28 November 2020 | New Scientist | 31Don’t miss
Read
Threats: Intimidation
and its discontents
explores the world
of intimidation, as
psychologist David
Barash considers why
humanity’s evolved
response to threats
sometimes makes things
worse rather than better.Watch
I Am Greta, a
documentary now
streaming on Hulu
and Amazon Prime,
celebrates the work of
Greta Thunberg, whose
campaign to save the
natural world led her
from school strikes to
speaking at the UN
General Assembly.Read
The Janus Point: A
new theory of time is
physicist Julian Barbour’s
answer to why time
seems to flow in only one
direction. Its arguments
could have astonishing
implications for the
origin and destiny of
life in the universe.
MI
DDLE
:^ DOGWOOFHundreds of Earths
Multiverse stories can be tricky to follow, but
a new sci-fi novel gets it right, finds Will HeathBook
The Space
Between Worlds
Micaiah Johnson
Hodder & StoughtonTHE multiverse isn’t easy to
wrap your head around – so
many versions of reality, in
which events in one place may
or may not be linked to what
happens in another. As such,
learning the rules of a sci-fi
multiverse can be a difficult
affair. But Micaiah Johnson’s
debut novel, The Space Between
Worlds, tackles the idea with
ease. It is a witty, deep and
savvy tale about travelling
through multiple universes.
Cara is a young woman who
works across a multiverse of
380 Earths in her job as
a “traverser”. Each time she
arrives at a new version of the
planet, she has to collect vital
information about what
makes that Earth unique
before bringing it back
home to her bosses.
A traverser can only visit
an alternate Earth if they are
already dead in that universe.
Luckily for Cara’s job prospects,there aren’t very many versions
of her still alive. She grew up in
a brutal and fascistic wasteland,
and so only eight versions of her
are still going. This means she
is free to travel to almost every
Earth in the multiverse, making
her a valuable employee.
The Space Between Worlds
is set primarily in two places,
each of which is visited across
multiple realities. The first is
the rich and clean Wiley City,
where Cara now lives, and the
other is the wild, Mad Max-style
wastes of Ashtown that she
hails from. Both places are
on Earth, though it isn’t clear
when in time the novel is set.
The book explores a lot
of exciting possibilities about
alternative realities, but it soon
becomes clear that exploration
and world-building on a
multiversal scale isn’t its goal.
Instead, it is a surprisingly
intimate novel about facing
down your demons. It muses
on questions of identity,
nature vs nurture and the
consequences of our actions.
Although there are a few
awkward steps in its world-
building process, the novel never
falls under the weight of too
much complexity. The characters
are sharply written and the way
that the plot twists and turns is
gripping. There are intense and
weighty revelations right from
the beginning. At times, the
book is reminiscent of Terry
Pratchett and Stephen Baxter’s
The Long Earth, and at others,
it is closer to Luiza Sauma’s
Everything You Ever Wanted.
The Space Between Worlds
is a fresh and interesting take
on the multiverse. On this
version of Earth, anyway. ❚Will Heath is a freelance
JON writer based in LondonAT
HAN^ KNOWLES
/GETT
Y^ IMAG
EStrauma-based disorder with its
own diagnostic criteria or a label
applied to a group of distinct
mental health conditions. Some
criticised DID’s inclusion in the
1994 update of the Diagnostic
and Statistical Manual of Mental
Disorders, a US handbook of
accepted psychological conditions,
for lending it credibility.
In 2009, Current Psychiatry
published a viewpoint calling for
DID’s removal from a forthcoming
edition of the manual, with author
Numan Gharaibeh arguing that
the listed diagnostic criteria were
“almost meaningless”. It remains
in the most recent edition, but
Crazy, Not Insane is sure to spark
the debate anew.
To the layperson, at least, the
footage of Lewis cross-examining
“alters” is convincing, and Gibney
clearly stands with his subject.
The film treads a careful line,
presenting childhood abuse not
to excuse people’s crimes, but to
ask what might be a just response
from society. Lewis supports life
imprisonment, describing herself
as “haunted” by the prospect of
someone who may be predisposed
to violence being executed.
At a time when it can seem
as if no serial-killer story has
gone untold, the nuance of the
discussion is striking. As Lewis
says in the film: “We are all far
more curious about what the
murderer did, the gory details
of the crime, than about why
they did it.” The fact she is
quoting Bundy, from one of their
interviews before his execution for
murder in 1989, adds to the irony.
Crazy, Not Insane lands like an
intervention – and maybe a rebuke
to our thirst for grisly true-crime
stories. Lewis says her motivation
is to understand the psychology
of homicide so it might be
prevented: “Murderers are made,
not born.” If we fail to extend to
them humanity, and are content
merely to consume their crimes,
are we part of the problem? ❚
Elle Hunt is a freelance
writer based in London