In Austin Taylor’s ambitious geek-chic novel, Zoe and Jack are Harvard students in love, a union “looped around them ... tightening, lacing them together”. What’s more, they have conceived an anti-ageing theory that gets old cells to revert to their original DNA blueprint; in short, a potential key to eternal youth. Like Bill Gates, they drop out and found a start-up.
Structured like a DNA helix, Infinity follows two strands – Zoe’s and Jack’s – moving in opposing directions but entwined. We begin with Zoe until an inevitable shattering revelation, then restart with Jack to pinpoint the original flaw.
Much relies on familiar tropes, like its classic Cambridge backdrop, which hasn’t changed much since Zuckerberg – students still listen to Radiohead and debate the universe. There’s a hint of the Stanford biomedical scandal Theranos, and Easter eggs (an Emily Dickinson poem, a character named Anna Lee) for fans of the Harvard start-up novel Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow.
Broad strokes convey worlds of backstory and baggage, because we’ve encountered these characters before. Jack’s a scholarship kid with a drug-addict mother; Zoe’s a daughter of an MIT physicist and a southern belle. Despite, or because of its predictability, there are unexpected moments of devastation, like an episode when Jack overhears his privileged friend make him the subject of a bet.
Many novels seem written these days with a future adaptation in mind. Infinity is no exception, so streamlined it’s practically a screenplay. Still, the author’s words can have a raw punch. “[Jack] felt the fear and anger and embarrassment ... come slouching back. Not even taking turns with him any more: all sitting together in his belly, having drinks and making jokes at his expense.”
However, I was most captivated by the beauty of Zoe and Jack’s theory, which Taylor – herself a recent Harvard chemistry graduate – supports with scientific papers in the appendix, and the construction of her tale as the two narratives interlock and unravel.
According to a 2010 paper in Nature Nanoscience, “When a theory or a model explains a phenomenon clearly, directly and economically, we say it is elegant.”
“Elegant” – a word employed by the novel to describe experiments – is one of science’s favourite adjectives. With a simple formula and two people in love, Notes Toward Infinity seeks to shed some clarity on the untidy business that is existing.
