LIMIT // Frank Schätzing
★★★☆☆
OVERVIEW/ This 1300 page story is very complex and multidimensional, at first there are two seperate storylines that begin to intertwine after about 750 pages. It is set in the year 2025, when the extraction of helium-3 on the moon takes over the energy market and oil is starting to become obsolete. The most influential person is Julian Orley, who built an "elevator" to a geostationary satellite, from where a shuttle takes visitors to the moon, more specifically to his new lunar hotel "Gaia". While he takes a group of important & very influential billionairs (to make them invest in his business) as the first ever guests to this spectacular place, a threat of nuklear dimensions is made against him and/or his building, which leads to a wild chase from Shanghai to London between the criminals and cyber-detective Owen Jericho (who somewhat involuntarily becomes involved in all this).
EXPERIENCE/ While the story and futuristic setting are very exciting and interesting, it is sometimes hard to keep track of what happens and how the backstory or certain happenings in the past are connected. He describes a lot of (true) historic facts and background information that is really well researched, but he could have cut a few hundred pages in my opinion.
His descriptions are very detailed, be it of the surface of the moon or the traffic situation in Shanghai or the dimensions and looks of the space station, and sometimes I didn't quite get the image.
DIFFICULTY/ I read it in German (my mother tongue), so the language obviously wasn't the problem but as mentioned above he sometime confused me with his complicated descriptions. The most difficult part would be to not be discouraged by the sheer volume though, since the climax of the story only starts to build up after about 850 pages.
CONCLUSION/ For everyone who doesn't mind a huge book and fans of futuristic stories with a little interest in history and the energy industry
(naanoo.com)