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Out of the Sun

Out of the Sun

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Harry Barnett is shocked to learn that he has a son - David Venning, a brilliant mathematician, now languishing in hospital in a diabetic coma. And this is only the first and smallest of the mysteries he is about to encounter.

David's condition is attributed to an accident or suicide attempt. But Harry discovers that his mathematical notebooks are missing from the hotel room where he was found and two other scientists employed by the same American forecasting institute have died in suspicious circumstances. Driven on by the slim hope of saving the son he never knew he had, Harry goes in search of the truth and finds himself entangled in several different kinds of conspiracy - none of which he ought to stand the slightest chance of defeating.

They say truth is stranger than fiction, but, according to physicists, reality is even stranger than truth.

To make sense of the mathematics of the world you, me and everyone else inhabit, the small, brave band of those who actually understand these things has had to acknowledge the probable existence of dimensions beyond the four we generally experience (length, breadth, depth, time). That’s hard enough to grapple with just for starters. What would a fifth dimension actually be? (The experts’ best guess is that it’s something like … well, guesswork.) But what about a sixth, seventh or eighth? Those same experts tell us we need to imagine a ten-dimensional universe. The mind truly boggles.

Then there are the parallel universes quantum theory increasingly points to. An infinite number of them, in fact (or theory), in which every possible alternative to every action we ever take is played out.

I try to remember that whenever I go to the dentist. Yes, somewhere out there in the multiverse, there’s a me that took better care of his teeth as a child. Of course, that means he missed out on all those good plot ideas I got from leafing through Reader’s Digest in the dentist’s waiting room, but the lesson of quantum theory is that you can’t have everything - at least not all at once.

Science moves fast, but not that fast, at any rate when it comes to the really big questions. The experts are no closer to agreeing on the grand theory of everything than they were back in 1996, when Out of the Sun was first published. I’d decided I wanted to tackle some of those big questions through the medium of a mystery thriller, because to me the science of them is certainly both mysterious and thrilling.

I needed – the reader needed – a down-to-earth, reliable, ordinary man in the street for company on this voyage into the unknown and unimaginable. Step forward Harry Barnett, flawed and dishevelled hero of my earlier novel, Into the Blue. I’d always sensed there was a story lurking behind a brief reference in Harry’s first adventure to an unfortunate incident involving a Danish tourist at the bar where he worked on Rhodes. That grew into the plot of Out of the Sun, providing answers to two surprisingly related questions: what happened to Harry after Into the Blue and what are higher dimensions? You’ll have fun finding out, though it’s true to say Harry didn’t.  Well, not most of the time, anyway.

'Undoubtedly Goddard's most entertaining book to date'

The Times

'Brilliantly plotted, full of twists, neat characterisation…this is a thriller full of good, traditional storytelling values'

Mail on Sunday