Hollow World

Executive Summary: A large departure from his Riyria books, Hollow World was still something I really enjoyed, but is likely not for everyone.

Full Review
I was a little nervous about reading and reviewing this book. I've been fortunate enough to exchange several emails and discussion posts with Mr. Sullivan over the last few months after discovering his Riyria books late last year.

Fortunate may not be the best word since Mr. Sullivan seems to go out of his way to interact with his fans. I hate writing reviews for books I don't like to begin with, so the notion of writing a review for an author I've actually talked with a bit was weighing on the back of my mind as I set down to read this book. Thankfully I really enjoyed the book, so none of that matters.

The book was a bit slow to start. Ellis Rogers is an unhappy man living in the present day who receives a terminal illness prognosis. Medical technology just isn't ready to solve his illness yet. His solution is to finally use the time machine he's been building in his garage to travel to a time when he can receive the treatment he needs.

So if read that setup as I wrote it, I'd probably not be too interested in reading the book. Thankfully this isn't a book that spends much time dwelling on whether someone (even an MIT graduate) could build a working time machine in his garage in 2014, or any of the other technological advances written about in this book for that matter. If that sort of hard science fiction is what you're looking for, you're going to be disappointed here.

What this book is about really is the nature of humanity. Politics, Religion, and especially love. You know, the stuff you're not really supposed to talk about in many social settings? For this reason alone I think many people may not enjoy this book. Especially those with more conservative leanings.

From my personal experience, most humans are social creatures. Why else would something like Facebook be so popular? They crave attention. Some more than others, but most people seem to need it to at least some degree. People want to be loved. Whether it is the platonic love of friends, the familial love of blood relatives, or romantic love of that special someone. It is our relationships with others that make life worth living.

The other major aspect of this book is what is happiness? Is Mr. Sullivan's Hollow World a utopia? A dystopia? Somewhere in between? A world where there is no more crime, war or disease. No more hunger? No more greed? Does that sound wonderful to you, or downright boring? Maybe a little of both? He also explores what it means to be human and unique. Are genetically engineered genderless clones still human?

I think this makes for both a great and divisive discussion book. Mr. Sullivan does a good job at presenting some of the different arguments, and leaves it to the reader to decide. For me personally I think that nothing is so black and white. The antagonist of this book makes some really good points. He also has some really awful ideas.

I hope that most of his Riyria fans will enjoy this one, but I suspect that won't always be case. I spent a lot more time thinking about the ideas in the book rather than just enjoying the ride. It's not the type of book I'd want to read on a regular basis, but one that I find enjoyable from time to time.

Pros: interesting future world, some interesting philosophical discussions, tense climax

Cons: uneven pacing, overuse of pop culture references

When Ellis Rogers hears that he is terminally ill with idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis, he decides to use the time machine he built in his garage. He says goodbye to his best friend and learns a devastating secret about his wife, who's been cold towards him after the suicide of their son.

But he goes much further into the future than he intended, and the future is very different from what he'd pictured.

Sullivan begins his book with an author's note, where he explains that the science he uses to explain time travel is meant to be taken much like that of H. G. Wells, a means to an end. If you're looking for hard SF and detailed explanations of how everything works, this is not the book for you.

Like The Time Machine, the book's an exploration of humanity, and toward the end especially, there are some interesting philosophical discussions. There's also a murder mystery to solve, which provides most of the plot based elements of the book.

I enjoyed his look at the future. It's quite unique, and allowed him to examine several aspects of modern day society. And for those of you who like questions of gender... without spoiling anything, his future has some surprises.

The pacing is uneven. Chapters full of character interactions and learning about life in Hollow World are suddenly interrupted when the mystery reappears. I sometimes had trouble transitioning from the laid back enjoyment of the former scenes to the intensity of the latter. It's surprisingly easy at times, with all that's going on, to forget the mystery is even there.

The book comes to a pretty tense climax. Everything focuses and the pacing evens out for the final chapters.

This was a personal pet peeve, and I'm not sure to what extent it will annoy others, but Sullivan threw in a LOT of modern pop culture references, which I found distracting. Especially since I didn't understand most of the references he used. For example, instead of saying that the gram (basically a TV show) Ellis watches is a documentary, he says, “This was a multi-part series similar to a Ken Burns documentary or something produced for the History Channel.” While I know what the History Channel is, I've never heard of Ken Burns. I read something once that a classic is a book that can transcend time. Once you have specific references to current culture the chances of someone being able to pick the book up and read it without problem 100 years later is doubtful. I could have used some end notes to explain some of the references, as will people less in the loop than I am. Luckily for me Sullivan tended to use several references in a row, so if I didn't understand one reference, often another would suffice to clue me in.

It was an interesting story with some thought-provoking moments towards the end.

“You're unique—truly unique. You have hair—and it's two colors. Your skin sags, and has all those great creases, like a beloved knapsack that has been taken everywhere and shows evidence of every mile. No one else has that.” This is going to be a slightly biased review because I've read pretty much everything Michael has published and loved most of it. That combined with the fact that Michael is immensely approachable and a very straight-forward person makes for a mixture I can't resist. You might want to read another of Michael's books first, though, to find out if you like his style. Hollow World, while definitely a Sullivan, is maybe not the best introduction. For that, I'd like to recommend his [b:Riyria Revelations 40689701 Riyria Revelations (3 Book Series) Michael J. Sullivan https://images.gr-assets.com/books/1547213730s/40689701.jpg 63273639] books to you. That said, bias or not – this book was very interesting, exciting and entertaining. In “Hollow World”, Ellis Rogers, a 58-year old man with a difficult family history escapes his wife of 35 years and his best friend, Warren, when he receives the news that he's terminally ill. Using a DIY time machine built in his garage, he jumps 2000 years into mankind's future. I have a few (minor) gripes with Hollow World: I'd certainly have enjoyed to get to “see” a bit more of the world itself. Yes, we get introduced to some individuals (voxes, wonderful!) but I know for a fact that Michael has a real knack for world building (read Legends of the First Empire if you don't believe me) and I wish he'd used it more extensively. When we reach the main part of the story (a bit too early), we're strongly exposed to “god and country”, “Old West” and “Good old times” stuff. Again, yes, it's intentional but it's going slightly overboard for my taste. Especially when Ellis Rogers – who seemed mostly sane till that point – picks up on the religious stuff I rolled my eyes. I also wished for Michael to be a bit bolder about Ellis and Pax. There's a lot to be said for not making things too easy and even at some key moments (“You recognised me!”) even the daftest old-fashioned guy should come around to see what's happening. On the other hand, the way Michael describes the relationship between Pax and Ellis is believable and – considering Ellis' past experience – it's probably much to ask for him to embrace what's going on. Plus: The door is not closed to more stories from Hollow World, I think. It has a lot of potential yet and I'd like to read more of it, especially about Ellis and Pax and humanity at that point of its development because the philosophical issues beyond the shallow religious meandering are still to be explored more fully. Maybe taking up just a little fewer major topics in one book would be good because, as Michael writes in the afterword, Hollow World encompasses “liberal versus conservative, gay rights, religion, and God” and it's hard to do justice to all of those within the confines of a single novel. And, honestly, there's nothing to argue about equality (not “gay rights”, Michael). Trying to tell anyone whom they're supposed (or not supposed) to love has nothing to do with “dualities” but is simply infringing on other people's turf – just ask Pax. Anyway, one conclusion still holds true after reading a less-typical Sullivan: When I look at my “Favourites” shelf on GoodReads, I see [a:Paul Auster 296961 Paul Auster https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1554662932p2/296961.jpg], [a:Isabelle Allende 15148942 Isabelle Allende https://s.gr-assets.com/assets/nophoto/user/u_50x66-632230dc9882b4352d753eedf9396530.png], [a:Thomas Mann 19405 Thomas Mann https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1430109860p2/19405.jpg], [a:J. R. R. Tolkien 19057277 J. R. R. Tolkien https://s.gr-assets.com/assets/nophoto/user/u_50x66-632230dc9882b4352d753eedf9396530.png] and [a:Michael J. Sullivan 2063919 Michael J. Sullivan https://images.gr-assets.com/authors/1433443335p2/2063919.jpg] - it's just that only the last one never disappointed.