The Circumference of the World

By: Lavie Tidhar

Narrated by: Maxwell Caulfield, Justine Eyre, Stefan Rudnicki

Caught between realities, a mathematician, a book dealer, and a mobster desperately seek a notorious book that disappears upon being read. Only the author, a rakish sci-fi writer, knows whether his popular novel is truthful or a hoax. In a story that is cosmic, inventive, and sly, multi-award-winning author Lavie Tidhar (Central Station) travels from the emergence of life to the very ends of the universe.

Delia Welegtabit discovered two things during her childhood on a South Pacific island: her love for mathematics and a novel that isn’t supposed to exist. But the elusive book proves unexpectedly dangerous. Oskar Lens, a science fiction-obsessed mobster in the midst of an existential crisis, will stop at nothing to find the novel. After Delia’s husband, Levi, goes missing, she seeks help from Daniel Chase, a young, face-blind book dealer.

The infamous novel Lode Stars was written by the infamous Eugene Charles Hartley: legendary pulp science-fiction writer and founder of the Church of the All-Seeing Eyes. In Hartley’s novel, a doppelganger of Delia searches for her missing father in a strange star system. But is any of Lode Stars real? Was Hartley a cynical conman on a quest for wealth and immortality, creating a religion he did not believe in? Or was he a visionary who truly discovered the secrets of the universe?

©2023 Lavie Tidhar (P)2023 Blackstone Publishing

Pretty Confusing as an Audiobook

So many questions... What's going on with all the voices / accents right out of the starting block? I suppose these are different characters breaking into the narrative to have a word? What exactly is the accent the main female narrator is going for? Tremulous South African private school guidance counsellor? Maybe that's what a Pacific Islander sounds like? I wonder, though.
Too many questions to hold in my head while driving a car, for sure.

Confusing, difficult to follow book

Wonderful reading voices rescue this extremely hard to parse story that alternates between multiple time periods, perspectives, and realities. The science fiction aspects seemed very weak to me, leaning on bizarre narratives involving a creature made of bees, and various notions around black holes and notions of God and the universe. I really wanted to like this book, yet I found myself increasing the speed to get through it and was relieved to be done, which is never how I want to experience a book.

Quest for a mythical pulp novel

Lavie Tidhar’s The Circumference of the World is an unusual that is more about sci-fi than actually being sci-fi itself. A mathematician with an atypical upbringing (South Sea Island childhood), as well as a sci-fi obsessed mobster are both in search of a legendary, but mythical pulp novel called Lode Star. The mathematician’s husband goes missing and she employs a face-blind book dealer to search for the book. Along the way, the life and times of the alleged author are displayed.

Tidhar creates an engaging tale that nevertheless doesn’t seem to hold together. The mythical author seems an amalgam of both L Ron Hubbard and Robert A Heinlein. Throughout the text there are numerous references to much of the sci-fi literature from the golden age (much of which would be classified as pulp). There’s also a story within the story that seems to align with the mathematician’s life.

The narration is reasonable with two narrators. Character distinction is good, and the pacing is brisk making for a quick listen.