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    Cloud Atlas: A Novel
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    Cloud Atlas: A Novel
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    Cloud Atlas: A Novel
    Ebook615 pages9 hours

    Cloud Atlas: A Novel

    By David Mitchell

    4/5

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    Currently unavailable

    About this ebook

    By the New York Times bestselling author of The Bone Clocks | Shortlisted for the Man Booker Prize

    A postmodern visionary and one of the leading voices in twenty-first-century fiction, David Mitchell combines flat-out adventure, a Nabokovian love of puzzles, a keen eye for character, and a taste for mind-bending, philosophical and scientific speculation in the tradition of Umberto Eco, Haruki Murakami, and Philip K. Dick. The result is brilliantly original fiction as profound as it is playful. In this groundbreaking novel, an influential favorite among a new generation of writers, Mitchell explores with daring artistry fundamental questions of reality and identity.

    Cloud Atlas begins in 1850 with Adam Ewing, an American notary voyaging from the Chatham Isles to his home in California. Along the way, Ewing is befriended by a physician, Dr. Goose, who begins to treat him for a rare species of brain parasite. . . . Abruptly, the action jumps to Belgium in 1931, where Robert Frobisher, a disinherited bisexual composer, contrives his way into the household of an infirm maestro who has a beguiling wife and a nubile daughter. . . . From there we jump to the West Coast in the 1970s and a troubled reporter named Luisa Rey, who stumbles upon a web of corporate greed and murder that threatens to claim her life. . . . And onward, with dazzling virtuosity, to an inglorious present-day England; to a Korean superstate of the near future where neocapitalism has run amok; and, finally, to a postapocalyptic Iron Age Hawaii in the last days of history.

    But the story doesn’t end even there. The narrative then boomerangs back through centuries and space, returning by the same route, in reverse, to its starting point. Along the way, Mitchell reveals how his disparate characters connect, how their fates intertwine, and how their souls drift across time like clouds across the sky.

    As wild as a videogame, as mysterious as a Zen koan, Cloud Atlas is an unforgettable tour de force that, like its incomparable author, has transcended its cult classic status to become a worldwide phenomenon.
    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherRandom House Publishing Group
    Release dateDec 10, 2008
    ISBN9780307483041
    Unavailable
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    Reviews for Cloud Atlas

    4/5

    5,353 ratings380 reviews

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    • 4/5
      Beautifully structured and beautifully written, not to mention a tour de force of originality.
    • 5/5
      David Mitchell is a genius.
    • 3/5
      Very challenging to follow the story with the time leaps and the way the characters change over lifetimes. Beautifully written. Epic and lush in its exploration of humanity.
    • 5/5
      This one was savored twice; I wound up buying copies for most of my friends. We then digested it as a collective effort and it retained as taut and marvelous as before.

      I then heard The Crane Wife. I parroted its Cloud Atlas, its Cloud Atlas. I was like the idiots in Flaubert's Parrot who croon, that's just like in Anthony Powell. Self-Awareness is often a drag.
    • 5/5
      When the film Cloud Atlas appeared in theaters last year, I read a few reviews to see if it might be worth seeing. These film reviews all mentioned the novel Cloud Atlas by David Mitchell upon which the film was loosely based. Several of the reviews also said that the book was far better than the film. So I read the book instead, and I’m glad to have made that decision. Cloud Atlas is one of the best novels I’ve read in a long time. It has an intriguing structure, several compelling stories that are loosely but meaningfully tied together, and a vision of humanity that is both dark and hopeful at the same time. The novel’s structure, which has been called “nested” by one reviewer, presents six stories. Half of the first five stories are told in a chronological manner starting with a sea voyage in the 18th century. The sixth story, a post-apocalyptic world that results from events that occur in the other stories, is presented as a whole in the middle of the book. Then we return to the second half of the first five stories to learn how we ended up at story six. At the end of the novel, we arrive again at the beginning. It goes like this: first half of stories A, B, C, D, E, then F (farthest in the future), then second half of E, D, C, B, A. Those who reviewed the film favorably complained about the “unfriendly” structure of the book. I think only those who have trouble reading anything more than a couple of paragraphs at one time without going into meltdown will have a problem with the novel. I had no trouble following the story lines. The stories seem at first to be unrelated, yet it soon becomes apparent that actions in one story will ultimately have consequences later on down the road in another story. That is, everything is connected, although not in an obvious way. Cloud Atlas is similar to a mystery in that respect. Clues along the way reveal how people and events are related. I found myself eagerly looking for those clues to see where the stories would take me next. In addition, we are following one soul through several reincarnations as s/he experiences the evolution of human civilization and its ultimate Fall. The film, on the other hand, created two lovers who reincarnated together repeatedly. I’m not opposed to romance and love stories, but that convention of the romantic couple seems to derail an important theme of the book. I refer to the existential dilemma that each of us is presented with in our lives. We are each born alone and we die alone. Pretending that you’ll have the same pal along for every ride seems falsely comforting. The apex of the story (F in my explanation above) takes place on Hawaii’s Big Island after a great global calamity has occurred. We follow a farming tribe that is episodically raided and enslaved by a marauding tribe on horseback called the Kona. Civilization is pretty much on the level of Europe in the early Middle Ages (aka Dark Ages). and technology is primitive. The farmers receive a visitor named Meronym. We learn she is one of the last surviving members of the very advanced civilization that existed before The Fall. Here we get to the heart of the book. Cloud Atlas is about the human greed that has led to environmental destruction. Because it is far away from the great continents, Hawaii has escaped the disaster, for a while anyway. Meronym makes it pretty clear what has happened. Speaking in the dialect of the Big Island, she says, ““The Old Uns tripped their own Fall….Yay, Old Uns’ Smart mastered sicks, miles, seeds an’ made miracles ord’nary, but it didn’t master one thing, nay ,a hunger in the hearts o’ humans, yay, a hunger for more……Oh, more gear, more food, faster speeds, longer lifs, more power, yay. Now the Hole World is big, but it weren’t big ‘nuff for that hunger what made Old Uns rup out the skies an’ boil up the seas an’ poison soil with crazed atoms an’ donkey ‘bout with rotted seeds so new plagues was borned an’ babbits was freak-birthed. Fin’ly, but’ly, then quicksharp, states busted into bar’bric tribes an’ the Civ’lize Days ended, ‘cept for a few folds n’ pockets here’n’there, where its last embers glimmer……..…Human hunger birthed the Civ’lize, but human hunger killed it too.” Unlike the film where humans are rescued and go off to live on another planet (how convenient and how utterly unrealistic), the humans living on the Big Island have to make the best of their current situation. Rather than whisking her young friend who is a teenage boy, not her lover, to another planet, she sees that he gets to Maui where he at least can live his life as a farmer without being subjected to the marauding Kona tribe. The final words come from his grandchildren - a hopeful sign that humanity has survived. I’m still not sure if I’ll bother seeing the film. I recommend Cloud Atlas to anyone who likes good story telling with some thought-provoking ideas presented throughout.
    • 4/5
      “Cloud Atlas”, by David Mitchell, has been on my ‘to read’ list for a long-ass time. Long like the list is long, long like the time it took me to finish it. The book tells 6 separate stories, in different styles, different genres, different time periods, and tells half of each-123456, then the second half of each- 654321. Ambitious for sure. Each story is only loosely connected, a vague reference perhaps in each. Even the themes are only vaguely connected- of course the universality of human struggles, trials, relations are present in each, but there’s is no “ah-ha!” moment that tells you the meaning of life. If you thought the movie was cuckoo, don’t dismiss the book on that alone. Some of the stories were more compelling than others, but overall it was an enjoyable, worth while read building momentum as it went. Incidentally, I read this book in LA, various spots in Hawaii, Dublin, and Lisbon- totally apropos of the book!
    • 5/5
      Some readers may find certain aspects of Cloud Atlas frustrating - mystical elements, abrupt segues, six voices with varying degrees of likeability, a slow and convoluted path to the message, and the equivocal stance the denouement offers on what hope we might have for humanity. These are legitimate concerns; however, I found it all quite beautiful and magnificent in scope. Despite being secular, or perhaps because of it, I adore mystical and religious themes in literature. Mitchell weaves them into his story in a manner which is both subtle and discreet. In particular, the six stories as compared to the six Paramitas of Buddhism is worthy of note. The abruptness of the transitions were a shock to the system but seemed a deliberate nod to Buddhist beliefs regarding the untrained soul's initial response to death and added to the overall experience of the book. The mastery required to write six distinct voices is impressive and imbued a sense of reality to the work. As for the slow build to a message of ambiguous hope or lack thereof, that is purely a matter of personal preference, and I love ambiguity as much as I love truthfulness in character. Best of all, I find this to be a novel which not only holds up to being reread but offers even more to the repeat reader.I received a complimentary copy of this book via a Goodreads giveaway. Many thanks to all involved in providing me with this opportunity.
    • 5/5
      i really enjoyed this book
    • 5/5
      Wow. I really enjoyed this layered round of stories. Three set in the past and three in the future, five of them split around the central story. Each story has its own voice and style and they touch eachother with strange details and often by knowledge of the previous story. From the 19th century colonization of the South Pacific to the last remnants of human civilization - each story is interesting and unpredictable. Thanks!
    • 3/5
      Cloud Atlas was one of those books that I literally googled "is it worth it?" because oh wow, those first twenty pages are so dull. And I have to say, I'm glad I kept reading.

      So Cloud Atlas is actually 6 stories, spliced together and shoved into one. Each story is its own genre, and completely independent of the others. At the same time, each story depends on the one before it. As you read it, the connections become clear, and you start to understand what's really going on.

      Some stories are much better than others. My favourite is, by far, the Somni story, which happens in the not-so-distant dystopic future. I find that the entire book is worth it for this story.

      Now my biggest problem with this work is, actually, the lack of connection between the stories. I wanted there to be something *more* to them all, and a crazy thread that would connect them all together. I mean, there is something (no spoilers) but it wasn't as intense or well-thought as I wanted it to be. I had a lot of crazy, intricate theories that melted away to nothing in the end (although, some of them, could technically be true even if the novel didn't explore them).

      But while this disappointed me, I also understood it. Yes, they're all connected, which highlights how each action has effects in the future, but it also shows the sheer randomness of life, and how seemingly small things have effects that resonate throughout time.

      Cloud Atlas, when it comes down to it, is an epic that tells the story of society, and of souls traveling throughout time until the very end of our world as we know it.
    • 5/5
      This stunning debut is a must-read for any serious modern reader. This innovative, nested narrative presents a number of classic voices, but never loses sight of its mission, which is to decry the abuses of the powerful against the downtrodden. This is also a cautionary tale about technology and its apocalyptic, if unintended, ends. Astonishing and unforgettable.
    • 1/5
      This is the rare book so awful that i will not finish it.In Chapter one, the author pretends to be Kipling, picking up ALL the racism and NONE of the charm. I got so mad I threw the book across the room. Hard to know, from this limited reading (I only made it about seven pages in) whether this is a case of a racist author hiding his racism behind a thin veneer of pretend racism, or whether its a not-racist-but-seriously-how-did-you-not-notice this author just innocently pretending to be kipling, so I tried the next chapter.In chapter two, the author pretends to be Wilde, but still has no charm, and also has no wit, which just leaves a hollow shell made of garish twiddle. It's awful.I didn't make it through that chapter, either, and at this point, if there was going to be a good story made of these parts, I'm missing too many parts due to my disgust over the writing to get it, so I'm out.
    • 1/5
      I found this in a charity bookshop three years ago. I had heard that Cloud Atlas was considered a book that divided opinions and was curious where I would fall on this divide, considering I loved reading The Thousand Autumns of Jacob de Zoet, with its wonderful, lyrical, crisp and crystal-clear prose. Well, now I know.Despite the best intentions and an open mind, I just couldn't get into this one, and I tried, I mean really tried. This is an ambitious and audacious literary experiment, and it simply doesn't work for me. The writing is all over the place, the characters are unlikeable and unrelatable, and the depicted events just so dull that I didn't give a fig about what happened next. From what I've read in reviews, this isn't the point of the book, but I'm afraid I can't take one without the other.
    • 4/5
      This novel is actually a series of nested stories of different genres set in time periods ranging from the 1800s to the post-apocalyptic future, loosely connected in ways both obvious and subtle. It's interesting, because the individual stories are decent but hardly exceptional, but the way it's structured is fascinating, and leads to the whole feeling like more than the sum of its parts. It is a structure that requires a certain amount of patience and attention, though, as first you're basically reading stories that don't seem to have endings, then later returning to pick up the threads of events that you've already moved on from. But it works, or at least it did for me. More in an intellectual way, perhaps, than a visceral one, but well enough, nevertheless. Certainly the more I think about it, the more connected the individual stories seem to be, in terms of recurring themes and motifs, and there's something interesting and satisfying in that.
    • 5/5
      Extraordinary book. Quite mind boggling and vast in concept. One small quibble - I would have liked a bit more linkage between the stories and tidying up at the end.
    • 2/5
      Product Description:
      In this audacious and dazzling novel, Mitchell weaves history, science, humor, and suspense through six separate but related narratives, each set in a different time and place, each written in a different prose style, and each broken mid-action only to be concluded in the second half of the book. One of the more engaging stories is set in 1930s and told via letters describing a young musician's effort to become an amanuenisis for a renowned, blind composer. Another focuses on a book editor who fins himself accidentally imprisoned in a home for the elderly.

      My thoughts...

      I'm not saying that the book was bad but I was unable to continue with this book. I was listening to the audio version and 35 minutes into it, it started over at the beginning. I know that's not any reason to give two stars, but the style of writing/reading being very biblical, I couldn't do it. I've heard so much good about the movie, maybe I'll watch instead.
    • 4/5
      Well I finished this book yesterday, and I am still not entirely sure how I feel about it. It was a fascinating read, but in the end, I still am left feeling like I wanted more. Without giving anything away, the five or six stories that are told and linked together throughout time were very interesting to think about. However, that "woah" moment never materialized for me. I thought there might be a big pay off at the end, but the book just sort of ended with a very brief exposition of what might be the meaning of the whole thing.

      With that said, I feel like I sound too negative. I really enjoyed the characters in teh story and even though each story acts as something like a short story, I always wanted to continue onto the next one to find out what was next. Mitchell's ability to change voices is quite impressive, and his skill as a writer is really second to none.

      Overall I would recommend this to fans of literature, but you need to stay on top of it and really focus to find a lot of the detail and connection between stories. Not a light beach read for sure.
    • 3/5
      I saw the trailers for the movie Cloud Atlas a few years back but never saw the film. In 2016 I read The Bone Clocks by David Mitchell and found it to be intriguing and engaging. It wasn't my favorite book of the year and I had some problems with it but I generally enjoyed it enough to be willing to give Mitchell's work some additional attention in the future. Cloud Atlas was written about a decade before Bone Clocks and someone mentioned to me that even though they can't be necessarily thought of as a "series" in terms of plot or the one being a sequel to another, they are related in terms of some of the structure (and even allusions to theme and character). So, I decided to give Cloud Atlas a whirl.One of the first things a reader should know going into Cloud Atlas is that it is an ambitious read and one that will potentially frustrate and confuse while working through the entire novel. It's not that it's a difficult novel but rather it's that Mitchell has built the novel as a structure of 6 different novellas and most of those novellas are broken into two parts. Often the break point for the novellas happen in undesirable (for the reader) locations. In fact, the first novella ends mid-sentence. Of course, this is intentional on the part of the author and works to put the reader off balance. It certainly works but unfortunately (at least for me), the effect of being thrown off balance wasn't entirely beneficial to my approval of the book as a whole.Taken on their own merit, the individual novellas/narratives aren't anything amazing. To a certain degree the stories felt like somewhat expected tropes for their given setting/genre. Don't get me wrong, I did find some creative elements and slight twists that kept the stories interesting but overall, I didn't find them particularly remarkable. The main accolade I can mention with regards to the individual stories is that it showcases Mitchell's ability to write stories in different voices and in different tones/genres/eras. Admittedly I am not scholarly enough to analyze his accuracy of historic vocabulary, spelling, mannerisms or racial/social diction, etc. nor did I do an analysis of his consistency of usage in the spelling and grammatical differences he employs. I can say that I found his use of vocabulary and diction to be generally believable as coming from the characters he created in the world he presented. I can say that I had an easier time with the archaic words and phrases from the historic sections than with the modified language in the futuristic sections. However, I did find some of the language to be distracting and annoying at times.*Minor plot spoilers in this paragraph*Critiquing the plot of the novel is difficult not because it's a difficult plot to follow but because that really isn't the point. As mentioned above, I didn't find the individual novellas to be anything remarkable. Each story has its own plot complete with unique characters, settings, rising action, climax and some degree of resolution. They are adequately entertaining stories but no single one of them is something that I would personally seek out or recommend. As far as the overarching plot of the book (as far as such a thing exists), we are following the trajectory of a reincarnated being from their first (?) life as a notary traveling by sea in the 19th century to the last (documented) life as an islander in a post-apocalyptic world. Each of the 6 stories shows some events in the life of this being and very coincidentally each life is peripherally (or sometimes more closely) connected to one or more of the former lives. The threads weaving the various lives together seemed to me very fragile and contrived. The only one that felt vaguely interesting to me was the relation of the second to last life (Sonmi-451) and the world of the characters in the sixth novella. It felt like there was too much effort put in trying to build plot points to keep these characters involved with one another and to me this was a disservice to the story.*End plot spoilers*So, if the plot isn't the point of the book and the novellas aren't remarkable, why read it? Why indeed? As an experiment on style and structure, this is an engaging study and worth looking at. While the plot as a storytelling element didn't resonate with me, perhaps elements of the plot will work better for other readers or perhaps some will be very interested in one or more of the novellas. It seems to me that the importance of this novel (and perhaps the reason for its praise) comes more in terms of the themes or ideas that it tries to present rather than the plot itself and at least equal to or possibly more than its novelty in form and structure.While it's not heavy handed in its presentation of theme or thesis, I felt like the book does put forth the idea of knowledge and language and their relation to power and influence. The various unique voices of each novella act as illustrations for the impact of language on the world and the inhabitants. The ability for language to inform and to obfuscate is clear not only in the choice of words but also in the structure of the novel (such as ending a novella mid-sentence to put the reader off balance). The knowledge of the relationship between the characters in the novellas is intentionally kept hidden from the reader (and from the characters) until the author wants to make it known. As more and more knowledge is shared, the risks grow larger due to greed and struggle for power and influence. Eventually power corrupts and the world falls back into a time where language and life is more primitive. Our characters and our novellas come nearly full circle in terms of worldly capabilities and the relation of the language in each novella's language styles help illustrate this.Is the novel effective in carrying out its purpose? I don't know. Partly because I don't know what Mitchell truly intended. The book certainly gained a lot of praise and even had a movie made. (Personally, I'm curious as to how well the movie would hold up since, as I mentioned above, I felt that the plot was secondary to the structure and theme) For my reading tastes, I much preferred Bone Clocks to Cloud Atlas. Bone Clocks had some similar concepts of reincarnation and similar uses of narrative and language structure in terms of the storytelling. But Bone Clocks also had stronger plot elements and linked together the reincarnated lives in a stronger way. Granted, Bone Clocks was likely trying to accomplish something different and appeal to readers differently.Overall, I can't wholly recommend this novel but I wouldn't dissuade readers from it either. I found it to be an engaging read and something I found myself thinking about even while the book was back on the shelf. I admired the efforts of Mitchell to create an ambitious form and to weave his ideas and theme through an intricate tapestry of lives and language. For students of contemporary literary experiments, this is a book worth exploring. For somebody looking for a casual "beach read", this isn't necessarily something to pick up. It's a thoughtful and thought-provoking work. I'm still thinking about it, though part of my thinking is honestly trying to think about if the whole thing was worth it. *grin****3 out of 5 stars
    • 4/5
      Cloud Atlas is one of those rare instances where I'd watched the film before I read the book and what makes it even more rare is that I'm not sure whether the film or the book is better.The structure of this novel is a bit nested and maybe a tad confusing at first. It consists of six short stories. The first half of the first five stories appear consecutively, then the sixth story is told in full before the second halves of the remaining five stories appear in reverse chronological order bringing each to a conclusion.One of the stories plays in the far future and I had trouble understanding the language (some form of English) while watching the film and while reading the book. I'd expect a native speaker to have less trouble.It's not an easy book and it requires some effort from the reader but I thought it was beautiful and the experience was worth it.
    • 5/5
      My first David Mitchell book. The scale is epic, but told in individual vignettes in different times and places with a mysterious connection that is the overarching plot. It is personal and cosmic and has just the right amount of magical realism to make me love it.
      As reported everywhere, Mitchell is a master of language. His literary finesse upgrades this from fantasy to literature (not that I care) and makes it hard to go back to regular writers.
    • 3/5
      Cloud Atlas is all plot and scene, no character. If you can figure out what is motivating the comet-birthmark character throughout all the incarnations, you get a gold star.
    • 5/5
      For an author to tell interwoven stories in such different styles and genres this successfully, is indicative of a hugely talented writer. I'm amazed at how Mitchell can so seamlessly imitate Melville, Evelyn Waugh, cheap mystery thrillers, and sci-fi dystopias...all in one novel. At the same time, he creates two new dialects, in time periods that range from the 1800's through to hundreds of years in the future.

      The book plays with themes of reincarnation, slavery, predator/prey relationships, and human selfishness. These themes criss-cross in the stories that are layed out in a mirror image.

      Definitely one of the best novels I have read in the last year. Each of the six story-lines is fantastic in its own way.
    • 4/5
      Six connection (and interrupted) "pyramid-shaped" stories about (in a larger sense) the universality of human nature. Once I caught on how the structure works (there is a bit of "huh?" in the beginning), this was a wonderful read. Each of the characters and their individual situations are so engaging that I would easily have read full novels about all of them. Their connections sometimes works really subtly and beautifully and sometimes is a little clunky, but I buy all of it - Mitchell's "symphony" idea works almost like a tasting menu. Well, if you ate it both forwards and backwards at the same time, that is. :) Style-wise, this is a pure marvel as well; had I not known the writer, I absolutely would have believed the pieces were written in the time they are set. I've enjoyed Mitchell's work in the past and this doesn't change my affection. More please. Next, I'm going to go see how on earth they managed to make this into a movie(!).
    • 5/5
      I adored this book. I read it twice just to make sure I didn't miss anything. It might seem a bit daunting at first but I would recommend the reader stays with it. It is well worth the experience. I found it moving, inspirational and complex and a story that has stayed with me.
    • 4/5
      I've finally finished Cloud Atlas and I'm not quite sure how a feel about it as a whole. I really like five of the narratives and think that "An Orison of Somni-451" is one of the finest dystopian stories I have ever read, but the stories never really clicked for me as part of one over-arching story. The sixth narrative, "Sloosha's Crossin' an' Ev'rythin' After", I hate, hate, hate! It took me longer to read that one section that it did all the others combined!
    • 4/5
      Very funny
    • 2/5
      Overrated!
    • 3/5
      This is not a book to review after you have just finished "Mindswap" by Robert Sheckley. Mr. Mitchell has produced an interesting set of nested narratives, in which a world is shown to have been badly damaged by the results of five incidents half revealed chronologically. The most interior tale is followed in the traditional fashion, and then we march back through the last halves of the others, until the original story is resolved in a satisfactory denouement. It seems to me to be deliberately set up to be a cross-over hit and the job was conducted adequately. Many other readers will rate this book more highly. Mr. Mitchell deserves credit for having found an intersting way to extract money from the reading public...I wish I had.
    • 5/5
      Brilliant!
    • 5/5
      Absolutely astounding.