Relativity
Relativity by Cristin Bishara is a short and sweet nerdy adventure! As a science oriented person, I’m always a fan of actual scientific theories being used in books, so when I discovered that Relativity had a heavy amount of string theory, I was hooked! I literally read Relativity in one sitting and I couldn’t be happier :D. I actually borrowed the NOVA string theory documentary (mentioned at the end of Relativity) from my math teacher in high school and skipped dinner to watch the whole thing in one evening. It was blissful ;-).
Note: I received an ARC of Relativity through Netgalley in exchange for an honest review. Some things may have changed in the final version.
Relativity by Cristin Bishara
Published by Walker Childrens on September 10th, 2013
Genres: Sci-fi, YA
Length: 288 pages
How I got my copy: NetGalley
IndieBound - Book Depository - Goodreads
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If Ruby Wright could have her way, her dad would never have met and married her stepmother Willow, her best friend George would be more than a friend, and her mom would still be alive. Ruby knows wishes can't come true; some things just can't be undone. Then she discovers a tree in the middle of an Ohio cornfield with a wormhole to nine alternative realities.
Suddenly, Ruby can access completely different realities, each containing variations of her life—if things had gone differently at key moments. The windshield wiper missing her mother’s throat…her big brother surviving his ill-fated birth…her father never having met Willow. Her ideal world—one with everything and everyone she wants most—could be within reach. But is there such a thing as a perfect world? What is Ruby willing to give up to find out?
Strengths:
- Ruby is a huge nerd and since Relativity is told in first person, we get to read all of Ruby’s nerdy thoughts. This made me quite gleeful because I definitely also think that way at times >.>.
- The idea of parallel universes has become popular as of late, but Relativity uses that idea to look at the various ways that Ruby’s family life could have been different. This leads to quite poignant introspection on Ruby’s part and there might have been some crying….
- The science in Relativity is pretty solid! Obviously string theory had to be stretched to make an actual wormhole show up, but that’s the fiction part and is totally allowed ;-).
- There is only a hint of a romance (well, in this reality >.>), but it is so sweet! It makes me hopeful for another book where we get to see what happens, but who knows!
Weaknesses:
- I am highly suspicious that the science might get annoying to people who are less interested in the mathematical theory. You’ve been warned!
- There is a fair bit of repetitive phrasing. Some of it works, and some of it had me scratching my head and wondering if my eReader had skipped back a page.
- Because Ruby is exploring alternate realities, not a lot of real change happened in her world, which left me a little unsatisfied. Ruby herself underwent plenty of change, but it’s weird when a book ends at nearly the same place it began ya know?
Summary:
Relativity is an adorably nerdy book that I highly recommend to anyone who thinks crazy science theories are intriguing. It might not be the right fit for some readers though, which is quite understandable. I’m still crossing my fingers for a sequel where we get to more fully explore what is going on with that tree!
