When “too much information” gets all too real
Consider telepathy, or “mental telepathy,” if you choose to belabor the obvious. Sounds like a great thing, right? What’s not to like about knowing what people think of you — or what they’re planning to do? That might stop a lot of fights. Wars, even. But wait. Could it actually cause a war? And do you really want people to know, really know, what you’re thinking about them? A crafty science fiction writer might put together a brilliant thriller along those lines. But that’s not where Connie Willis goes with the theme. In Crosstalk, her unique take on “mental telepathy,” she delivers a madcap story about people who suddenly find they can read minds. And it’s got as many twists, turns, and surprises as the cleverest of whodunits.
A CHALLENGING JOB, AND AN EVEN MORE CHALLENGING FAMILY
Bridget Flannigan, known to one and all as Briddey, is an executive at Commspan. The company struggles to compete with Apple in marketing cell phones with must-have features. But Briddey has struggles of her own. The interminable gossip mill at Commspan is bad enough. But Briddey is deluged 24/7, with texts, emails, and phone calls from her neurotic sister Mary Clare. The nutty woman is deathly afraid that her nine-year-old daughter, Maeve, is unwittingly consorting online with terrorists or watching zombie films (which she is). But Briddey’s great Aunt Oona is worse. The woman affects a deep Irish brogue and constantly tries to drag her along to the frequent meetings of the Daughters of Ireland Gaelic poetry readings.
CROSSTALK BY CONNIE WILLIS (2016) 502 PAGES ★★★★☆
SURGERY TO HELP THEM READ EACH OTHER’S EMOTIONS
Meanwhile, Briddey is frantic about her lover, Trent Worth, who’s a more highly placed executive at Commspan. Trent is constantly dragged into interminable meetings with the big boss. Her contact with him is usually limited to brief, monosyllabic phone calls which are interrupted by endless work emergencies. And they’ve just agreed to a minor surgical procedure called an EED. The famous doctor who will perform the surgery promises that it will enable them to grow closer. It was Trent’s idea. “He said he wants to wait to get engaged till after we have the EED,” she explains to Mary Clare, “so I’ll be able to sense how much he loves me when he asks me.” And he says he really, really loves her.
So, what could go wrong here? Well, just about everything once Briddey undergoes the procedure.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Connie Willis has won an astounding eleven Hugo Awards and seven Nebula Awards — more major science fiction awards than any other writer. She’s been a published writer since 1970 and a Grand Master of the Science Fiction Writers of America since 2011. Willis is best known for the four Oxford time travel novels published from 1992 to 2010: Doomsday Book, To Say Nothing of the Dog, Blackout, and All Clear. All four of these novels won at least one of the two top SF awards, and two of them one both. (I loved two of them but couldn’t finish the other two.)
Willis is American. She was born in Colorado in 1945 and graduated from what is now the University of Northern Colorado with degrees in English and Elementary Education. She now lives in Greeley, Colorado, with her husband, a physics professor. They have a daughter.
FOR RELATED READING
I’ve reviewed several of Connie Willis’s novels:
- Doomsday Book — Oxford Time Travel #2 of 5 (A time-travel novel about the Black Death)
- Blackout — Oxford Time Travel #4 of 5 (Historians study World War II in person)
- The Road to Roswell (An award-winner’s comic alien abduction story)
For more good reading, check out:
- These novels won both Hugo and Nebula Awards
- The ultimate guide to the all-time best science fiction novels
- The top science fiction novels
- The top 10 dystopian novels
- 10 new science fiction authors worth reading now
And you can always find my most popular reviews, and the most recent ones, on the Home Page of Mal Warwick on Books.
