Thanks to Ballentine and Netgalley for this advanced copy.

I'll be honest, I had a really hard time following this book and I"m not sure I could tell you the plot of it if I tried. I was confused by the end of the first chapter and should probably have DNF'd it but I just kept powering through. I might try again? Sometime? I don't know.

The Book of Elsewhere by Keanu Reeves and China Miéville is a mind-bending thrill ride that'll keep you on the edge of your seat. This unique collaboration brings together Reeves' haunting narrative and Miéville's singular style to create a story that's both action-packed and deeply philosophical. The book follows "B," an immortal warrior who's lived for 80,000 years and is now desperate to find a way to die. As he works with a shadowy government organization, the plot takes unexpected twists that'll make your head spin in the best way possible.

What really sets this book apart is how it blends genres and explores complex themes. It's not just about the action (though there's plenty of that); it dives deep into questions of mortality, identity, and the nature of existence. Miéville's prose is as lush and imaginative as ever, painting vivid scenes that jump between different time periods and realities. While it might be a bit confusing at times, especially if you're not familiar with the BRZRKR comics, the sheer creativity and emotional depth make it a worthwhile read. If you're in the mood for something that's equal parts thrilling and thought-provoking.

I really reeeeally wanted to like this book. Instead, I was constantly confused. The storyline is hard to follow and nothing truly feels explained. To this day, I couldn’t explain the plot to you. What a bummer!

When Keanu wants a ghostwriter, the man really commits. China Mieville is one of my favorite writers. The way he manages to not only dream up extremely imaginative worlds, but bring them to life in a highly engaging and readable way. Based on Keanu's graphic novel series, he and Mieville do right by the source material.

Me and a friend buddy read this together. We both found it mind blowing and absolutely entertaining. We both actually moved our chapter readings up so we could finish it sooner together. We really loved this story and loved the whole novel.

I gave this book my all and tried to like it, but I just couldn't keep up with the different "side stories" and how they relate. Unfortunately, I ended up DNF'ing around 20% because I felt like I wasn't making any progress. I was interested in B's story but felt like I was never going to get back to in and I was more confused than enjoying the story. Maybe i'm just not the target audience.

A big thank you to Netgalley for letting me read and review this book.

The Book of Elsewhere is a big release since this is a collaboration of two massive names in their respective spheres - Keanu Reeves and China Miéville. This book was one that I've seen very divided reviews on, and I understand why.

The book centers around a character named B who, along with his 'brother', have the ability to be reborn every time they get killed. And they get killed a lot. It is told through multiple points of view, and the timeline jumps with each one. This does make the story a little bit harder to follow, and I don't recommend listening to the audiobook of this title (I did take a look at it), since each POV is voiced by another actor and it can get quite confusing.

Overall this book is not a bad book. It takes a look at different periods in history and how each of them reacted to these beings. It also explores how our society today would approach someone like this - either by studying them for science or using them as a tool for warfare. It also takes a look at what this being represents. And that's where the twist in this book comes in. The further you get into this book the more you see how the original purpose of something can be distorted with time and with retellings.

This book really is for the serious science fiction reader, and unfortunately I don't really fall into that category. Therefore this book was not really enjoyable for my own reading preference. I do think that it is a very good exploration of humankind and how we react to the other. It also does explore balance in the universe as well, which is a very interesting concept for a scifi book.

This story was unique. It features a character known as Unute, or just B. He turns out to be an immortal being who can get killed, but comes back from an egg every time. He can come back in the same place, or someplace else. He has been following another immortal being through history, the deer-pig, trying to understand it. But, they usually don't tolerate each other. The military or some sort of black ops unit is using Unute's skills in combat for its own purposes.

The text was very hard to follow at first. I wasn't really sure what was going on. Gradually, you get used to the writing style and the story becomes more clear. But, it is still mysterious and somewhat fragmented. There are jumps through time and it can be hard to follow those. I think this story would work well in a visual medium, where the viewer could see signs of what time period the characters are in. Since Unute is an immortal being, the time period can be anything at all.

It is violent, so be prepared for scenes of blood and violence and gore. Unute's character has to be killed in order to go back and be re-born from his egg again. So too, does the other immortal being, the deer-pig. Unute seems to be exhausted finally, by all the destruction and death he has seen in his thousands of years of life. He is ready to become mortal.

The Unit, the black ops team he is attached to, seems to want to make more soldiers like him. They catch the deer-pig and do experiments on it. It's somewhat gruesome.

It was OK as a story, but I think there was too much ambiguity in the writing for me to really enjoy it that much. I also don't usually like books with this much violence. If that's your thing, you might enjoy this book.

Thank you to the publisher and NetGalley for the ARC in exchange for my honest opinion.

The Book of Elsewhere
By Keanu Reeves and China Mieville

I have been a fan of China Mieville ever since reading "Perdido Street Station". All of his books are multi-layered – none is an easy read. I have struggled to get through some of them, but was always glad I did.

Now comes this latest book, co-authored with Keanu Reeves. Perhaps that combination contributed to the weirdness. This is the story of a man named Unute – called B - who can be killed, but cannot remain dead. He has been reborn over the millennia and seems to remember each incarnation.

As the story begins, Unute is working with a secret unit of government trying to determine 1) why he cannot be permanently killed and 2) why he becomes a berserker with superhuman warrior skills when threatened. From there the story becomes more and more convoluted, jumping back and forth through time – and narrators. It required my total concentration to get through this one – and I am still not sure that I know what the authors were trying to convey!

Many stories leave the reader with food for thought. This one overwhelms the reader from all directions. I would like to say I loved it. I will let you know when I figure it out.

I struggle to rate this because I could not finish it, after making it about 26%. It was just confusing and hard to follow and I felt consistently lost. But there were some chapters I did enjoy and some interesting ideas. If you are a hardcore sci fi fan, you might have an easier time with this.

I don't really know what I was expecting, but this was somehow both more readable and more insufferable than I expected it to be. I have not read any China Mieville prior to this (although the City & the City is sitting on my TBR) so I don't have a frame of reference for his work without the influence of Keanu's partnership, whatever that may have been. That being said, the plot could not have bro-ed down harder if it tried. It borderline passes the Bechdel test, but only [spoiler, kind of?] if you can assign gender to a malevolent spirit thing occupying a human (female) form. It feels made for the silver screen, with Keanu starring as the 80,000 year old god/demigod/Death/unclear and has plenty of screen time dedicated to his hobbies (hunting pigs) and artfully-curated home (sleek lines, rich mahogany). A final bone to pick with the writing form—Mieville was never satisfied with one word where 2-3 SAT words would do. I kept a running list while reading and now have 45+ new vocab words to study.

If there's any redemption after all that, it's that once you muscled through the first 100-ish pages, the text moved pretty quickly from there. I read the entire thing within a 48-hour period, but I was also motivated by an impending book club to be prepared for.

I'm so sad to say that this was a miss for me, but I can't wait to hear what my book club thinks. I imagine I'll need to give my other Mieville a long rest on my shelf before I'm ready to give it a fair shot.

Thank you to Ballantine/Del Rey for the opportunity to give my honest review.

As a fan of Miéville‘s The City & The City, I was excited for another book and what I stepped into was a retelling of Highlander: The Series except there were a lot less immortals and none by losing their heads were feeding their energy into a rival, making them even stronger.

It also reminded me of the vast conspiracies involving the Timelord at the center of Doctor Who, being recorded and recognized across history; those who support the lead, B or Unute, and those who are out to take him down.

It was difficult at the beginning because I wasn’t quite sure what happened, why, and whose perspective had merit. It was like if Duncan McCloud worked for a modern special forces military group because he couldn’t die with flashbacks to prior lives like his unconscious was screaming at him in the present.

I enjoyed it and see how a sequel could go in many directions, as well as his prior lives could be throwback stories.

Thanks to NetGalley and Random House Publishing for an ARC of this book.

I usually do not give feedback books that I DNF so early on, but I was really disappointed in the portion that I did read.

The choice to use third person present was awkward. There was so much repeating of names just on one page and the POV did not fully flesh out what was happening. While I was reading it, I felt like this had to be written like that in hopes that it is picked up so out could be easily turned into a screenplay/script.

I am a huge Keanu Reeves fan. Like, HUGE. Naturally I snapped up his debut novel as soon as I could! That said, Keanu's first foray into prose fiction isn't perfect, but still a commendable effort, helped along by the literary talents of coauthor China Miéville. Die-hard Reeves fans will recognize the basic story and characters from his previous project, the comic book series "BRZRKR." This novel expands upon the backstory, motivations, and themes of "BRZRKR," painting a picture of an immortal super-assassin whose history is just as conflicted as those of his antagonists.

I liked that this tale did not make any quick judgments about who was in the right or in the wrong, and explored the complex implications of what it means to live forever, as well as humanity's conflicted relationship with life and death. Much like Reeves' own persona, the entire novel is shrouded in an air of mystery; many chapters will come across as arcane or esoteric to general readers. I found the final third of the novel somewhat confusing, like there were too many loose ends to tie up at once. Yet there are moments of brilliance as well, namely in the flashback chapters whose titles allude to episodes in "The Canterbury Tales" and that depict encounters with Unute across history. My favorite episode was "water," a chapter written entirely in the second-person that could stand on its own as a short story. Reading that chapter made me long for an annotated critical edition of this book, in which passages penned by Reeves and passages penned by Miéville are clearly marked and identified.

Even though "The Book of Elsewhere" wasn't always my cup of tea, I always enjoy following Reeves' muse with all of his creative projects and I look forward to seeing what he has in store for us in the future.

Thank you to the publisher and netgalley for the arc of this book. all opinions are my own.

This was fantastic. I really enjoyed it! I'd recommend it.

This book confused me in a way that very few books in the last few years have. It made me wonder, “Is there other required reading that I missed?” Honestly, the only book I could think of that made me feel this way was the Jessica Jones book I read earlier this summer and wrote about here. The difference is that Jessica Jones book led me to questions of continuity and how much of this book was a cash grab vs. an actual publishing initiative. This book made me wonder “do I need to read BRZRKR?” I always felt like I was just missing something during my reading of this book. It’s a very good book but the lingering “I didn’t do the assigned reading before class” feeling never went away and was a bit distracting. I liked the main character and it made me think a lot of Highlander which I’m guessing is intended. There’s also a demon pig that’s one of the wildest characters I’ve encountered this year.

Just one last note: This book is fine but I’m not sure it does China Mieville any benefits. When I think of China’s bibliography, I think his output has made him a cornerstone of the New Weird literary scene and I’m not sure this book matches that. Ultimately, I think what I need is a Jason Schreier-esque breakdown of ‘who did what in this collaboration.’ Maybe that exists already and I just didn’t find it but honestly the Keanu/China collab was almost distracting in trying to figure out where it began and ended. I liked this book but it was also a book I obviously over-thought a lot.

Wildly inventive sci-fi-horror with techno-fantasy trappings. Doesn’t treat the reader with kid gloves, but if you’re willing to take the deep dive, the rewards are fathomless. It has enough surface fun to sate our adrenaline hunger, but plenty enough roiling deep down to keep us considerate and mindful of the depths Mieville and Reeves plumb. Fantastic.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for this ARC! However I didn't finish it. It was written like a script and I just don't feel I'm the right audience.

Great collaboration between Reeves (with his action sensibilities) and Mieville (with his...weirdness). Will definitely be ordering for my library.

This felt very different from the graphic novels and I'm unsure how much is of that is the influence of Mieville and how much is the story being told in a different format. The graphic novel doesn't use the descriptions and environmental queues that a novel needs to set the tone and pace. I do think this story lends itself more to a visual medium. Regardless it had a much slower pace which allows you to really take the story in. I liked that they're were call backs to events and characters in the GN. This very much felt like an extension of an existing story.