Mr. Universe
Author: Arthur Slade
Publisher: Orca Book Publishers
Seventeen-year-old Michael goes to visit his eccentric mad-scientist uncle who, busy working on yet another time-travel experiment in his cluttered lab, barely notices him. He keeps muttering things like "quantum multiverse transporter" and Michael has to entertain himself. Which is how Michael accidentally ends up in an alternate universe. Everything looks remarkably similar to his own world but with a few key differences, like lizard men dressed in gray suits and three-wheeled vehicles. And then there's Emily, a sassy, confident girl who needs Michael's help before he can find his way back to his own dimension.
Bumbling teen Michael has accidentally slipped into an alternate universe via his uncle’s science lab and now needs to get back. Well, maybe not now—but soon. It turns out that Michael’s not that quick on the uptake, and it takes him a couple of chapters to discover that he has even left his own universe. (Michael and his uncle are at opposite ends of their family’s gene pool when it comes to intelligence, it seems.) To complicate his experience, Michael has a more-than-platonic interest in the mysterious Emily, who may or may not be from this new universe, and grey-skinned men with bad suits and lizard eyes are trying to zap both of them into oblivion
Lizard-eyed men. So typical. Sheesh.
Michael is one of those charming knuckleheads who endears himself to the reader by being agreeable and clueless, and the voice of the character seems to be the main draw in the early chapters. For such a short book (120 pages, maybe 15,000+ words), we don’t get much in the way of danger until about 38 pages in, when his uncle warns him to beware of the grey lizard men (yes, his cell phone apparently works across dimensions). In fact, with Emily, Michael wouldn’t have much incentive to return without those lizard men. Once the bad guys start zapping, the pace escalates, as Emily and Michael try to find a way to get back to their respective universes before the lizard men erase them.
The great thing about a book like this is that reluctant readers will not be intimidated by the length of the text, and they are almost guaranteed to figure out what’s going on before the main character does. And for many young people these days, any mention of a multiverse is a draw in and of itself. Having said that, the lack of world-building in the book is disappointing. There isn’t much to differentiate the two universes, and the story relies heavily on established tropes about the supposed multiverse popularized by recent Marvel movies. But considering the short format, that is perhaps excusable; readers will know what to expect.
Mr. Universe is marketed as being for readers 12+, but considering the novel’s somewhat comical danger and the fact that Michael and Emily never engage in anything remotely intimate, this book would make a nice entry-point for a younger middle-grade audience.
-M.D.S.