I might pick this book up again when I'm in a bit more of a sci-fi mood, but it wasn't for me — not because of the genre, but because after reading other reviews, I knew I was going to get out of it what I put into it emotionally. I just don't have a ton to give right now, trying to comprehend a plot and also forfeit my emotions. That's a little too much like the real world for my liking lol.

Ethan Chatagnier has given us a smart, interesting literary sci-fi debut novel, Singer Distance. There are two distinct story lines and readers will likely be more invested in one or the other but both are compelling. First we have a story about finding out that there is intelligent life on Mars and the resulting quest to develop and implement a method of communication. This is where the title comes from. For hard core sci-fi fans be aware that there are no alien space ships or little martians running around. The second story line is the tale as old as time: boy falls in love with a girl unable to reciprocate and eventually she is gone. As is usually the case, distance and time do nothing to diminish his love. I thoroughly enjoyed taking the journey that the author so intelligently and lovingly laid out. I expect good things from Ethan Chatagnier in the future.

I received a drc from the publisher via Netgalley.

really beautiful in a cerebral and almost detached way. has some similar gentleness as station eleven which is a clever if somewhat misleading comp title given their different subject matter but. a lovely surprise

I can honestly say that I would not have thought a book centered on mathematics would be such a true pleasure to read. The mix of sci-fi with the analytical was different but made the story even more interesting to me.

Ethan Chatagnier also really delivers with this slight alternate history where we have contact with "aliens" and have for years.

Great story, great characters, and just an overall great read.

WOW, this was so much more than I expected going into it. The amount of humanity and emotion in this story is wild, and so so unexpected -- what a great way to start the year of reading!

This is a little bit of a mess, but in an AMAZING way - it's all over the place but I feel like that keeps you as a reader on the edge of your seat, not knowing exactly where things will go until it all wraps up. Once it does, you're left with this overwhelming feeling of just... wow.

The writing is stunning, this was my first book by the author (maybe a debut?) and I'm OBSESSED, will absolutely be buying a physical copy & also checking anything else out by them in the future.

"Singer Distance" by Ethan Chatagnier is a captivating science fiction novel that takes place in an alternate history where humans and Martians (aliens from Mars) communicate through mathematics. The protagonist embarks on a journey to find his missing girlfriend; who is an expert in this language and disappeared years ago. The book combines elements of literary fiction and science fiction to create a memorable reading experience.

Not quite for me—the plot didn’t grab me—but the prose is pretty damn good. Thanks to Netgalley and the publisher for the review copy.

I thought this was an unexpected gem and it also introduced me to a PNW publishing house that I’ll be following in the future!
As mentioned in another review, I love the very specific scifi trope of the "human-alien translator", which we get in this book as part of its first contact story. I really like that this book managed to be very character driven, and it's a slow burn that worked well for the story being told. The writing/prose were excellent, and I thought it had a good ending. Lots to enjoy here!

Seriously? This was only 288 pages? It read so much longer. I’m not sure why.
I mean, it’s an exceptionally well-written book, but it’s quite…languidly paced. Science fiction at its most meditative. Or a love story at its most otherworldly.
I did enjoy it, mostly. Especially, in retrospect.
For one thing, it’s difficult to not appreciate a beauty of the author’s language, the haunting lyrical quality of it, the way he writes love, the way he writes longing…that’s a song in and of itself. A song of distance. This novel is very much about distance.
A distance between two planets. A distance between two people. The efforts to span it.
The planets are Earth and Mars. In book’s alternate reality, the two are in communication, albeit halting and sporadic and with math as the language of choice.
The people are Crystal Singer who drives the communication brigade and the man who loves her. She’s a challenging, mercurial, complicated woman driven by a mind that at times disagrees with her soul; he’s a much more straightforward sort of person, the most complex thing about him is his love for Crystal, which drives him for years and years. Drives him to find her when she disappears. Leaving a doozy of a surprise behind.
This is a love story, a science story, a road trip story. In its own way, set to its own melody, it is lovely. Compelling. Emotionally engaging. Like a good song. You just got to give it time to weave its magic around you. I mean, it had me at Mars. And slowly won over with the rest over time.
Not sure how it’ll work for other readers. Thanks Netgalley.

I was excited to read this book - the cover, the description, the off-the-bat comparison to one of my all-time favorite novels, Station Eleven (!) - but it didn't live up to my perhaps unreasonably high hopes. After lots of back and forth, I'm compromising on a 3-star rating: I think objectively it's a 4-star book, but it landed lower for me because of the contrast between what I expected and what I got.

Two things in particular that I struggled with:
- The pacing seemed extraordinarily slow, and I say that as someone who generally loves literary fiction - especially slow-moving, character-driven novels. It felt to me like the story was lacking propulsion. (I do think this improved in the second half.) I was surprised to learn it's only 288 pages - it felt like 400+.
- I just didn't feel sufficiently connected to - or invested in - Rick. I didn't think about him when I wasn't actively reading the book. And again, I say that as someone who generally can't take her mind off whatever she's reading!

That said, this book is inarguably well-written. And despite what I disliked, I'd still recommend it to others, which is rare. The way Chatagnier explores "distance" in all its forms - from between people to across planets - is unique and compelling. It just didn't work for me this time around; I'm open to coming back to it.

Thanks to NetGalley and Tin House for my ARC in exchange for my honest opinion.

I'm going to be the odd one out. I struggled with this genre mixing novel from the beginning, when it introduced the concepts behind communication between Mars and the earth. There's science, there's philosophy and I wasn't sure what was real and what was invented- or whether that distinction mattered. It's 1961 and MIT grad students Rick, Crystal, Ronnie, Priya, and Otis are headed to the desert in a van to follow up on Crystal's calculations that will allow them, theoretically, to communicate back to Mars by digging trenches and setting fires. The road trip takes them to Crystal's house where they meet her father and then to the site, where things go, well-no spoilers. Then there's an immediate flash forward that frankly confused me a bit as I tried to figure out where we were in space and time. Ultimately, this is the story of Rick, Crystal, and their daughter but honestly, he'd lost me by that point. Suspend disbelief and enjoy the writing if you're a fan of the genre. Thanks to netgalley for the ARC. For fans of literary fiction.

Singer Distance was a really interesting story, probably not at all what I expected, but enjoyable nonetheless. In a world where there are Martians, they are definitely smarter than us, and have been sending us puzzles for decades, a group of math wizard grad students take a road trip to attempt to solve their latest puzzle. Crystal is at the center of it all, and her boyfriend Rick will do just about anything to help her get there.

The story is far less about the Martians, and far more about Rick and his journey. It's about the lengths we go to to achieve goals, and the lengths we go to for the people we love. After their initial journey, Crystal starts to drift away. At first, Rick hears from her frequently, but as the months, then years, pass, she grows more distant. But Rick can't seem to let go, and while Crystal is off chasing math answers for aliens, Rick is chasing Crystal.

It's certainly a quiet story, though a lovely one. It's light on the Martians- we don't actually really have much to do with them outside the puzzles- but heavy on humanity. While I'd probably have preferred a bit stronger of an ending, it was still sufficient. I did have some idea of where the twists were heading, but I think that was okay, for it was more how Rick would respond to the twists of his life than how the reader would.

Bottom Line: Quiet, but with a lovely human-centered story, it was worth the journey even without the Martians.

In the world of this book, life on Mars has connected with life on Earth. The Martians communicate with the people of Earth through mathematical proofs that are carved into the surface of Mars, visible during certain periods of the orbits of the two planets. After success solving the early proofs, Earth's scientists have struggled with the latest one and decades have passed without any success. In December 1960, Crystal, a graduate student, believes she may have solved the elusive proof. Her fellow graduate student and boyfriend, Rick, has organized a trip with Crystal and three of their classmates to Arizona to paint Crystal's solution in the desert in order to communicate it back to Mars. They have high hopes, and believe they are on the verge of making history. But what comes next is not like anything that Crystal, Rick, or their classmates could have ever expected -- and Rick and Crystal's lives are set on surprising paths, with unintended consequences for them, both professionally and personally, and those in their lives.

This story is a creative and insightful exploration of science and discovery, the pressures of success, and the search for connections. Often surprising and always thought-provoking, this is a book you'll continue to reflect on long after you finish the last page.

Highly recommended!

Singer Distance by Ethan Chatagnier follows a alternate history in which the US has communicated with Martians. The story mainly follows Rick and a few of his friends in the 1960s as they seek to find answers to new questions posed by the Martians.

While I was expecting a very sci-fi centered story in which Rick's friend Crystal disappears, this story is far more focused on the realities of love, loss, and the interconnected relationships of people on Earth. The story is broken up into three parts which each felt distinct and yet came together as part of a whole nicely.

I wasn't sure how I felt about this book at the beginning -- the writing is beautiful but at times went over my head, particularly with some of the scientific vernacular and theories used and discussed throughout. However, by the end of the novel, I realized that I really had been pulled into this lyrical story that held so much emotion -- both good and bad. I enjoyed the arc of the story and felt moved by its ending.

Overall, I think this is a story to be read slowly and savored rather than one to be ripped through in a day or two. The writing style is distinct and the ideas throughout will leave you thinking long after you've stopped reading.

Thank you to NetGalley and Tin House for an advanced copy of this book in exchange for my honest opinion!

I really enjoyed this one. It's a charming, quirky piece of speculative fiction-- the kind of book that you recommend to friends and family and maybe even read again. It has shades of Carl Sagan's "Contact," with an inventive plot and compelling characters. It did leave me wanting more at the end, but the plot resolved itself neatly (if leaving a lot of questions, particularly regarding the more sci-fi aspects). I highly recommend it. Thanks to NetGalley for the advance copy in exchange for this unbiased review.

Ruined my life, so 5/5

I will admit right off the bat that there's much about this novel that's messy, including but not limited to some inconsistent pacing and the fact that your satisfaction in where it all leads depends heavily on what threads you had invested yourself in. But messiness to me is essentially a vital component of great sci-fi, and great writing in general. And this does something else that I consider a delightful quality for sci-fi to have: On the surface it's about something concrete, surrounded by math and science and what can be explained, but in reality this is a novel about something more abstract and emotional, something so deeply human that it's painful to think that another civilization elsewhere in the universe is struggling with the same fundamental constructs of interaction. Perhaps we wish that these things could be explained through the concrete, through mathematical formulas - the distances between us are infinite yet infinitesimal. It's almost a spiritual notion, yet it's the kind of thing that even the most secular among us would find themselves pondering.

I immediately noted that this novel begins with a quote by Yiyun Li: "What a long way it is from one life another, yet why write if not for that distance" (from Li's highly resonant book of memoirs Dear Friend, from My Life I Write to You in Your Life). Quoting Yiyun Li is an effective way to get on my good side right off the bat, but it also leads to certain expectations as far as the emotional contents of the novel, so upon reading this quote I was unsure of whether her name was being invoked simply to create an illusion of what was to come, or whether it was a promise. And honestly I think that quote was ultimately lived up to by the novel itself, and strikingly in tune with the novel's own themes.

I don't cry very often at books (or movies, or at all) but this one really hurt me. I read it in a few sittings, and the further I got into it the more urgency I felt to get to the end because I knew that the novel would be hanging over me like a cloud in my daily life, a bubble of emotion waiting to burst and rain over me. I needed it to pop sooner rather than later, but I also didn't want to rush it, as I knew that this would end up being a novel from which the emotionality sticks with me for a long time to come, including the disconnected emotions of my life surrounding it. So much of what this novel emotionally considers is what I find occupying my mind often, or perhaps those are just the things I picked up on because I'm always thinking about them. Some things are very clear, though, such as how someone who is gone but not dead can feel like a ghost nonetheless, how a house can feel haunted by memories, how landmarks of the past can feel very much like graves even if all those involved are still alive (there's a moment in the novel where Rick imagines Crystal's father leaving flowers at a site that reminds him of her. She's not dead, and yet it feels proper to pay remembrance to someone who has fallen out of view). These are ideas that embed themselves in so much of my own writing.

In any event, I clearly have a soft spot for sci-fi and I won't try too hard to justify that. But this resonated with me quite a bit. So much sadness builds up, and in a way that manifests as desperation to the degree that if these events were happening in real life it wouldn't really feel right. But as far as sentimental and romantic (which I mean in the idealistic side of the definition, not the love side, although I guess neither is actually a perfect fit for what I mean. Look, I get to make up what words mean now. Good luck figuring out what I mean) sci-fi goes, it's all absolutely worth it.

In many ways, this novel was not what I expected. Set in an alternative history where Martians and Earth communicate through the universal language of math, I expected something more fantastical and sci-fish. No, the novel revealed itself to be even better, delving into the mysteries of the human heart and brain, a story of love and its persistence across time and space.

For centuries scientists had been baffled about lines on Mars, theorizing a lost civilization who had left irrigation canals etched on the surface of the planet. In 1894, an astronomer carved three parallel lines into the desert. And the next time Mars was opposite the Earth, astronomers were stunned to see four parallel lines etched on the surface of Mars. Communication between Mars and Earth posed mathematical problems, until Earth’s scientists were unable to formulate an answer to one and Mars went silent.

Crystal Singer is an expert on the Curious Language and believes she has found the answer to Mars’ last communication. In 1960, Crystal and her boyfriend Rick and three other MIT Phd students drive across the country to the desert to set up an answer.

Success has it’s negative side. Crystal progressively retreats into her obsession to answer the latest communication from Mars that suggests distance was a construct. Her equation for calculating “true distance” between objects was called Singer Distance. Her letters to Rick become more sporadic and she never leaves a trace of how to find her. Finally, she just disappeared.

Rick never moves on. Thirteen years later, Rick learns that Crystal has a daughter–his daughter-and Crystal’s sister can no longer care for her. As scientists prepare another answer for Mars, Rick and his daughter travel cross-country searching for people who might know how to find Crystal. Then, Rick realizes that Crystal may have already given him the answers they sought.

Singer Distance is a beautiful story of how love negates distance. It is a story of loss and of of hope, of being alone and seeking to bridge the gaps between us. It’s a beautiful, wondrous read.

I received a free egalley from the publisher through NetGalley. My review is fair and unbiased.

A strange and wonderful speculative fiction story about the world if we had already communicated with Martians.
In 1960, a group of MIT grad students, including Crystal Singer, her boyfriend Rick take a cross country road trip to communicate with Mars. By this time, it's well known that the martians communicate through math formulas, and only reciprocate when a formula is solved. Sometimes it is many years before the math of humans catches up to Mars. In this case, Crystal thinks she has solved the 30 year old unanswered proof and the group is on their way to paint in the desert. When Crystal turns up missing however, Rick finds himself caught in a long journey of love and loneliness.

This is a beautiful and wondrous novel and will captivate anyone looking for a speculative fiction story depicting the connection of love. #SingerDistance #TinHouse #EthanCHatagnier

A Smart, Compelling Take on "Contact", with a Caveat

The "sciencey" parts of this book, including the riffs on math and physics, are the heart of the story, interesting and engaging fun. We get a great premise, (we communicate with Mars by carving huge equations on Earth's surface and the Martians answer with increasingly more challenging mathematical and symbolic responses). The multi-century alt-history of those communications, (told in flashbacks), starts with the Victorians, incorporates the actual scientists who would have been involved in solving the Martian's equations, and is absolutely fascinating. This is inspired, top notch stuff.

But, and this was a very big but for me but maybe not for anyone else, once we are firmly in the present and following our two main characters there are a lot of angsty coming of age personal history flashbacks and melodramatic info dumps about them, (lots of daddy issues), an obsessed central character in the tortured genius role who quickly loses our sympathy and then our interest, and a dreary sad-sack romance thread that feels like graduate student puppy love that just goes on way too long.

This is all very well written, and in addition to the high quality fiction-sci there are some strong set pieces and some pointed and arresting throwaway lines and observations. Some slogging and skimming wasn't too high a price to pay for the good parts. And if you like the romance/angst angle, you'll actually get a win-win.

(Please note that I received a free advance ecopy of this book without a review requirement, or any influence regarding review content should I choose to post a review. Apart from that I have no connection at all to either the author or the publisher of this book.)

A nicely written love story in a fascinating speculative fiction setting -- focused on communication -- with other species and between ourselves.