Quantum Parallel Universe Many Worlds = No Fun for Anyone

I cannot stand reading stories about parallel-divergent dimensions. Anything vaguely resembling the Many Worlds Theory is straight out*. A Multiverse? Sure, I can do that, as long as it is either Finite or Infinite But Non-Divergent/Non-Repeating/Non-Variations-On-A-Theme. Why? Because the very moment you use the infinite parallel universes, the events within the story are immediately rendered moot. There is no sense of risk nor success because by the definition of the operating rules of that world, all successes and failures have happened AND there is no meaningful difference with the universe you just read over the rest that makes its results more important. The death of a character becomes meaningless and, more importantly, boring. A non-event. In fact, everything becomes self-negated, not just occurrences. Interesting hypotheses of physics, sociology, super-nature, technology or fascinating settings of impossible cities and otherworldly plains are all drawn with the white on white art supplies of the Nihilist painter. It is the dread step past existentialism that is slightly freeing but not in a way that makes you feel any better. So fuck the "every choice spawns enough worlds to allow every option to have occurred" bullshit. You want an alternate universe? There are somewhere upwards of eighty different rationales for the World Where Nazis Won And You Have An Evil Twin But It's In Another Dimension. At least leave enough traction in the story for me to keep holding on to its plot. If you make it all frictionless water-dust by injecting it with the UnMeaning of the Total Comprehensive, it all gets washed out and away.



I'm also increasingly bored with quantum and nanotech magic science in fiction. Particularly since it's often an unpleasant hybrid child of Mrs. Pedantic and Mr. Inaccurate Understanding whose grandfather was Herr No-Interesting-Extrapolations. Seriously, I enjoy a good "what could we do with technology?" vignette as much as the next guy, but a real actual plot with character development and stuff would be nice too.


*Except that one about how you'll never perceive your own death because in some universe SOMETHING happened to save you from that death and thus allow your perception to continue and in the story as the likelihood of being able to survive gets smaller and smaller for the main character the events that he perceives in his accursed and inescapable immortality get stranger and stranger. I think there were alines at the end, there.