Book Review: The Great Derealization by Tobias Malm
Book Review: The Great Derealization by Tobias Malm
What if the world around you wasn't real—and, even more frighteningly, what if you couldn't trust your own memories to tell you the truth?
That question lies at the heart of Tobias Malm's The Great Derealization, an imaginative and highly unconventional science-fiction novel that takes readers into a future where reality, virtual reality, artificial intelligence, and human consciousness have become almost impossible to separate.
The story centers on Laila Kazi and her sister Nabila, along with a group of friends living in a futuristic world in which people routinely move between "base-re"—physical reality—and Maya, an enormous simulated environment. Digital existence has become so sophisticated that the distinction between the real and the artificial is barely perceptible.
The novel begins with a mysterious message directed toward Nabila. Laila tells her sister that she is not who she thinks she is and that the world she currently experiences may be a fabrication. Her memories may have been altered, her body may have been taken over, and the people around her may not be what they appear to be.
From there, the story becomes an increasingly strange journey through Maya.
Malm creates a future that is simultaneously fascinating, chaotic, funny, disturbing, and occasionally grotesque. The characters move through bizarre environments, encounter artificial beings and strange creatures, and repeatedly find themselves questioning the rules of the worlds they inhabit. At one point they navigate an apparently endless subway system; elsewhere they encounter surreal landscapes, floating whales, bizarre parties, abandoned playgrounds, and other environments that seem to have escaped from a particularly feverish dream.
The world-building is one of the book's greatest strengths. Malm has clearly put considerable thought into how everyday life might evolve after humanity becomes deeply dependent on artificial environments and digital technology. People use virtual reality almost casually. Bodies can be rented or controlled. Digital beings can interact with humans. Physical reality itself has become something people can escape from rather than simply endure.
There is also an interesting social dimension to this future. The characters live in a world affected by environmental destruction, dust storms, economic hardship, technological inequality, and the lingering consequences of humanity's past. Earth is no longer the idyllic planet people remember. Instead, the characters encounter reminders of a lost natural world, while advertisements and virtual experiences offer increasingly elaborate substitutes for what has disappeared.
The novel's language is just as distinctive as its setting. The dialogue is filled with slang, invented terminology, Bengali expressions, futuristic vocabulary, and the casual speech of young people who have grown up in this strange world. Words such as "base-re," "off-re," "Maya," "jinn," "bhramara," and "dhulo" become part of the vocabulary of the story. This gives the novel a strong individual voice and helps distinguish Malm's future from the more familiar worlds found in conventional science fiction.
At the same time, this stylistic approach will not appeal to every reader. The slang is extensive, and the story frequently moves at a frantic pace. The sheer number of strange concepts, locations, characters, and realities can occasionally be disorienting. That seems intentional, however. The reader is experiencing a world in which confusion is part of the point.
And confusion is ultimately one of the novel's central themes.
What is reality? What makes a memory authentic? If an artificial world feels completely real, does that experience become less meaningful? And if an artificial intelligence develops consciousness, where does the boundary between human and machine actually lie?
Malm doesn't make these questions easy to answer. Instead, he builds them into the experience of reading the novel. Just when the reader thinks the characters have figured out which world they are in, another layer of uncertainty emerges.
The latter portion of the story becomes particularly tense as the characters struggle to find their way back to base reality. Their journey is not simply a physical escape. They must also determine whom they can trust and whether the reality they are trying to reach is actually what they believe it to be.
The conclusion brings the story back to the physical world, but rather than tying every mystery into a neat package, it leaves the reader with additional questions—particularly concerning Nabila and the possibility that the boundaries between reality and simulation may be even more complicated than they appeared.
The Great Derealization is an ambitious science-fiction novel that combines virtual reality, artificial intelligence, family relationships, environmental collapse, social commentary, and surreal adventure. It is not conventional science fiction, and readers looking for a straightforward futuristic adventure may find its deliberately chaotic style challenging.
But readers willing to enter Malm's strange universe will find plenty to think about.
The novel's most intriguing achievement is that it doesn't merely tell us about a world where people can't distinguish reality from simulation. It makes the reader experience some of that uncertainty firsthand.
For readers who enjoy unconventional science fiction, virtual-reality stories, artificial intelligence, and novels that leave you questioning what is real, The Great Derealization offers a distinctly original journey.
Goodreads Review
https://www.goodreads.com/review/show/8998593166