The beginning of Blake Crouch’s Dark Matter shows family night in Jason Desson’s Chicago home.  Then, the story travels in time, showing how an unplanned pregnancy led to a quietly joyful marriage and family, although at the cost of his scientific career and his wife’s artistic career. Instead, they love their son and their home, even if their ambitions haven’t exactly been fulfilled.

Like Bonnie Rozanski’s The Mindtraveler, Dark Matter uses scifi to ruminate on the path(s) not taken. Jason and his wife, Daniela, seem content, if not thrilled, with their lives. But a Jason from another world, in which he pursued his scientific ambitions at the expense of his personal life, has discovered the ability to move between alternate timelines. The original Jason’s timeline is the best, and happiest one, and he wants it, and he’s willing to do whatever it takes to become the other Jason, even kidnapping him, drugging him and sending him back to other Jason’s original timeline…

If the two-Jason problem sounds a bit confusing, there are even more Jasons, as the timelines split. I really liked this because it developed the somewhat simplistic theme of Family vs. Ambitions into a wide variety of paths and paths not taken. Each choice can change the universe.

One extremely minor character, JasonADMIN, really resonated with me. In all the variant timelines, this guys sets up a secret chatroom for all the alternate Jasons to find themselves, and then he manages all the different viewpoints. Did he ever have to /kick himself? Why did this Jason become the admin instead of pursuing Daniela and Charlie? Could being great at a small but necessary project be the best possible timeline for JasonADMIN?

I didn’t love the Jason and Amanda storyline. Romances of proximity don’t usually draw me in, and it was hard to see Jason trying to return to his true love, while also flirting with Amanda. I didn’t love her leaving, either. It didn’t feel like she was running towards anything, as much as she was a minor character who had fulfilled her use to the protagonist, and exited stage left.

Towards the end of the novel, there are almost infinite Jasons in the original Chicago, all taking similar paths back to Daniela and their son, Charlie. Jason (our Jason, original Jason) needs to out-think an army of himself, all just as in love with Daniela as he is. Each version is 99% the same, willing to fight and kill to return to the peaceful family life from the beginning of the novel, for a dramatic conclusion.

This is my Review of the Month for the review collection on LovelyAudiobooks.info