String Theories - excerpt from 2011 Amazon Breakthrough Novel Award Entry

by Ned White

STRING THEORIES recounts the adventures of a brilliant quantum theorist afflicted with severe amnesia and a young woman he has apparently met by chance, as they seek the truth of their connections to each other -- and of their own origins. Set in present day New Mexico and the Great Plains, the story unfolds as a cat's cradle of causation and coincidence, physics and faith, the esoteric and the mundane framed within a larger story exploring the mystery of their love itself. Reese Archuleta, in his late 30s, spearheads a Los Alamos-based group working on string theory, a branch of quantum physics that configures bits of matter and energy as tiny vibrating strings. He has been at the Labs since age twenty-three, when his comatose body (with nearly total loss of memory) was discovered in an arroyo inside the heavily guarded compound. Dahlia "Sage" Stipes, 30, is self-described "trailer trash" from Kansas, a budding Buddhist, and now a fugitive from the law -- after shooting her abusive husband in the ass -- at a gas station in the Oklahoma panhandle. Reese's intense attraction to her baffles him; but far more bewildering is Sage's unique ability to witness, nay, share, his occasional "split reality" experiences that he calls "Schrodingers." Things happen, time seems to rewind a few seconds, and then they don't happen. Bound together in inexplicable ways, they pursue a growing accumulation of clues to their existence - scattered throughout the wildly quirky cultural and physical landscape of northern New Mexico, peopled with characters good, bad, and bizarre, at least one of whom holds the key to Reese's forgotten past. This is an ode to physics, Taoism, the magic of New Mexico - and the power of love that sends them hurtling to a conclusion of astonishing revelation.

17 pages, Kindle Edition

First published March 22, 2011

About the author

I've been writing steadily since college - novels, stories, plays, poetry, and teleplays (including several programs for PBS, HBO, and local TV). I also construct crossword puzzles for the New York Times, Los Angeles Times, and other publications.

My first novel, THE VERY BAD THING, was published by Viking Penguin, sold modestly, earned some good reviews. Since then I've had several fine agencies representing new work, but ultimately (spring 2009) I chose to self publish three novels I've written over the last several years.

CALLING OUT YOUR NAME is an adventure story for young adults, set largely in the Deep South in the recent past: a rural Georgia teenager sets off on an improbable journey to find his developmentally disabled younger brother, who's apparently run away.

PLACE is adult literary fiction... about a woman who disappears, quite literally.

STRING THEORIES, to be republished in March 2016, is also adult literary fiction - a "physics love story" and adventuresome romp set in New Mexico.

BILLY BUCK is harder to described. Take a look at t.

All are available on Kindle, Amazon, and from me via ayPal (free shipping).