The Secret Knowledge

Crumey (Mobius Dick) takes on the complex and thorny subjects of parallel universes, Schrödinger’s cat, and the plight of philosopher Walter Benjamin in this intelligent work of speculative fiction. The narrative pivots back and forth among various times and locales, including the present day; Paris in 1913, home of rising composer Pierre Klauer and his fiancé, Yvette; Scotland in 1919; and Spain in 1940. When Pierre is shot and apparently killed, Yvette honors his last wish and, with the help of a stranger, Louis Carreau, reclaims his unpublished score from his parents’ house. Pierre then appears to resurface in Scotland several years later as a factory worker. Whether he lived or died—or both—is the question, as modern-day pianist David Conroy, his career on the wane, ponders if a rediscovered Klauer score might be the answer to all his problems. Though the chapters featuring Pierre and his milieu read like heavy-handed melodrama, the philosophical questions the book raises are clever and insightful. (Mar.)