All Tomorrows: The Myriad Species and Mixed Fortunes of Man by C.M. Kosemen
Published 2008 · 30,525 words · about 2 hours at an average pace · Science Fiction, Satire & Humor
How hard is All Tomorrows: The Myriad Species and Mixed Fortunes of Man to read?
All Tomorrows: The Myriad Species and Mixed Fortunes of Man scores 40 out of 100 for difficulty on ReadingRate, making it moderately challenging. The score is a weighted composite of nine measures: four of how hard the prose is to parse, five of how hard the meaning is to extract.
- Vocabulary: 38 out of 100
- The book borrows the register of natural history and gives each species a coined name, but its sentences stay plain and explanatory. The vocabulary is closer to a popular science guide than to Pynchon's jargon, and it sits just above Beach Read.
- Sentence structure: 30 out of 100
- Short, declarative descriptions of anatomy and habitat make up most of the text. There are no nested clauses or stylistic experiments, and the prose is a little more formal than a diary like Anne Frank's.
- Abstraction: 45 out of 100
- The book describes concrete bodies and environments, but they serve a larger meditation on identity and deep time. The ideas ride on vivid images, much as Atomic Habits rides on concrete examples.
- Information density: 48 out of 100
- Each species arrives with its own habitat, anatomy and history, so new facts keep coming at a steady pace. The book is short and every entry is compact, so the density sits above a light novel but well below Moby-Dick's digressions.
- Narrative indirection: 30 out of 100
- Kosemen states events and species traits openly in the manner of a field guide. The reader draws out the melancholy and the implications about humanity without needing to decode an unreliable voice.
- Symbolic density: 42 out of 100
- The remade bodies stand for lost identity and the power of those who shape others. Beyond that central metaphor the book sticks to literal speculative biology, so its symbolism is lighter than The Great Gatsby's.
- Ironic distance: 45 out of 100
- The detached natural-history voice carries a dark irony: grotesque fates are described as calmly as ordinary zoology. The tone is deadpan but the book does not pull the layered reversals of Lolita.
- Resolution withholding: 42 out of 100
- The book follows a long arc of loss and slow recovery, closing its main threads while leaving the future open. Its ending is more settled than 2666 but less closed than a genre romance.
- Structural complexity: 40 out of 100
- The book is organised as a catalogue of species across deep time, not as a single storyline. This episodic structure is easy to follow, though it has more shape than the linear diary of Anne Frank.
How All Tomorrows: The Myriad Species and Mixed Fortunes of Man is regarded
All Tomorrows: The Myriad Species and Mixed Fortunes of Man holds a literary regard score of 20 out of 100, weighing its place in the canon, its critical reception, its influence on other writers, and the standing of its author. Regard is measured separately from difficulty: a demanding book is not necessarily an admired one.