How to Live Safely in a Sci Fi Universe
{4.5/5} “I am a certified network technician for T-Class personal-use chronogrammatical vehicles, and an approved independent affiliate contractor for Time Warner Time, which owns and operates this universe as a spatio-temperal structure and entertainment complex zoned for retail, commercial, and residential use. The job is pretty chill for the most part, although right this moment I’m not loving it because I think my Tense Operator might be breaking down.”
How to Live Safely in a Science Fictional Universe by Charles Yu, published in 2010
Charles is in time travel repair. His father and mother are both lost in time, but the AI in his time machine is friendly. When he goes to help someone named Skywalker he has to tell him that he can’t kill his own dad. When he takes his time machine in for repair he spends some time in the real world. Returning to his machine, he sees himself — his future self — coming out of it. So he shoots his future self.
Yu’s use of language is astonishing.
As for the story, the first part is brilliant. The part where he’s writing the book that he received from his future self — that was less interesting to me.
It’s about what you can do when the universe you’re in is a science fictional one. It’s about a relationship with a father who spends all his time inventing something that he fails to demonstrate when a corporate representative comes to see it.
This is the 1st book I’ve read by Yu.