S.

S. is an experience, that's for sure. This experience is the sum of two stories; the first is the novel, The Ship of Theseus, that is printed traditional in the text, the second is the story of two readers told through the marginalia - commentary on the text and notes to each other.

The Ship of Theseus is supposedly the last novel of V.M. Straka, an author whose works spawn whole academic departments at universities around the world. As such, anything printed representing the works of this fictional author should be 'a classic'. Ship of Theseus misses the mark as a supposed classic. It's interesting. It's obviously metaphorical, referring to events we don't really know. Perhaps it's a bit like The Master and Margerita that way - referencing Soviet politics that just aren't readily understood by folks on this side of the Cold War. The difference being that 'Straka's' works refer to fictional events and literature that can't be researched to gain better understanding.

And that's where the marginalia comes in. At first they help to give the reader the idea that they're investing in a larger world and give us context. It works to some extent. The margins, along with additional inserted notes and scraps, also add up to fairly round characters, surprisingly. These scribbles are also supposed to build a mystery about the author, filled with codes in the text and out in the world. In this latter attempt, the story is weak.

So, S. is made up of two stories fed out simultaneously, both of which are sort of 3-star efforts on their own. I rate this a 4 and could almost go higher because the design of this experience is outstanding. The way the two stories interact makes it a bit better than the sum of its parts, but the best part is the print/paper quality and the inserts. The text and design is straight out of the 1940s. The tactile experience of the paper and case - it's brilliantly aged, you need to get your fingers on this. S. is a 5-star production.

This book is more of an experience than it is a story. The book itself is entitled The Ship of Theseus by the not-real author V.M. Straka, and is a story of a mysterious man who awakens with no memory of his past, and his attempt to find his place in the world. He is opposed and in turns opposes a seldom-seen figure named Vedova, and assisted or propelled or guided by a ship of very strange figures who seem to know more than they are telling him.

While that story is in the actual printed pages, the story that is woven around the amnesiac is meatier, and provides a whole set of additional mysteries to obsess over. This overlay story is where the experience of S. really lies.

There are margin notes. There are notes replying to the notes. There are entire conversations in the margins, in multiple waves. There are additional documents and photos and decoder devices jammed into the pages of the book. There are conversations and documents referenced but never fully summarized or explained.

There are multiple possible approaches to experiencing S. You could read The Ship of Theseus, attempting to ignore the margin notes, and then go back and read each wave of notes in their chronological order, as much as can be deciphered. You could just read it straight from page 1 to page 474. Or, you could do as the folks on several blogs are doing - obsess over every mystery and try to solve them as you read, flipping forward and back and doing research online. I chose the second path.

While I can't say everything that was foreshadowed at the beginning, or even the additional mysteries that are alluded to partway through, were ever completely explained, I did find the experience enjoyable. This is most assuredly not a book for everyone, and it's almost impossible to summarize. But, if you like artificial reality games, or enjoy mysteries that are never fully explained and require a bit of effort on the part of the reader, you should definitely experience S.