1. Cloud Atlas

By David Mitchell

This was a book club pick and a booker prize finalist. The most interesting aspect of the novel is the structure. There is a series of 5 or 6 stories that are 'nested,' meaning that the book begins and ends with the same story and that each story except the middle (or last depending on the way one looks at it) is split down the middle. To illustrate the order:

1st story beginning
2nd story beginning
3rd story beginning
4th story beginning
5th story
4th story ending
3rd story ending
2nd story ending
1st story ending

The first story is set in the past and the stories move forward chronologically until the 5th or 6th (can't remember just how many there were) which is in the far future. Each of the stories is linked although not always in expected ways. I wonder if to some degree Mitchell was trying to illustrate the cyclical nature of time?

I highly recommend this book.