The Universe Versus Alex Woods

In English author Gavin Extence’s debut novel, The Universe Versus Alex Woods, the titular teenage protagonist embarks on a geeky and surreal journey after forging an unlikely friendship with a marijuana-addled Vietnam veteran. Many critics have compared the book to the works of Kurt Vonnegut and Mark Haddon.

The book begins at the end of Woods' story. Seventeen-year-old Alex Woods is sitting in the driver's seat of a car belonging to his friend, Mr. Peterson. Next to him is an urn containing the cremated remains of that same friend. He has been pulled over by the police who shine a flashlight into the car. Woods panics at first, but by the time he is being interrogated back at the police station, he is calm. He admits to having cultivated the 113 grams of marijuana found in the glove compartment of the car.

The police are satisfied with the simplest explanation of how he ended up in that car with the remains and the marijuana. However, Woods wants to tell the reader the whole story. He begins seven years earlier when he is ten years old. He lives with his mother, a fortuneteller. One day, while he is in the bathroom, a meteorite crashes through the window, hitting Woods in the head. Of his tarot card enthusiast of a mother, Woods says, “She didn’t realize that she’d foreseen the entire catastrophe until after it had happened."



As a result of the meteorite injury, Woods becomes epileptic, given to suffering seizures. He also has a large scar on his head. Around the neighborhood, he is known as "the boy who lived" or "the boy who survived."

The meteorite, Woods says, is the first pivotal moment of his life. The second comes as he is feeding ducks at the park. While doling out bread and reading Sky at Night magazine, some bullies come upon him and begin to harass him. Woods hides in a shed while the bullies take out their unsatisfied aggression on a nearby greenhouse. Afraid of future reprisals from the bullies, Woods refuses to snitch on them, taking the blame for the damage to the greenhouse himself. As it turns out, the owner of the greenhouse is Mr. Peterson, the cranky, pot-smoking Vietnam veteran who strikes an unlikely friendship with the young man.

When Woods meets Mr. Peterson, the older man is largely a recluse. He is a widower who hardly spends any time at all with other living creatures, aside from his dog. As the story progresses, Woods learns that Mr. Peterson is dying of a terminal neurological disorder. At this point, the central conflict of the story emerges. Mr. Peterson wants to end his own life on his own terms, and he needs someone's help to do it. However, because he doesn't have any friends, he chooses Woods to be his co-conspirator in euthanasia. This causes a great deal of introspection on Woods' part as to whether to participate in Mr. Peterson's scheme. It also sets off the adventure that takes up the bulk of the novel.



The primary moral prism through which Woods views his current dilemma is the writing of his favorite author, Kurt Vonnegut. Woods starts a Vonnegut fan club for people interested in “morality, ecology, time travel, extraterrestrial life, twentieth-century history, humanism, humor, et cetera,” after reading Sirens of Titan, Cat's Cradle, and Breakfast of Champions. He calls it, "The Secular Church of Kurt Vonnegut."

In a twist of fate, Mr. Peterson's dog is named "Kurt." In this way, the title is a bit of a misnomer. Yes, the universe is against Alex Woods in a number of ways. Being hit with an epilepsy-causing meteorite is some bad luck indeed. His best friend Mr. Peterson being in so much pain that he seeks doctor-assisted suicide is bleak as well. Nevertheless, in other ways, the universe is on the protagonist's side, as long as he accepts the chaos along with the order, much as his literary hero Vonnegut might suggest.

In the end, Woods and Mr. Peterson are successful in their scheme, traveling to Zurich in order to find a doctor willing to help the older man end his life on his own terms. That readers come to actively root for the success of their plan, regardless of their feelings about euthanasia, is a testament to the profound level of humanism on display throughout the book--a humanism that would certainly make Vonnegut proud.