Book Review: Mysterium by Robert Charles Wilson

Book Review: Mysterium by Robert Charles Wilson
Genre: Science Fiction, Alternate History
Bob's Thoughts "Sometimes a book attempts to accomplish too much. Sometimes it's still a good read."
Grade: B-
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100 Books 100 Posts: #6







There's a lot of high concepts in this book. So many, it's a wonder not a single one of those concepts were fully explored in a 300 page book. Yet, while those issues are strained at best, what is left is an enjoyable tale of a displace community.

So, if you have read books like SM Stirling's Nantucket Series or Flint's 1632 series, you will recognize elements of the plot. Due to some tests at a secret government lab on a strange object, the town of Two Rivers, Michigan is somehow transplanted from our reality to an alternate history where a Gnosticism is the predominant religion. The universe they are transplanted in is highly authoritarian with religious Proctor's controlling everything in society. They are also much less developed, in both population and technology.

A group of people in the town must contend with the oppressive nature of the new society while trying to discover how they were sent to this world. Not shockingly, the phenomenon confuses the people of the new universe. Some see it as a gift needed to help fight the evil Spaniards. Other see it as a dangerous and unpredictable element that needs to be destroyed.

Mysterium would make an excellent part of a book. All the issues are only briefly flirted with. We don't really get a full glimpse of the town, the new universe, the physics involved in the transformation, the religious aspects nor many of the characters. You do get some fun action and some likeable, if underdeveloped characters. What you don't get is any sense of fulfillment, of understanding, in the story. In fact, by the end, you are left more confused than you started.