget of perfection - even when it was used to illustrate something cruel or callous, to fill in the colour in a character’s motivations.So what’s not to like?I really struggled with the first 20% or so of the book. This is where the heavy lifting was done for the world building. This was establishing Cara’s credentials as having come from Ashtown, with a hardness of character and a set of sensibilities that have allowed her to survive, when so many of her parallel world selves didn’t. And I really didn’t like her very much. Then there is an extended visit to a parallel Earth that takes the remainder of the first half of the book. Again, this is critical world building, and was quite enjoyable as it was beginning to benefit from a pay-off of the earlier character establishment. And the consequences and differences of parallel worlds started to become really interesting. But I still didn’t understand where the story was going.It was only in the second half of the book that the full pay-off for all of the world building and character establishment really kicked in. And then it *really* kicked in. The second half of the book was an exciting ride of twists and dense plot - fully taking advantage of all of the world building that had been done across multiple parallel worlds. This is where I really started to engage with the characters, and get to like so many of them… and I enjoyed it immensely.So while the second half of the book is 5 stars through and through, I can’t fully forgive it for my struggles in the first half.But here are some other random things that I enjoyed:- The central conceit that it is only Earth Zero that initiates traversing isn’t ignored or glossed over, but is quite neatly explained, and even contributes to the plot. I appreciated this not-so-little detail, that is missing in some other parallel worlds stories.- At the 50% point in the book, I made a prediction about what would happen to one of the main characters by the end of the book. And although it turned out that I was wrong, there was a moment when the character contemplated that course of action and rejected it. That felt like the author rewarding me twice: once as a nod to me having predicted it, and again for providing me with something else that was ultimately more satisfying.- The mechanism for traversing was only obliquely ‘explained’, but is clearly intended to be entirely based on science and technology. However, the traversers themselves had developed a little mysticism around it that I found incredibly human.Until this book hangover subsides, I will continue to find it intrusive and an invasion of privacy that other people have read this book, and may have become as attached as I have to so many of the characters.It will pass.

Here is a writer who loves her characters and wants us to love them too. And so they are fully rounded, including all the rough edges.The premise is excellent and the plot always intriguing, but it’s the characters that kept me wanting to turn the page.I can’t wait to read the next instalment.

This is a well written book full of insight and based on a great concept. But don’t read it if you are currently suffering from grief or a bereavement as it can be upsetting, as it’s very much about the nature of life, choices and mortality.

This is a pretty easy read, graphic in parts, but the story keeps you engaged and the cast of characters is relatively small. Not overly original, but definitely worth a read.

I don’t really like Sci fi. It’s not my thing. But this book. This book!!! Gah. Amazing. I loved it. I was gripped from the beginning.I had been put off reading it because I was worried the world building would be too complex given the premise, but it wasn’t at all. Really clear and easy to get in to. I read it one sitting.Loved it.

Totally enjoyed this book. There are elements of Vonnegut and Toni Morrison, but with faster pacing than either of them. This is a great concept, well thought out, with fascinating world building, fast plot and great characters.The logistics of travel between parallel universes can get tricky....but describing that travel is only available among worlds with similar frequencies, the plot can move in a smart and creative pace...and can have some fun twists...like you can only travel to a world in which you are dead.The dystopia of Earth Zero gives just enough information to make it fascinating and not cumbersome--letting the reader collaborate in some of the blank spots.The plot moves fast with action, insight, and ideas.

I love that it’s an original storyline and you get lost in the story. What an amazing read!

Assim q entendi q esse não era o romance q eu não sei pq esperava q fosse e comecei a aproveitar o livro pelo q era, um comentário profundo sobre os problemas do mundo e dos indivíduos q tem q sobreviver nele, lindamente escrito, então pude enfim começar a amar essa história e personagens e cada um deles vai te cativar e ao menos te fazer sorrir e pensar se não querer abraçar e guardar num potinho. E sério a escrita é incrível, o livro deve ter mais parte marcada do q não ksksk até os agradecimentos foi lindo! Não sei como lidar c esse livro.

This has quickly become one of my all time favorites. Layered and powerful writing. So so very lovely. A must read for sure.

This book was better than I expected