Sound Mind

by Tricia Sullivan

When Cassidy Walker stumbles into the middle of the highway, bloodied and bruised, Bard college in flames behind her, and manages to flag down a ride, she thinks the worst is over. Arriving in the nearby town of Red Hook, Cassidy tries to call her parents but the phone lines are down - no radio or television signals are being received either. The town, it seems, is cut off from the rest of the world. But that's not the strangest thing. Not by a long shot. Nobody in Red Hook has even heard of Bard College. Furthermore, they claim that Cassidy is not a music student, but a hand at the local stable. And she has lived in a house she can't remember, with people she barely knows, for over a year.The world is fracturing. Cassidy just knows it - just as she knows that she is responsible. As Cassidy undertakes the ultimate road trip, through bubbles of reality, she will find that everything she thinks she knows about herself is wrong. Is she losing her mind or is the world a far more complex place than she thought?

Genres: Science Fiction, Fiction

Paperback

First published June 7, 2012

About the author

Tricia Sullivan (born July 7, 1968 in New Jersey, U.S.) is a science fiction writer. She has also written fantasy under the pseudonym Valery Leith.

She moved to the United Kingdom in 1995. In 1999 she won the Arthur C. Clarke Award for her novel Dreaming in Smoke. Her novel Maul was also shortlisted for the same award in 2004.

Sullivan has studied music and karate. Her partner is the martial artist Steve Morris, with whom she has three children.

Reviews

[Rhuddem Gwelin · Rating 3 out of 5]

Sometimes I like books even if they're confusing and a little bit boring. This is one of them. I have a feeling that I sort of understand what's going on - parallel cyberworlds and stuff - but I skim all the details. What I like is simply the characters Cassidy and Cookie. That's enough. I liked the other Sullivan book I read too 'Occupy Me' Just as confusing but I liked the characters.

[John Owen · Rating 4 out of 5]

An interesting, fascinating, alarming and thoroughly confusing book. Sullivan takes a big subject, the nature of the world and how we perceive it and how it changes as we interact with it. At heart, it's a book about Deep Information, the concept that all of the information in the Universe, from every particle up to every idea in our heads, are all part of the same continuum, and we step outside our normal perception and into this larger continuum at our peril. Sullivan builds a corkscrew of a novel out of the concept, from the point of view of two women, one a musician, the other having a strange ability to see the Grid underlying everything. The first believes she has caused the discontinuities in the world, the second understands that the first is the solution to the problems. At times, it can be a bewildering ride, but hold on tight and it is well worth it.

[Jan Jackson · Rating 4 out of 5]

I give this four stars. Because it’s writ large, with lots of small strokes. The authors discourse on music, its abstract nature, and the profound relationship we have with it is VERY interesting. It’s a tad overlong, and very wordy, and gets a bit academic at times (maybe that’s why so much of it is set on a university campus), but worth persevering with.

I would note that (and I only realised this after I went to check out Tricia Sullivan’s other books) is that this is a sequel to ‘Double Vision’. But I don’t think that should stop you.

[Macha · Rating 4 out of 5]

don't start this one until you've read Double Vision: the two books appear to be a single work chopped into two parts before publication., and there is no recap or indication in the text that they are related. it's about memory, and the properties of music. how we need to be tied to the world we're in, and how we are continually making and remaking that world as we go - folding space, winding time, owning our ground. living.

[Sue Chant · Rating 2 out of 5]

A complete mess - couldn't be bothered to finish it.

[Jess Penhallow · Rating 1 out of 5]

The predominant feeling I had whilst reading this book was confusion. Maybe it just wasn't for me but I didn't understand what was happening until right at the end, and then barely! I understand being clever and asking big questions but you need to give the reader some plot to hold onto. Sorry, not impressed. I did finish it at least but only out of habit and perseverance.

[Martinxo · Rating 2 out of 5]

Not sure what happened here. I loved this book for the first 100 pages or so, it looked like a five star rating. Then the plot went a little haywire and I just lost interest...

oh, well, doesn't mean it's a bad book, and YOU might like it

[Steve Clark]

Paperback