DARK MATTER

by Garfield Reeves-Stevens ‧ RELEASE DATE: Oct. 19, 1990

Breakthrough sf/horror/fantasy magnum opus by the Canadian author of Night-eyes (1989), a UFOlogy novel praised for its poet's ear but criticized for not coming to grips with its aliens. No one will deny that Reeves-Stevens comes to grips with quantum physics, the subject here. Physicists, casual readers of Hawkings, and the brainiest of sf readers will find themselves tested in keeping up with Reeves. Stevens as he plunges into space-time, gravity and black holes, relativity, particle and wave theory--and ""dark matter,"" which is ""all the mass in the universe which we can't see."" Reeves-Stevens's triumph is that he has dramatized theoretical concepts so brilliantly that most readers won't be able to tell ""real"" theory from ""fictional"" theory--and theory, ravishing theory, is here by the ton. The actual novel is not so bad either, despite echoes of Thomas Harris. Who has been sawing open the skulls of beautiful women in L.A. and, with the skills of a surgeon, baring their brains while the victims are still alive and conscious? Well, none other than Nobel Prize-winner Anthony Cross, whose advances in quantum physics have left Einstein and the whole world of modern physics in the dust. Unfortunately, Cross's theories are tied to his need to plunge his fingers into living brain matter for ""inspiration."" Reeves. Stevens underplays the usual police procedural by plotting his story more in the Genius & Madness genre, though he does not totally escape either the police novel or the Shadowy Military Agency melodrama. Mostly he involves us with character, and why fellow physicist/lover Charis Neale furtively follows Anthony Cross about and sweeps up any incriminating evidence he may have left behind. Meanwhile, black Homicide Lieutenant Kate Duvall finds Charis on the scene once too often and tracks Neale and Cross to the private lab where Cross unlocks the secrets of creation--and indeed at last discovers The Beginning. Gripping horror, towering sf.

Pub Date: Oct. 19, 1990

ISBN: N/A

Page Count: -

Publisher: Doubleday

Review Posted Online: N/A

Kirkus Reviews Issue: Sept. 15, 1990

Categories: FICTION