Sea of Tranquility

Sort of liked this, but it didn't quite work for me.

The part I liked was the humanist aspects of it, the characterizations of people. She does a great job quickly painting characters as the narrative skips around in time. I wanted to know more about what happened to Edwin! I also liked the minimal sci-fi world building, particularly the moon colonies.

What I didn't like is so much of the book came off trite. The one protagonist, the woman writer on a book tour, was a bit too on-the-nose as an author standin. I really didn't like all the pandemic stuff, it seemed like a direct narrative of the Covid trauma we all just experienced and I didn't want to read it in this format. Also I don't generally like time travel stories or "what if it's all a simulation" sophistry. It says a lot about the author's writing skill that I liked the book despite it being constructed from all these pieces I don't like.

Overall this book reminds me more than a little of Cloud Atlas. Partly the narrative structure, partly the humanist characterizations, partly just the prose style.