Rating: 
Summary: delightful speculative fiction
Review: He is an obsessed scientist focusing on one goal, to prove that the mind and personality is unique using the scientific method. Jonathan accepts a position at the university of Michigan because they have the equipment he needs to map brain activity and photograph minds. He is so enthusiastic about his quest that he has most of the students and faculty volunteering to be research subjects.At a conference where he tries to the sell the concept that all people do not think alike due to personality differences he meets and falls in love with Alynn Reed. They move in together and between his love life and research, he is a very happy man. An anomoly appears in his research showing two identical brain matrixes, that of a five-year-old boy and of a deceased senior citizen who died just before the child was born. Alynn suggests it is the same mind in two different bodies and that proves reincarnation is a reality. When Alynn is murdered, a grief stricken Jonathan tries to prove that Alynn's belief system is correct despite the humiliation he receives at the hands of his colleagues and the suspicions of the police who consider him a suspect in his lover's death. Michael Kube-McDowell tackles some very tough questions that have haunted mankind down through the centuries. The protagonist is stuck on one paradigm until the evidence takes him in another direction, a journey where the data embraces a different scientific theory scorned by his peers. VECTORS is good work of speculative fiction, filled with wonder and hope. Harriet Klausner
Rating:
Summary: delightful speculative fiction
Review: He is an obsessed scientist focusing on one goal, to prove that the mind and personality is unique using the scientific method. Jonathan accepts a position at the university of Michigan because they have the equipment he needs to map brain activity and photograph minds. He is so enthusiastic about his quest that he has most of the students and faculty volunteering to be research subjects. At a conference where he tries to the sell the concept that all people do not think alike due to personality differences he meets and falls in love with Alynn Reed. They move in together and between his love life and research, he is a very happy man. An anomoly appears in his research showing two identical brain matrixes, that of a five-year-old boy and of a deceased senior citizen who died just before the child was born. Alynn suggests it is the same mind in two different bodies and that proves reincarnation is a reality. When Alynn is murdered, a grief stricken Jonathan tries to prove that Alynn's belief system is correct despite the humiliation he receives at the hands of his colleagues and the suspicions of the police who consider him a suspect in his lover's death. Michael Kube-McDowell tackles some very tough questions that have haunted mankind down through the centuries. The protagonist is stuck on one paradigm until the evidence takes him in another direction, a journey where the data embraces a different scientific theory scorned by his peers. VECTORS is good work of speculative fiction, filled with wonder and hope. Harriet Klausner
Rating:
Summary: Mike's best yet
Review: I am perhaps not the most objective of sources, as Mike is an old friend of mine. We met our first day of college at Michigan State University (mumble mumble) years ago and have been close friends ever since. However, what I lack in objectivity, perhaps I can make up for with scope. I've read pretty much every piece of fiction Mike has ever published, a few that he hasn't published, and some of his non-fiction as well. The story is well enough described in the cover blurb and other materials, so I won't go into that. All of Mike's books and stories are good, but this is the best yet. In it he combines all his numerous strengths as a writer and human being. Mike has always been able to make the science part of science fiction intelligible to non-science types like me, without talking down, and he weaves the needed explication into the narrative far more seamlessly than most. He was an unusually thoughtful and inquisitive college freshman, and has become an unusually thoughtful and inquisitive mature writer. Without simply falling into credulity, he manages to make the topic of reincarnation, if not yet scientifically respectable, then worthy of cautious inquiry. More than in most "hard" SF, his characters are fully human and fleshed out, warts and all. The all-too-common "tell the readers what they need to know about quantum mechanics for the story to work, why don't you" kind of dialog is replaced with real conversation between believable human beings. Humor and tragedy interweave in the lives of his characters, just as they do in real life. I could effuse a lot more, but you get the point. Do yourself a favor and buy this book. Do some of your friends a favor, and buy them copies, too.
Rating: 
Summary: Save your money
Review: I bought this book based on someone's recommendation and the positive reviews here. I was intrigued because of my interest in the subject of reincarnation. I have yet to come across a good piece of fiction on the subject... this book certainly isn't what I was looking for! Grammatical errors, inconsistencies in the text (such as the spelling of the cat's name), and a general aura of disbelief on the part of nearly every character in the book made this a tiring read. No conclusions were drawn by the end, and the author's handling of the ending was dismal. I can think of a bunch of things that would have made this book more interesting and easier to read. Unfortunately, the author didn't. Save your money.
Rating:
Summary: Makes You Sit Up and Pay Attention
Review: I have done something that I never do. I have ordered three copies of this book. One is a Yule gift for friend. The second I'm keeping to read over again. The third I'm tucking away for when my first copy falls apart. It takes amazing courage for a respected SF author of Kube-McDowell's reputation to tackle a subject like reincarnation. That's usually the venue of New Age crystal clinkers or East Indian guhrus. Vectors succeeds at examining this concept from the unusual juxtapostion of both neuroscience and spiritualism. The protagonist/scientist must find more than Empirical evidence of something no person on the planet has ever discovered, that life goes on after death. The writer's other equally brave challenge is that he's embraced the tale in the arms of an amazing love story. Kube-McDowell is one of those authors whom I respect and trust. He transmits the spark of life to full-bodied, intelligent, passionate characters, and he's no slouch when it comes to the science. Arthur C. Clarke of 2001, A Space Odessey fame has collaborated with this man on a recent project, so you know there will be no fudge factor for fuzzy logic in his work. And that integrity lays Vectors' firm foundation. There are no ignored thought trails, no easy outs or do-overs. Dr. Jonathan Briggs must get the science right, and this character proves true to his intellect and to his emotions. Vectors does something else that I rarely ever see in science fiction. This novel acurately portrays Wiccan and Pagan people in their environs of a spiritual gathering. Kube-McDowell grants these major and minor characters grace and dignity without falling into dogma. There is nothing... I repeat NOTHING lax about this book. It held my curiosity captive for the entire read. I found myself sneaking paragraphs at stop lights, reading in slow traffic, sitting in my car in my driveway turning pages, and not putting it down until 3 a.m.
Rating:
Summary: Mike's best yet
Review: Mr. KMD weaves a wonderful cautionary tale of the near future. There is hard neuroscience mixed with speculative spiritualism, but the bottom line is living, loveable characters who adapt and grow. And the ending is a shocker...but the very next page is a sneak peek into the sequel ("Fragments"). By the time this series is over (feels like at least three, maybe four books in all), Michael will have turned the whole universe upside down. If you read it only to see a dark vision of where we shouldn't go in his setting, you should read it. But there is also an orchard full of ideas, some hard science, others ehtereal, to be savored. I can hardly wait for book 2. This novel is a triumph; albeit act one. Buy and read if you like sci-fi at all, and for sure if you are either a) of open-minded spritual grounding, but especially if b) you think you know how the universe works (because you have a wake up call...)
Rating: 
Summary: Part one...an excellent beginning
Review: Mr. KMD weaves a wonderful cautionary tale of the near future. There is hard neuroscience mixed with speculative spiritualism, but the bottom line is living, loveable characters who adapt and grow. And the ending is a shocker...but the very next page is a sneak peek into the sequel ("Fragments"). By the time this series is over (feels like at least three, maybe four books in all), Michael will have turned the whole universe upside down. If you read it only to see a dark vision of where we shouldn't go in his setting, you should read it. But there is also an orchard full of ideas, some hard science, others ehtereal, to be savored. I can hardly wait for book 2. This novel is a triumph; albeit act one. Buy and read if you like sci-fi at all, and for sure if you are either a) of open-minded spritual grounding, but especially if b) you think you know how the universe works (because you have a wake up call...)
Rating:
Summary: Another all-nighter! - Waiting for the sequel!
Review: Someone else mentioned staying up all night to read Vectors. I found myself once again getting far too little sleep because I just wanted to read "one more chapter!" Other reviewers have been more eloquent than I but I agree that one of Kube-McDowell's strength's has always been making science interesting to a non-scientest like myself. However, I'd say that what I love best about all of Mr. Kube-McDowell's writing is the way he takes an interesting subject, presents all sides of it, and writes characters you really care about to play out the story. I'd highly recommend this book, especially to anyone curious about the blending of science and spirituality.
Rating:
Summary: Another all-nighter! - Waiting for the sequel!
Review: Someone else mentioned staying up all night to read Vectors. I found myself once again getting far too little sleep because I just wanted to read "one more chapter!" Other reviewers have been more eloquent than I but I agree that one of Kube-McDowell's strength's has always been making science interesting to a non-scientest like myself. However, I'd say that what I love best about all of Mr. Kube-McDowell's writing is the way he takes an interesting subject, presents all sides of it, and writes characters you really care about to play out the story. I'd highly recommend this book, especially to anyone curious about the blending of science and spirituality.
Rating:
Summary: A masterful melding of science, philosophy, and character
Review: Sometimes, things just seem to come together. A brilliant scientist meets a creative pioneer. Science meets philosophy. And a mystery meets a mystery. When was the last time I stayed up all night reading a book, even when I didn't really have the time, even when I had things to do the next day, because I simply could not bear to put the book down? When was the last time a book beat sleep? When was the last time I finished a book and then had to keep it with me the next day so I could go back and start reading it all over again? Well, these days, that doesn't happen for me all that often, but it happened with Vectors. I stayed up all night reading Vectors (the first time; I'm halfway through the second reading), because I could not, would not, not even at the promptings of family and friends--not even when I knew where we were going and no one else in the car did--put it down. Everything else paled when placed next to my engagement with this book. Vectors is full of unlikely meetings, seeming coincidences and risks. Kube-McDowell breaks every rule in the hard science-fiction author's canon. There's spiritualism, having tea with neuroscience. There's a respectful nod to the neopagan community, dallying over questions of evidence and data. There's a sweeping love story that encompasses everything else and makes this story sweet and real without being cloying or predictable. Everything is vivid, from the science to the characters to the descriptions of a not-too-distant future Ann Arbor. Kube-McDowell's prose is gorgeous, lush without being purple, almost romantic. The characters are alive. You want to know them. The story itself is a roller coaster ride that will engage you from page one. I wasn't able to put it down. I'm having trouble putting it down for the second time. I put it down to write this review, because I don't want it to end again. It's going on the reread-every-year-or-so shelf with books like Stranger In A Strange Land and Jitterbug Perfume. Michael Kube-McDowell has taken some risks, writing a book like Vectors. And Vectors is a risk worth taking.
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