‘There Is No Antimemetics Division’ – qntm (Penguin)

 

Page Count: 275 Pages

If you frequent these parts you’ll know my reading tastes, it’s hard not to by now ;o) As a rule, it’s a rare thing to see me pick up any sci-fi that steps past the likes of Doctor Who, and Warhammer 40K, and into the realms of ‘high concept’ and ‘hard sci-fi’. Nothing against the stuff, it’s just that more and more, I read to relax (and escape) and I don’t find ‘high concept/hard sci-fi’ particularly relaxing. It’s that simple ;o)

Every so often though…

I’d heard a number of very complimentary words spoken about ‘There Is No Antimemetics Division’, more than enough to pique my interest, and the vague promise of a little cosmic horror was enough to swing it. I picked it up for a read and…

An antimeme is an entity with self-censoring properties. Some are benign; others, less so…

But how do you contain something you can’t record or remember? How do you fight against an enemy when you can never even know that you’re at war?

Welcome to the Antimemetics Division. No, this is not your first day.

‘How do you fight against an enemy when you can never even know that you’re at war?’

Well, that wasn’t the question I found myself asking to start off with; I was more interested in, ‘Is it even possible to tell the story of a war that one side can’t remember fighting, and the other side actively wants you to forget? How does that work?’

Well, luckily for us, qntm makes it all look simple with a tale that starts off by asking ‘what is the opposite of a meme’ and then takes that answer to its logical point; the fate of our reality is at stake and may well have been the whole time, if only anyone could actually remember…

By doing this, qntm takes an interesting concept and swiftly turns it into something that is immediately urgent and will demand the ingenuity of Marie Quinn and the other members of her team. Again, if they can remember the real threat that lurks in plain sight. And that’s the thing… If they do remember, that threat will immediately become aware of them and it is unstoppable.

‘There Is No Antimemetics Division’ is a devious read then; a book that poses all sorts of tricky situations and will have you questioning its reality just as much as the characters do. It’s full of twists and turns that qntm ties off beautifully at the end. Okay, maybe it all ties together a little too simply but it all works within the framework that has been set up; that and the fact that I will never fail to appreciate any plot that fully embraces the ‘Bill and Ted’ approach to problem solving.

I wouldn’t want to give too much away here but it’s really hard to as the (understandably) fragmented nature of the plot has left me wondering what I’ve missed. What I can say is that qntm puts his concept through the wringer while, at the same time, giving it enough humanity to make the book a compulsive read. I had to put it down, I had things that I really needed to do, but I was pretty sour about every minute I spent away from this book.

And ‘There Is No Antimemetics Division’ is a chilling slice of cosmic horror like I haven’t read in a long time. If cosmic horror is the terror of something far beyond our comprehension… What can be more incomprehensible than something that literally robs you of your power to comprehend it? And it’s well aware of you…

I am already looking forward to wrapping my head around a re-read and I’m glad I took a chance on ‘There Is No Antimemetics Division’. If you haven’t given the book a go… Well, maybe you did and somehow forgot ;o) Give it a go anyway, I don’t think you’ll regret it.