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Kings of Infinite Space
Paul Trilby is having a bad day. If he were to be honest with himself, Paul Trilby would have to admit that he's having a bad life. His wife left him. Three subsequent girlfriends left him. He's fallen from a top-notch university teaching job, to a textbook publisher, to, eventually, working as a temp writer for the Texas Department of General Services. And even here, in this land of carpeted partitions and cheap lighting fixtures, Paul cannot escape the curse his life has become. For it is not until he begins a tentative romance with the office's sassy mail girl that he begins to notice things are truly wrong. Strange sounds come from the air conditioning vents, the ceiling bulges, a body disappears. Mysterious men lurk about town, wearing thick glasses and pocket protectors...
Kings of Infinite Space is a hilarious and horrifying spoof on our everyday lives and gives true voice to the old adage, Work is Hell.
Kings of Infinite Space is a hilarious and horrifying spoof on our everyday lives and gives true voice to the old adage, Work is Hell.
352 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 2004
24 people are currently reading
466 people want to read
About the author
James Hynes
33 books142 followersJames Hynes’ essays and book reviews have appeared in the New York Times, the Washington Post, Boston Review, and Salon.
A native of Michigan, he attended the University of Michigan and the Iowa Writers' Workshop. He has taught fiction writing at the University of Iowa, the University of Michigan, Miami University, Grinnell College, and the University of Texas. He lives in Austin, Texas.
A native of Michigan, he attended the University of Michigan and the Iowa Writers' Workshop. He has taught fiction writing at the University of Iowa, the University of Michigan, Miami University, Grinnell College, and the University of Texas. He lives in Austin, Texas.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 120 reviews
August 4, 2016
I'm horrible, but I'm bailing out. First page... first sentence and it reads like a high school sophomore creative writing project. I'm a snot, an elitist, but I cringed.
"One brutally hot summer's morning, Paul Trilby--ex-husband, temp typist, cat-murderer--slouched sweating in his t-shirt on his way to work, waiting behind the wheel of his car for the longest red light in central Texas."
Ouch. I would have maybe been hooked on the cat murderer part, but the rest of it.. wow.
His fourteen-year-old Dodge Colt rattled in place in the middle of the Travis Street Bridge, hemmed in on all sides by bulbous, purring pickup trucks and gleaming sport utility vehicles with fat, black tires. The electric blues and greens of these enormous automobiles reflected the dazzling morning glare through Paul's cracked and dirty windshield; they radiated shimmering heat through his open window."
I'm sorry Mr. Hynes, this may be a great book and funny as all heck like the back cover says, but you've lost me. Maybe it's for the best.
"One brutally hot summer's morning, Paul Trilby--ex-husband, temp typist, cat-murderer--slouched sweating in his t-shirt on his way to work, waiting behind the wheel of his car for the longest red light in central Texas."
Ouch. I would have maybe been hooked on the cat murderer part, but the rest of it.. wow.
His fourteen-year-old Dodge Colt rattled in place in the middle of the Travis Street Bridge, hemmed in on all sides by bulbous, purring pickup trucks and gleaming sport utility vehicles with fat, black tires. The electric blues and greens of these enormous automobiles reflected the dazzling morning glare through Paul's cracked and dirty windshield; they radiated shimmering heat through his open window."
I'm sorry Mr. Hynes, this may be a great book and funny as all heck like the back cover says, but you've lost me. Maybe it's for the best.
July 14, 2014
I'm just too insecure for a book about a depressed temp right now
March 9, 2010
This went from dull to ludicrous with only a brief stopover at interesting. The ridiculous finale, complete with a battle of office supplies and a deus ex machina in the form of a ghost cat, was the last straw.
August 25, 2024
Hynes does things nobody else does, and some folks might have some problems with that. But he mixes the high and low easily and with wit, and in a unique way. This might not be his best book, but it is still better than most other satires around:
Here's a little thing I wrote back in the day:
James Hynes's two previous books, Publish and Perish: Three Tales of Tenure and Terror and The Lecturer's Tale, both received a good deal of national attention for their blend of biting academic satire and sometimes chilling horror. Of all the writers looking, sometimes desperately, for new ways to tell stories, Hynes is one of the most successful. He has combined highbrow literary influences with wonderful popular ones like Buffy the Vampire Slayer in a way that is both very funny and genuinely weird. In his brand-new novel, Kings of Infinite Space, Hynes has broadened the object of his satire: it's in the workaday world of a government bureaucracy, in this case the Texas Department of General Services (TxDOGS, for short), an office . . . housed in a wide, low-ceilinged, underlit room in the shape of a hollow square. In the center of the square was a courtyard where a sun-blasted redwood deck surrounded an old live oak, which was fighting a losing battle with oak wilt. The offices along the outer walls, with views of the parking lot and the river, were taken by senior managers. Middle managers had offices along the inner wall with a view of the dying oak tree, and everybody else occupied the honeycomb of cubicles in between, where nearly every vertical surface was grown over as if by moss with stubbly gray fabric.
Paul Trilby, Hynes's protagonist, is an ex-academic who began his fall in an earlier Hynes novel. Now he has reached bottom, barely able to afford no-brand hot dogs on his salary as a temp typist at TxDOGS. He reads H. G. Wells novels on his morning breaks and falls asleep in the bathroom. And, in a wonderful Hynesian move, he is haunted by the ghost of his ex-wife's cat, a beast he murdered.
He is not long at the office before he begins to notice strange things: coworkers who never work but who always have their work finished, odd pale-skinned men wearing ties and pocket protectors who appear at unexpected moments. This may sound like an extension of his academic satires, but Hynes doesn't stop there. In one of the earlier books, his character sold his soul for tenure. In Kings of Infinite Space, Paul Trilby makes a different choice. The humor is still there — people really do laugh out loud when reading Hynes novels — but this time there is also a vague glimmer of nobility. Paul Trilby even falls in love, allowing this book to be funny, frightening, smart, and sexy! It is absolutely unlike anything you have ever read.
https://annarborobserver.com/articles...
Here's a little thing I wrote back in the day:
James Hynes's two previous books, Publish and Perish: Three Tales of Tenure and Terror and The Lecturer's Tale, both received a good deal of national attention for their blend of biting academic satire and sometimes chilling horror. Of all the writers looking, sometimes desperately, for new ways to tell stories, Hynes is one of the most successful. He has combined highbrow literary influences with wonderful popular ones like Buffy the Vampire Slayer in a way that is both very funny and genuinely weird. In his brand-new novel, Kings of Infinite Space, Hynes has broadened the object of his satire: it's in the workaday world of a government bureaucracy, in this case the Texas Department of General Services (TxDOGS, for short), an office . . . housed in a wide, low-ceilinged, underlit room in the shape of a hollow square. In the center of the square was a courtyard where a sun-blasted redwood deck surrounded an old live oak, which was fighting a losing battle with oak wilt. The offices along the outer walls, with views of the parking lot and the river, were taken by senior managers. Middle managers had offices along the inner wall with a view of the dying oak tree, and everybody else occupied the honeycomb of cubicles in between, where nearly every vertical surface was grown over as if by moss with stubbly gray fabric.
Paul Trilby, Hynes's protagonist, is an ex-academic who began his fall in an earlier Hynes novel. Now he has reached bottom, barely able to afford no-brand hot dogs on his salary as a temp typist at TxDOGS. He reads H. G. Wells novels on his morning breaks and falls asleep in the bathroom. And, in a wonderful Hynesian move, he is haunted by the ghost of his ex-wife's cat, a beast he murdered.
He is not long at the office before he begins to notice strange things: coworkers who never work but who always have their work finished, odd pale-skinned men wearing ties and pocket protectors who appear at unexpected moments. This may sound like an extension of his academic satires, but Hynes doesn't stop there. In one of the earlier books, his character sold his soul for tenure. In Kings of Infinite Space, Paul Trilby makes a different choice. The humor is still there — people really do laugh out loud when reading Hynes novels — but this time there is also a vague glimmer of nobility. Paul Trilby even falls in love, allowing this book to be funny, frightening, smart, and sexy! It is absolutely unlike anything you have ever read.
https://annarborobserver.com/articles...
December 8, 2015
I'm not sure how to classify this book. It sort of goes off the rails in about the third chapter and we never get back to conventional travel again. The book reminded me of the office space movie with many of the office cliches about cubicle life ensue, but you get a few clues that it isn't all about cubicles.
As for the rest of the book, it's hard to talk about without spoilers. All I can say is that without ever taking you far from the rows of cubicles, Hynes takes you far from the realm of ordinary fiction. The book is funny, the adventures within are curious and unexpected and I very much like to be surprised in a novel... which happened in this one at least a dozen or so times. A very fun read.
As for the rest of the book, it's hard to talk about without spoilers. All I can say is that without ever taking you far from the rows of cubicles, Hynes takes you far from the realm of ordinary fiction. The book is funny, the adventures within are curious and unexpected and I very much like to be surprised in a novel... which happened in this one at least a dozen or so times. A very fun read.
December 20, 2017
DNF. A little witty: "Mr. Egg. Herr Egg. Monsieur Egg. Señor Egg." But unsympathetic protagonist and a lot of nonsense.
If this is supposed to be a satire of academia, I would recommend instead:
If this is supposed to be a satire of academia, I would recommend instead:
May 2, 2011
I won this book in a contest and didn't know anything about it prior to sitting down with it. It purports to be a brilliant satire of office and academic life, but I found it wanting in both brilliance and satire. The writing style is pretentious, with flagrant use of "big words" and literary allusions that seem tacked on rather than natural, like the author is trying to say, "Look at me, I can use big words and make literary allusions that you probably won't understand, because I am smarter than you!" Furthermore, the supernatural plot (man is haunted by a ghost cat, office is haunted by unseen minions who will do all of your work for you - at a cost) is weak, unconvincing, and ultimately fails to explain itself sufficiently. This would be a fun little book if not for the heavyhanded insertion of big words and literary allusion, but those grated on me enough to take away most of the fluffy enjoyment the book otherwise might have had.
July 22, 2023
Read this for TexLit! This is the first horror/thriller book I’ve read and I wasn’t sure what to expect, but I couldn’t have expected this very odd and off putting story! I truly hated all but 2 of the characters and one of those characters was a ghost cat lol. One star is for the successful spookiness & one for the cat!
May 28, 2008
This starts out pretty entertaining and rapidly goes straight into idiotic. Kind of a shame - I enjoyed the first 50 pages or so, but it moves from clever to wacky at such a breakneck speed that I found myself wondering if I'd mistakenly picked up a different book.
December 17, 2021
Somewhat of a sequel to the first and third novellas in Publish or Perish, so better to read that excellent book first.
February 8, 2008
I saw Nancy Pearl speak last year, and this was one of the books she recommended. I was expecting more, and ended up skimming the end... I liked the beginning best -- an ex-English professor has travelled in his own personal downward spiral to land in a government job in Texas. The descriptions of his office, his coworkers, his downfall, etc. are all very funny, and delivered in that pretentious English professor voice. It's super surreal, which I like, but, in the end... eh, it just didn't hold my interest.
July 4, 2007
My enjoyment of this book was probably bolstered by two facts: the author used to work at a company I used to work at, and he also used to work at a place just like the place my spouse currently works at. Furthermore, someone who knows him recommended it to me. So I felt like a bit of an insider while reading this book all about insiders.... The story is a sometimes-adolescent, sometimes-hilarious explanation of office culture for those of us who maybe don't exactly fit in there. Really funny.
December 23, 2014
This is a really fun read: a combination of horror with the office novel and a smattering of academia. The ending felt a bit laboured to me, though. I think I would have liked it if Hynes had tried to do something more interesting in commenting on office life and its true horrors rather than just keeping to the entertainment side of things, which for me made it less entertaining and just kind of tediously conventional towards the end.
October 6, 2015
A story that manages to be both funny and creepy, bolstered in the audiobook by a fantastic narration by Adam Grupper!
August 5, 2025
Player Piano meets H.G. Wells at a state agency.
I typically read about five to eight books at the same time. I try to keep them separate by keeping them in different genres so the story lines don’t blur. With this batch I was reading Kings of Infinite Space alongside Player Piano by Vonnegut. In that, my strategy failed miserably. Right off the bat, as it happens, both stories had very similar protagonists, with each having the same name, Paul, and both of them had earned PhDs. Both were stuck in jobs that were less than satisfying, in companies they both hated.
The Paul of the current novel was employed at the Texas Department of General Services as a temporary, working as a technical writer. He falls in with a motley crew of managers and other staff who never seem to do any work. Paul is oppressed and depressed, but the secret society has brought him into the fold to share their secret. This is not too dissimilar to what happens to the Player Piano Paul. The themes of both are also surprisingly similar. Man against machine, the dehumanizing aspect of meaningless work, and the inevitable rebellion. Eventually, however, Infinite Space changes course in a spectacularly improbable and unsatisfying way. Neither book is very good, but of the two, Infinite Space is the hands down winner of the Bulyer Litton Award for terrible fiction.
I typically read about five to eight books at the same time. I try to keep them separate by keeping them in different genres so the story lines don’t blur. With this batch I was reading Kings of Infinite Space alongside Player Piano by Vonnegut. In that, my strategy failed miserably. Right off the bat, as it happens, both stories had very similar protagonists, with each having the same name, Paul, and both of them had earned PhDs. Both were stuck in jobs that were less than satisfying, in companies they both hated.
The Paul of the current novel was employed at the Texas Department of General Services as a temporary, working as a technical writer. He falls in with a motley crew of managers and other staff who never seem to do any work. Paul is oppressed and depressed, but the secret society has brought him into the fold to share their secret. This is not too dissimilar to what happens to the Player Piano Paul. The themes of both are also surprisingly similar. Man against machine, the dehumanizing aspect of meaningless work, and the inevitable rebellion. Eventually, however, Infinite Space changes course in a spectacularly improbable and unsatisfying way. Neither book is very good, but of the two, Infinite Space is the hands down winner of the Bulyer Litton Award for terrible fiction.
February 23, 2023
Paul Trilby hat einen schlechten Tag. Genauso wie der Tag gestern, der Tag davor und wahrscheinlich auch der morgige Tag. Er kommt bei der Arbeit nicht voran, er wohnt in einer schäbigen Wohnung im schäbigsten Viertel der Stadt und seine einzige Mitbewohnerin ist eine Katze, die er schon vor einiger Zeit ertränkt hat. Kann es noch schlimmer kommen?
Pauls Geschichte fängt ganz normal an. Sicher, die Kollegen wirken alle ein bisschen überzogen, aber sonst ist es die Geschichte eines Verlierers, der sich aus eigener Schuld auf einer Abwärtsspirale befindet. Aber langsam scheinen sich die Dinge zum Besseren zu wenden. Genauso langsam wird die Geschichte immer seltsamer. Anfangs könnten die Ereignisse noch eine logische Erklärung haben, aber irgendwann wurde deutlich, dass es nicht nur die Geschichte eines spießigen Büroalltags war. Skurriles in einer scheinbar normalen Geschichte verpackt, damit bin ich über weite Strecken nicht klar gekommen. Das Ende hat mir wieder besser gefallen, aber der durchschnittliche Eindruck überwiegt.
Pauls Geschichte fängt ganz normal an. Sicher, die Kollegen wirken alle ein bisschen überzogen, aber sonst ist es die Geschichte eines Verlierers, der sich aus eigener Schuld auf einer Abwärtsspirale befindet. Aber langsam scheinen sich die Dinge zum Besseren zu wenden. Genauso langsam wird die Geschichte immer seltsamer. Anfangs könnten die Ereignisse noch eine logische Erklärung haben, aber irgendwann wurde deutlich, dass es nicht nur die Geschichte eines spießigen Büroalltags war. Skurriles in einer scheinbar normalen Geschichte verpackt, damit bin ich über weite Strecken nicht klar gekommen. Das Ende hat mir wieder besser gefallen, aber der durchschnittliche Eindruck überwiegt.
February 9, 2018
It’s a strange amalgam of comedy, science fiction, fantasy and satire (of office workers, the bureaucracy, male power games and whatever moving target hoves into the author’s field of vision at any given time). I enjoy this author for his quirky humour, intelligence, wit and frequent flashes of brilliant writing and so despite the weirdness of the plot, I kept reading.
The protagonist is a man (a reincarnated character from “Publish and Perish”) hurtling his way to the bottom, career-wise and in every other way solely through his own very bad behaviour and one can’t help hoping that he gets there sooner rather than later (please no sequels!).
Allegories are scattered through the book although the breadcrumb trail is a bit hard to follow for those who haven’t read H.G. Wells or Henrik Ibsen (“The Island of Doctor Moreau”, “The Time Machine” and “Peer Gynt”).
The protagonist is a man (a reincarnated character from “Publish and Perish”) hurtling his way to the bottom, career-wise and in every other way solely through his own very bad behaviour and one can’t help hoping that he gets there sooner rather than later (please no sequels!).
Allegories are scattered through the book although the breadcrumb trail is a bit hard to follow for those who haven’t read H.G. Wells or Henrik Ibsen (“The Island of Doctor Moreau”, “The Time Machine” and “Peer Gynt”).
January 13, 2021
I liked The Lecturer's Tale and Publish and Perish: Three Tales of Tenure and Terror, but this book was cringe-o-genic for me. Also, I'm concerned that this novel violates the strict legal limit on the number of times you can use the word "lubricious" in a single book. Or possibly career.
November 4, 2021
This book is a bit like a lava cake - it starts off looking predictably good like all chocolate cakes do. It's easy to eat, and meets expectations in the way a better than average employee does on their annual review. BUT, then you strike pay dirt; and the Clampet's desert plate is gushing with a dam break of comfortably disorienting anti-pancreatic heterogeneity. These two things, each very good on their own, combine into something marginally better - but altogether different. It's the novelty that's additive. Originality boosts this book from par, to better than average amongst tough competition. It would get a couple of seasons on Netflix.
December 10, 2017
Good ending and glad it's over.
Don't get me wrong I like the book. It just moves at slow pace. 90% office hell (the boredom part) 10% awesome spooky mystery and horror. The 10% is really good and the ending is fantastic. I watch James Hynes teach writing on The Great Courses, which is how I found this book. I definitely recommend it, but its definitely slow with just enough suspense to keep you turning the pages.
Don't get me wrong I like the book. It just moves at slow pace. 90% office hell (the boredom part) 10% awesome spooky mystery and horror. The 10% is really good and the ending is fantastic. I watch James Hynes teach writing on The Great Courses, which is how I found this book. I definitely recommend it, but its definitely slow with just enough suspense to keep you turning the pages.
July 19, 2025
Tricky one to rate. On the one hand - I really couldn't put it down. I liked some of the characters, though others come across as one-note.
The main character is very unlikable, both in how he got to this point in life and in his reactions to the things going on around him. The various sex scenes read like a teenage boy's fantasy and add nothing to the story.
And the resolution to the story seemed rather convenient.
And yet...I was entertained.
The main character is very unlikable, both in how he got to this point in life and in his reactions to the things going on around him. The various sex scenes read like a teenage boy's fantasy and add nothing to the story.
And the resolution to the story seemed rather convenient.
And yet...I was entertained.
October 2, 2022
It's been a long time since I've read a book with as strange a plot line as this one. But I was able to identify with the protagonist, at least as far as what he HAD gone through, if not what he was GOING through [a plus for me]. And It did keep me reading up to the end. I'd consider reading it again some day if I didnt have a thousand other books waiting for me to read for the first time.
July 3, 2025
Talk about random! A former English professor has bottomed out and has taken a temporary position at the Texas department of documents as a tech writer. He suffers through all the ignominy one can get in cubicle land. His colleagues are janky and suspicious. They lure him into a cabal. Oh yeah, he even sees a dead cat which he had killed. Mondo Bizarre!
September 15, 2017
The author has a keen, clever wit that infuses his characters and fictional ambience with life. His acute prose keeps this book alive despite the strange plot turns. He has an uncanny ability to draw interest to the most otherwise boring protagonist.
March 4, 2019
Bizzarre and creepy. I wouldnt say its funny but I have to say there is some really great dialogue and the story builds into the horror well. Definitely worth a read if you want something to mess with your head for a bit.
January 9, 2022
3.5 stars rounded down to 3. After a slow start it flows along pretty well … until the last 50 pages when it takes the dumbest turn and can’t go back. At least it was entertaining for 75ish percent of it!
May 16, 2017
Twisted, warped, and brilliantly funny
January 5, 2018
The Office meets iT and funny till the very last line to boot.
April 13, 2019
This was not my book. It's described as hilarious, but it wasn't. About half-way through, I became curious to see how it would end, but there was some skimming along the way.
January 1, 2020
Sad and not funny or even amusing.
Displaying 1 - 30 of 120 reviews