Sum: Forty Tales From The Afterlives by David Eagleman - Fiction - Paperback

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Details. Condition: New. Format: Paperback. ISBN: 9781847674272. Publisher: Canongate Books. Overview. Sum: Forty Tales from the Afterlives is a dazzlingly inventive collection of short fiction from neuroscientist and bestselling author David Eagleman. In just over a hundred pages, Eagleman imagines forty entirely different versions of what might await us after death, each a miniature parable exploring identity, memory, morality and the strange nature of being human. Playful, unsettling and endlessly inventive, this slim paperback has become a modern classic of speculative short fiction.. About the Book. What happens to us when we die? David Eagleman doesn't offer a single answer — he offers forty. In one afterlife, God turns out to be the size of a microbe, entirely unaware of your existence. In another, you are split into every age you've ever been, living simultaneously as your five-year-old and eighty-year-old self. Elsewhere, the afterlife is populated only by the people you actually remembered while alive, meaning some souls are crowded with company and others are nearly alone. Some tales are rebuilt from your credit-card records; others force you to live alongside every version of yourself that you might have become. Each vignette is short — most just two or three pages — yet lands with the precision of a fable, using the afterlife as a lens to examine free will, consciousness, love, regret and what it means to be alive. Eagleman's background as a neuroscientist gives the collection an unusual rigour beneath its whimsy. The result is a book that can be read cover to cover in an evening or dipped into one tale at a time, each visit rewarding readers with a new angle on mortality and meaning.. Forty distinct, bite-sized tales — ideal for short reading sessions or discussion. Blends neuroscience-informed ideas with genuinely imaginative storytelling. Written by an internationally bestselling scientist-author. Perfect for philosophy lovers, book clubs, and fans o