Reviews

Infinite Ground by Martin MacInnes

nightfold's review against another edition

4.0

This book single-handedly invents the genre of Borgesian corporate horror

masonanddixon's review against another edition

Among the first books I've seen to bear Tom McCarthy's influence in its fractalized surreal vignettes of the absurd, Infinite Ground is a slippery, postmodern mystery that is less about a missing person than about the idea of the word 'missing'. When the even the particular contains the infinite what good is attention, what power is story telling in the infinite of space, and the infinite of the molecular, the atomic, the viral? More a pleasure to think about than to read, but MacInnes may have a convert on his hands should his later, more broadly acclaimed, novels mend that gap.

_ciaran's review

adventurous challenging dark mysterious reflective slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Plot
• Strong character development? It's complicated
• Loveable characters? No
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.75

emilycarney's review against another edition

mysterious reflective slow-paced

5.0

I REALLY enjoyed this. Weird in a way that is still very tangible in the first half so you’ve got a decent grip of it when it starts becoming more abstract and tangled.
Had a gut instinct about what the ending meant, but the more I think about it the more options there are.

Spoiler

My immediate thought was that he wouldn’t be accepted into any new community and would probably be killed even if it did exist and wasn’t some crazed hallucination. So much of this book is him really struggling to integrate into different settings comfortably. But then the idea that he would, that it’s where all of the missing people are and that it’s full of people who just had to escape their lives is probably a happier ending, in a way, and I don’t think it’s impossible to interpret it that way either - or as a big old metaphor for him processing his grief and getting eaten by bugs along the way but now he gets to swim in the sea and not go to work, etc etc.

 I wonder what that says about me, but I’m not sure I want to know.

unbornwhiskey's review against another edition

3.0

somewhere between the spiral fictions of paul auster and stanislaw lem lies martin macinnes' hallucinatory interior, an evocative landscape in which minutes seem to widen and squeeze together like the bellows of an accordion, where the dense forest which makes up most of the interior's surface area seems to swallow any human settlement and any temporary perception acquired by the main character, an unnamed detective who moves through the story in a state of almost total confusion and uncertainty. around and within this interior, macinnes' investigates less the disappearance of a single person than the phenomena of disintegration itself. how do things and people just evaporate, escaped through some fold in our perception? is the process of disappearance abrupt, a gust of air and then nothing but space and swirled particles, or do they rot out of shape, slowly eaten through by an inner error until nothing remains of their original body? and to paraphrase michelle branch, where do you go when you're gone?

carlaonion's review against another edition

I have not yet given this book a star rating as still a bit confused as to what I read! I certainly did enjoy it but it's not what I expected (and I wasn't even expecting a classic detective novel!)

silviasodr's review

3.0

3 1/2
Bought this one solely because it was recommended by Jeff VanderMeer on the cover and (as expected) what a *weird* book! Like a sick child of Murakami and an X Files episode.
Sometimes surreal, interesting and engaging, sometimes it felt like the writer went a little over his head, but still thoroughly enjoyable.

jv1066's review against another edition

challenging mysterious tense slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? It's complicated
• Loveable characters? No
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

4.0

v171's review against another edition

challenging dark mysterious reflective tense slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? N/A
• Strong character development? No
• Loveable characters? No
• Diverse cast of characters? Yes
• Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated

4.0

Often, readers will describe their preference in books as being interested in plot-driven vs. character-driven narratives. But what really drew me to the New Weird genre is the introduction of the atmosphere-driven stylistic choice. 

Infinite Ground is a fever dream of a story, loosely focusing on an inspector's investigation into the disappearance of a 29 year old man named Carlos. The beginning of the book did well in keeping up the narrative of the investigation while peppering in hazy, dreamlike (and often horrific) encounters and experiences of the unnamed protagonist. The surreal aspects get dialed up as you progress further into the book, making you feel like you're lost in a dense forest of prose, hunting for the plot. This complemented the actual story perfectly, and really enhanced my reading experience. 

This (just barely) revitalized my faith in the New Weird genre. After a string of misses from VanderMeer, I'd started to question if I actually enjoyed New Weird, or if I just enjoyed science fiction that had a New Weird edge to it. Infinite Ground was a breath of fresh air, and a reminder that this can be done very well. A typical review of mine might focus on character development, structure, and dialogue, but this kind of book can't really be analyzed in that way. I hate to say it's only vibes, but I really do have to holistically focus on how this book made me feel. And I just liked it. 

aligeorge's review against another edition

4.0

Jen Campbell described this on booktube as a 'marmite' book - which I kind of agree with, but not in the sense of love/hate. My feelings on marmite are that sometimes it's just right for me, but I can go for long periods without it. Infinite Ground is an interesting read, but being a post modernist text it's one that demands concentration, so not really the best thing to read before bed for instance.

The premise is interesting and there are lots of good ideas in here, the writing is good and it's always quite unexpected. But if you're looking for a bit of tartan noir, that is not what this is.