The Observable Universe

Heather McCalden

• Publisher: Fitzcarraldo Editions
• Year: 2024
• Topic: Literature
• eBook ISBN:
  9781804270158
• Subtopic: Social Science Biographies
• Index: Literature

Are we ever truly lost in the internet age?  The Observable Universe is a moving, genre-defying memoir of a woman reckoning with the loss of her parents, the virus that took them, and what it means to search for meaning in a hyperconnected world. When she was a child, Heather McCalden lost her parents to AIDS. She was seven when her father died and ten when she lost her mother. Growing up in Los Angeles in the 1990s, her personal devastation was mirrored by a city that was ground zero for the virus and its destruction. Years later, after becoming a writer and an artist, she begins to research the mysterious parallels between the histories of AIDS and the internet. She questions what it means to 'go viral' in an era of explosive biological and virtual contagion and simultaneously finds her own past seeping into her investigation. While connecting her disparate strands of research – images, fragments of scientific thought, musings on Raymond Chandler and late-night Netflix binges – she makes an unexpected discovery about what happened to her family and who her parents might have been. Entwining an intensely personal search with a history of viral culture and an ode to Los Angeles,  The Observable Universe is a prismatic account of loss calibrated precisely to our existence in a post-pandemic, post-internet life.

Table of contents

• Praise
• Title Page
• Epigraph
• Contents
• DIRECTIONS FOR HOW TO READ
• WEIGHTLESSNESS
• SEASHELL HEAD
• LA MARATHON PHOTO
• NETWORK
• LOS ANGELES REFRACTION
• ORGANIC MATTER
• OLDEST KNOWN SPECIMEN
• TO HOLD TO
• JAPANESE PHONE BOOTH
• MAN–COMPUTER SYMBIOSIS
• ORIGIN
• PHOTOGRAPHS
• TELEPRESENCE
• INTERGALACTIC NETWORK
• G IS FOR GUMSHOE
• NO MATERIAL EVIDENCE EXISTS
• AZT
• HOW TO SPEAK OF THE DEAD
• THE PARTY
• A CONTINUOUS LINE
• GEMMA
• MESSAGE BLOCKS
• RECORD OF THOUGHT
• MINITEL
• MYSTERY!
• RADIOLAB HIV
• PACKET SWITCHING
• TRANSFERENCE OF ENERGY
• YOUR MEMORY’S NATURAL ORGANIZATION
• BLUE MOON
• LO FOR LOGIN
• I WAS WRITING A BOOK
• WHAT A PICTURE CAN DO
• TINDER MONKEY
• ELECTRONIC MAIL
• THE 110 FREEWAY
• AGE OF VIRUSES
• WRITING ABOUT DEAD PARENTS
• ONE-LINER
• INTERNETWORKING
• GOING TO THE MOVIES
• PAINTINGS IN A HOSPITAL
• LITTLE RED RIDING HOOD
• SLIM DISEASE
• A PLOT OF ATMOSPHERIC IMPRESSIONS
• TOBACCO MOSAIC VIRUS
• GO WEST
• WHERE THE TWO FORCES MEET
• YOURS TRULY
• HOW YOU GET TO BE THE WAY YOU ARE
• IT RUNS IN THE FAMILY
• ELF PHOTO
• VIRUS HACKER
• DESIGNATIONS
• NOIR IS A PLACE
• VIROLOGY 101
• IS THE INTERNET ALIVE?
• SOME DEFINITIONS OF CULTURE BY MERRIAM-WEBSTER
• NOVEL RETROVIRUS
• TIME IN A HOSPITAL
• QUOTE FROM A TELEVISION SHOW
• LA POLAROID
• THE SCREEN IS A MEMBRANE
• DETECTIVE REPEATING GLANCE
• FLAG DAY
• METHODS OF VIRAL CULTIVATION
• BLACKOUT
• R.I.P.
• ‘ON GRIEF OF MIND’
• ANOTHER NOVEL RETROVIRUS?
• HAND-HOLDING ICU
• CULTURE = LIFE CONTENT
• NOPE
• DAPHNE ON INSTAGRAM
• CYBERSTRATA
• LOOSE PHONE BOOK EQUIVALENT
• BASKING SHARK
• SNEEZING
• SEVERELY COMPROMISED
• LEGEND OF THE PERPETUAL LAMP
• ITCHY BRAIN
• AN AVERAGE GRAVE
• SNOW WHITE
• VIRAL VISIONS
• GOOGLE DEATH
• SETTLEMENT
• WHY WE TALK ABOUT IT
• NURSE’S CAP
• RESURRECTION
• BLACK HOLE
• SIGH
• ALCHEMY
• CRASHING, OR INCREASED NUMBERS
• DAD ASHES
• ELECTRON MICROSCOPE
• PHONE SEX?
• CIRCLES AND ARROWS
• MARLOWE KNIGHT
• TRANSATLANTIC RELATIONS
• BACKBONE
• METAPHORS WE THINK WITH
• HOW I THINK YOU BECOME A PERSON
• AIRPLANE GIRL
• THEORIES OF VIRAL EVOLUTION
• RED RIBBON
• SIGHT
• CHAMELEON VIRUS
• TRUE DETECTIVE
• UPDATES
• SOME EXAMPLES
• ARCHITECT
• TRIPLE COCKTAIL
• CYBERSPACE
• INFECTION OF IMAGES
• NIGHTTIME REFRACTION
• WHERE IS IT?
• VIRAL ETYMOLOGY
• E FOR EBOLA?
• MACULAR DEGENERATION
• EXPLOSIVE CONTAGION IN NETWORKS
• DOPPELGÄNGER
• UNKNOWN ESSENCE
• COME ON AND SAFARI WITH ME
• SOME THINGS ABOUT METAPHOR
• ALBUM AMICORUM
• CLOSEST LIVING RELATIVE
• SHARDS
• IF YOU’RE WONDERING WHY THOSE SCENES ARE HERE
• CHRONICLE OF LINKS
• HUNTER OR PREY
• COLLECTIVE HALLUCINATION
• VIRUSES MANIPULATE BEHAVIOR
• BACK-TO-SCHOOL NIGHT
• MAKING A NAME
• EXOSKELETONS
• CAT VIDEOS
• METAPHORS INFLUENCING REASON
• GRIEF IS A VIRUS
• EXCEPT
• A FEW OBSERVATIONS
• PEER-TO-PEER
• THE BOOK I WAS WRITING WHEN NIVIA DIED
• TELEPRESENCE 2
• JESSICA JONES
• ECLIPSE PERIOD
• BRAVE NEW WORLD
• FERDINAND
• VIRAL NEUTRAL LANGUAGE
• SHOW, DON’T TELL
• POINT OF ORIGIN
• FIVE SNAPSHOTS OF A TOWN
• SOME LITTLE BUG IS GONNA GET YOU SOMEDAY
• ELECTRON MICROGRAPHS
• INTERNET LANGUAGE
• ESCAPE HYPOTHESIS
• COLLECTIVELY EDITED AND MAINTAINED
• METAPHOR DEFINITION
• AMENDMENT
• ALL ROADS LEAD TO MY FATHER
• TRUTH
• SEEING IS BELIEVING
• AUTONOMOUS PROTECTION
• SELF-PRESERVATION INSTINCT
• BLUE BUTTERFLY
• IT’S A RIVER IN EGYPT
• LINK ROT
• VIRAL STRUCTURE
• ATHENA
• ONLINE INVESTIGATOR SEARCH
• MONOLITH
• MEDICAL METAPHORS
• THE LITTLE ICE AGE
• VIVIAN’S BIRTH
• OLDEST TRICK IN THE BOOK
• DIGITAL FOOTPRINTS
• DO DO, DO DO DO DO
• THE 101 COFFEE SHOP
• PROCEDURE?
• PHOTO OF NIVIA IN A FIELD
• TOTALLY ACCEPTABLE
• VIRAL SENSATION
• LADY X
• PERSECUTED DOCUMENTS
• INCESSANT MOVEMENT
• PEOPLE REMEMBER DIFFERENTLY THAN THEY USED TO
• POSTCARD, 2013
• TAXONOMY
• AMSLER GRID
• A SHORT BURST OF INCONSEQUENTIAL INFORMATION
• LEEUWENHOEK
• EMERGENT BEHAVIOR
• FINDING THE P.I.
• CATERPILLAR VIRUS
• THE BERLIN PATIENT
• NET
• PENGUIN MAN
• FAINTING
• CRISPR
• MIDLIFE CRISIS/UNEXPECTED VICTORY
• IT WAS A DARK AND STORMY NIGHT
• PARTING
• DOCTORS AND DETECTIVES
• TRAVEL BAN
• ENZYME
• DAD FRAGMENTS
• LESS ABOUT INTERPRETATION
• WHEN A PERSON DIES
• AIRPORT ARRIVAL
• COMMUNICATING VIA IMAGES
• AIDS DISKETTE
• EQUIVALENTS
• THE END OF THE UNIVERSE
• INSTRUMENTAL RESOURCES
• NOTES ON OBSERVATION
• GATES CLOSING
• INTERNET STORY
• GETTING THE CAR
• PrEP
• BLOOD
• MAP
• LIFE GOALS?
• ANTIVAXXER
• FLIGHT MH17
• P.I. INTRO
• NOT REWRITE YOU
• FLICKERING SCREENS
• END OF TRANSMISSION
• PHOTOS OF EMPTY ROADS
• AUTOCOMPLETE
• TALK TO TEXT
• LIKE CANADA?
• THING
• FIVE IMAGES OF MY PARENTS DYING OF AIDS
• A PHOTOGRAPH NOT YET TAKEN
• INFLUENCE CAMPAIGN
• GODWIN’S LAW
• INTERNET CAFÉ
• LIKE CICERO, IN HIS LIBRARY
• CRISPR BABIES
• CONSISTENT WITH ACTUAL DNA DATA
• MATTERS INTO MY OWN HANDS
• THINGS I KNOW ABOUT MY FATHER
• THINGS THE INTERNET SAYS ABOUT MY FATHER
• WORDS I PIN MY LIFE TO
• ALL I KNOW IS
• THE LONDON PATIENT
• CONTAGION
• RADIO CITY MUSIC HALL
• UNIVERSAL PROPERTIES
• WILDERNESS
• ONE HUNDRED CENTURIES
• THE DETECTIVE’S WISDOM
• CAVE OF CRYSTALS
• AT THE ROYALE
• Note About the Text
• Sources
• Acknowledgements
• About the Author
• Copyright