The Infinite Tides

By Christian Kiefer

Mathematical genius. Brilliant engineer. Revered astronaut. Keith Corcoran is all of these things and more, but his otherworldly talents do nothing to prepare him for the tragedy that befalls his family, or its irrevocable outcomes. After a six-month mission aboard the International Space Station, Keith returns to a house that has already ceased to be a home - emptied entirely of furniture and the people he loves. It is here that Keith tries to make sense of the ghosts, the memories and the feelings that he can barely acknowledge.

His experiences in space quickly fade into the distant past. What remain in their wake are endlessly interlocking cul-de-sacs, big box stores and enormous parking lots. Within this seemingly hopeless expanse, an eccentric man from a distant country presents an opportunity for redemption. Their unlikely friendship leads Keith to an understanding of all he has lost, and a sense of how to live under the weight of gravity.

The Infinite Tides is a captivating and comic tragedy about love, loss and resilience. An indelible and nuanced portrait of modern life as viewed through the prism of American suburbia, it tenderly illuminates the strengths and weaknesses that flow through us all.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing
• Release date: Jul 3, 2012
• ISBN: 9781408829196

Christian Kiefer

Christian Kiefer earned his PhD in American literature from the University of California, Davis, and is on the English faculty of American River College in Sacramento. He is an active poet, songwriter and recording artist, and lives in the foothills of the Sierra Nevada Mountains in Northern California with his wife and five sons.

Reviews for The Infinite Tides

[johnluiz-1 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

In this novel, Kiefer has created a moving story about a mathematical genius, Keith Corcoran, who manages to fulfill his life mission of being an astronaut. The only problem is that when his teenaged daughter dies in a car accident while he's on an international space station, and his wife leaves him, he is left to deal with the consequences of the isolation he always sought out. Keith is a fascinating character. He feels more connected to numbers - which he sees in colors and treats as if they have their own corporeal existence - than he does to people. He discovered early on that his daughter shares his gift, but when she becomes more interested in a regular life - dating boys and participating in cheerleading - he's disappointed with her.

After her death, he has to come back to earth and deal with his regret that his monomaniacal pursuit of his career goals took him away from his family for so many long stretches that he lost all connection to them . The house he moves back into - completely emptied of all furnishings when his wife left him with the request that he sell it - becomes a metaphor for just how empty and hollowed out his life has become. As sad as all this sounds, it's not a depressing book to read because Kiefer does a good job of getting inside Keith's head and showing how he perceives the world.

Be prepared when you read this, however, that there is a lot of lyrical writing, with very abstract language, that conveys Keith's mode of thinking. The first 40 pages alone are full of that language - as we get long descriptions of the best moment of Keith life's - when he's on a spacewalk outside the space station, installing a robotic arm that he, as an engineer, designed. It's moving and poetic - but it also takes a long while to get the main gist of the story - dealing with the aftermath of his daughter's death.

While I liked the novel very much, that was my one quibble with it - that it went down some tangential paths that aren't as compelling as the ones that flesh out the main premise of the book. I don't think it's fair to quarrel with how a writer chooses to fill out a story (but of course I will anyway) but in this case I was disappointed that he didn't deliver more background details about Keith's relationship with his daughter and his wife, and what his feelings might have been while he was locked up in the space station, unable to return to earth, until 3 months after his daughter died.

We get some of that, and when we do, they are the most powerful sections of the book - particularly the flashbacks of Keith discovering, when his daughter is very young, that she has inherited his mathematical genius and then later, during her teenaged years, when he tells her how disappointed he is that she close to lead the normal life of a teenager and not do more with her gift. With his wife, there is just a brief scene about how they met and then just brief and shrill phone conversations.

What we get a instead are a few, albeit very hot and sexy, scenes from the affair he starts with the neigbhor, and then many scenes about the friendship he strucks up with a Ukrainian immigrant he meets at a Starbucks who used to work at a Russian astronomical observatory, but who since coming to America has been underemployed as a stockboy at a Target.

Ultimately, that friendship becomes an important part of the story but for the early scenes when he keeps running into the Ukranian at a Starbucks and then rescues him when after he's passed out drunk there to the many scenes when they sit in an empty lot next to the astronauts' house watching the stars, it feels like a good chunk of the novel isn't living up to the premise the author set up.

While finding some of these sections a little slow and tedious, I couldn't help but compare it in my mind to another tale about the loss of a child told from the father's perspective that I read this summer. In the novel You Came Back by Christopher Coake, we start with a father who has just started to remake his life seven years after his son died, falling down stairs at home -- an event that led to the dissolution of his marriage. Just when he becomes engaged to the new woman in his life, a woman who bought his old house seeks him out to tell him his son's ghost in in the house, calling out to him. If you played the Stephen King game (suggested in his book on writing) of "What if" a character had to deal with this scenario, Coake delivers masterfully on every aspect you'd expect a man to have to deal with in that situation -- disbelief, anger, then a desperate wish to believe it's true, and then a a reconnection to his ex-wife when she hears the news.

In this novel about Keith's loss, I wanted to know so much more about his daughter, his relationship with his wife, and the three months he spent stuck up in the space station after she died, because conditions wouldn't let him return any sooner. By the end of the novel, though, the relationship with the Ukranian that didn't initially seem as consequential or relevant as any of those matters does play an important role in Keith's "re-entry" into life on earth. And admittedly, many of the details and story elements Kiefer choose to include fit with a man who lived so much in his head and had trouble connecting with people. Coming back to earth, Keith is forced to forge relationships -- he wants to do nothing but get back to work and lose himself into his career responsibilities, but NASA won't let him until it's obvious he's dealt with his grief and its main physical manifestation, severe migraines. The relationship with his Ukranian friend proves very important and in the last quarter of the book, their connection plays out in interesting ways. In the end, while I may not have been riveted to every single page, I still enjoyed the entire experience because the novel tells a powerful story about how one man deals with tragedy and begins to rebuild his life from the ashes of it.

[katieanyc · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

An astounding debut novel. Brilliant.

[rebarelishesreading · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

[The Infinite Tides] is a debut novel by [[Christian Kiefer]], a poet, slongwriter and recording artist who teaches English at American River College in Sacramento. [The Infinite Tides] is the story of Keith Corcoran, a brilliant mathematician who has spent his entire life moving toward the goal of being an astronaut. While on his first mission aboard the International Space Station his daughter dies and his wife leaves him. The bulk of the book moves between providing back-story to these events and following him as he tries to move forward in his life, dealing with the loss and coming to terms with himself. Corcoran is a compelling character and I found myself caring very much what happened to him. It's a powerful story and well worth reading.

[hcbownslibrary · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

A profound debut novel illuminating the complexity and beauty of human experience, The Infinite Tides captures heartbreaking tragedy and transforms it into growth via the protagonist, Keith Corcoran. An astronaut, husband and father whose life changes overnight, Keith learns through tribulation to become a friend (in the deepest sense of that word) and to shift his values from the surface of culture to those which are most meaningful, in a world that has wrenched away that which he previously took for granted.Subtlety, depth and refreshing intelligence are blended with humor and a most endearing hero you cannot help but love by the end of the book.A final note- this is a book you can trust with your heart. It will not leave you hopeless in the end, and many writers could learn from Kiefer to avoid "Disney" endings, while not driving their readers into brick walls of despair. I have probably never encountered such an eloquent explication of the experience of psychological, spiritual and emotional trauma, of depression and hopelessness (though William Styron's work comes to mind), of the seemingly merciless trials we can experience in the world, but I have also never beed carried to higher ground through such a fallible, and yet lovable, hero.

[auntmarge64 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

A character study of genius, grief, hitting bottom, and finding a way back.Mathematical superstar Keith Corcoran has finally reached his goal of becoming an astronaut, but while assigned to the space station he receives word that his teenaged daughter has died. He is subsequently incapacitated by the first of many crippling migraines, but for various reasons he cannot be returned to Earth for months. During that time he's unable to do most of his work while, back on Earth, his wife leaves him and removes the contents of their home, leaving it for him to sell. His return, and how he copes with his grief and forced time off, forms the story.Keith arrives home to find that his wife has, except for Keith's clothes and a couch, a bed, and a small TV, literally emptied the house. Still grieving his daughter's death, unsure if he'll ever be able to be an astronaut again, and with no confidant, he spends weeks alone, remembering and feeling guilty over his absence from his daughters life. He spends many days reading the paper at a local Starbucks, where one day he is approached by the boisterous Peter, a Ukranian immigrant who turns out to be his neighbor. Slowly they become friends, opening up about their individual pain. Peter was an un-degreed assistant astronomer at home, but here he can find work only as a stock clerk and is depressed and considering returning home. His wife, a delightful woman thoroughly in love with her husband, encourages the friendship as healthy for both men and tries to find ways to bring Keith into their family circle. As the months go by, Keith hits bottom emotionally, but then gradually turns a corner with help from Peter and family. Peter also finds a way forward that will make the move to the U.S. rewarding for him. Because it's told from the POV of an emotionally isolated man in the midst of grieving, not really able to focus on the problem, this is a slow story to develop, but I couldn't quite stop reading it, and eventually it reeled me in. Definitely recommended.

[hjvanderklis_1 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

Keith Corcoran has spent his entire life preparing to be an astronaut. NASA sends him up to the International Space Station to install and operate a new robot arm. Wow, sailing tens of meter from the Destiny Module, only his pressure suit to protect him from empty space. Stars above, Earth below. A boyhood’s dream come true. Tragedy hits: his daughter Quinn has died in a car accident and Keith cannot do anything but wait. Houston compiles a funeral DVD with speeches and the rituals, but his fatherhood fails. When it comes out, that Keith’s wife also has left their failing marriage, hell breaks loose. Back on earth Keith is alone, with memories and emotions he cannot bare alone.What will become of him, a brilliant mathematician, Astronaut? Like infinite tides Keith’s life now consists of interlocking cul-de-sacs, big box stores, enormous parking lots. His empty house is eaten by termites and can hardly be sold. And yes, there’s hope: flirts with neighbour Jennifer, and a Ukranian friend Peter. Living under gravity’s powers is heavy, but we all have to face it everyday. Keith suffers from migraines and will not return to space ever. Even astronauts come back to life on Earth. The two of them hang out drinking beer, smoking weed and peering at distant galaxies through a telescope. A visit to the beach, and experience the tides come and go finish this novel. Both Peter and Keith are not happy in the here and now. But it’s only today that counts.The Infinite Tides is both a powerful concept, but the continuous repetitions of mini-themes often distracted me. The actual space trip is only a small portion of the book. I’d like to read more on the preparations and relate more to the main characters.About the authorChristian Kiefer earned his Ph.D. in American literature from the University of California, Davis, and is on the English faculty of American River College in Sacramento. His poetry has appeared in various national journals including the Antioch Review and Santa Monica Review. He is also an accomplished songwriter and recording artist. He lives in the hill country north of Sacramento with his wife and five sons.

[karieh_2 · Rating: 3 out of 5 stars]

The premise of “The Infinite Tides” seemed too awful, too heartbreakingly coincidental to bear. The idea that a man, at the moment his lifelong dream came true, would lose his only child, and after the fact, his wife, seemed an idea almost too big to write about.That turned out not to be true. The main character, Keith, is so mechanical, so incredibly hard to relate to, that by the middle of the book, I’d lost all sympathy for him. The author does a good job laying out exactly how Keith’s mind works (think zeroes and ones, parabolas and straight lines) – and yet Keith is so far removed from nearly all human emotion that it feels almost like a waste of time and energy to try and connect with this person that seems more like a machine.“It had been just at the moment of his greatness. Of course it had. Were the intersection of vectors to coincide with some other moment, some other instant that was here and then past, would anything have changed?”The distantness of Keith’s thoughts about the moment of his daughter’s death fits perfectly with his location at the time of the event – but the reader never gets any closer to him than that. Every time he thinks about his daughter or his wife – or the fact that he’s lost them both – his thoughts are so analytical that it is as if he is examining his life under a glass slide. Which is fine, I suppose, but it does present difficulty for any reader who wants to connect with the character.At some times, Keith seems close to a recognizable emotion…but it then dissolves into facts/equations/solutions. “He did not clearly know where he had been when she had careened into the oak tree in his car. In orbit, somewhere, above Earth. He had occupied some stretch of fluid miles, but what did such a location mean? He had been on the surface during most of her cheerleading activities and had failed to attend a single event. Perhaps that was the true calculus, here as everywhere: the calculus of location and the understanding that the numbers themselves were possessed of a fundamental gravity comprised not of fluid motion but of fixedness.”The other characters in the book were a bit more human and the description of the sameness of suburban life were interesting, but overall, what seemed like the perfect setup for a touching and emotional novel turned into more of a math textbook instead.