Shimmer

By Ryan Sung

What does it mean to be the center of the universe? In a world of misinformation, blame, and a crisis of meaning fueled by the failings of modernity, The Question Mark, a man with no exclusive identity and an unknown past receives a lump-sum of money one day, who peculiarly decides to purchase the three previous properties he had lived in throughout his life. With unclear reasons behind his actions, The Question Mark goes on to rearrange his three homes exactly how they appeared when he previously lived in them, down to every last detail as an exact resemblance of his old lives. However, once his endeavor is fulfilled, memories and timelines start to collide from one unsettling incident to the next as time becomes disoriented and he begins to observe the unobservable, before he is visited by a mysterious entity in a liminal state between wakefulness and sleep. The entity then shows him the world beyond human perception, gives him a peculiar set of instructions on how to leave it - and provides insight into what would happen if he didn't. What follows The Question Mark's out-of-this-world disappearance is the arrival of an extraterrestrial orb of light left in his place, and a multi-POV story told from nine introspective points of view over the span of millennia. Through inner-dialogue with The Question Mark and deep exploration of the human psyche responding to the new reality that was born after an extraordinary occurrence, the grand-narrative of the orb of light moves through a chronicle of harsh reality and time, before and after it is harnessed into something that changes the world and the future of the species forever. Shimmer is what can be classified as experimental sociopolitical science fiction, and is a critical tale of humanity, belief, and the era of 'post-truth' that provokes a visceral and unrelenting commentary on modern day America. It's about time. "Give time-management a whole new meaning. Observe the unobservable. Leave the world with a question mark. Watch your neighbor dematerialize. Have an identity crisis. Blame internet culture. Blame modernity. Blame every desert of self-gratification, the ignorant convenience of all your selective, performative outrage, and one big 21st century horizontal shit-show of political narcissism set on fire. Blame the age of anonymity and socially-turbulent hearsay. Blame yourself. Revel in the awkward silence. Stare at the black screen. Kill the vibe. Capitalize on every single impulse. Eat some ice cream. Lie for fun. Write science fiction. Steal Tenium, manipulate an entire species, and then revitalize the world into a greater reality. Curse your ancestors, your creators, and the same infinite moment that left you idle and burning out in the waste. Snort some nerve-dust. Let evil evolve and then eat your feelings for a never-ending weekend in hell. Start a war on information, disassociate into the digital-age, drain all your remaining battery-life, hand personal growth to automation, monopolize thought, and then turn corruption into a universal currency. Fall back in love with the same girl on a loop every 100 days. Break some hearts. Get up. Grow. Become something larger than life itself. And make sense of all those little moments in between."

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: B0CDNGYSYJ
• ISBN13: 9798856245416
• Release Date: August 2023
• Publisher: Independently published
• Length: 509 Pages
• Dimensions: 9.2" x 1.3" x 6.2"