I recently finished reading Cloud Atlas by David Mitchell, a novel split into six interlocking stories that spans from a 19th-century maritime adventure to a near- and post-apocalyptic sci-fi future. There's much to like about the book, but since I'm such a structure-fiend I'll mostly stick with a surface description of the layout.

The book is designed to be read in the form of a queue stack: first-in, first-out last-out. I.e., the book starts with the first story, which is interrupted by the second story, which is interrupted by the third story, until we get to the complete sixth story, which is then followed by the conclusion to the fifth story, which is followed by the end of the fourth story, until the book ends with the conclusion of the first story. It looks sort of like this:

While the six stories vary greatly in place, time, genre, and prose (Melville-like, Victorian novel, pulp fiction, Hollywood movie, sci-fi, Faulkner sci-fi), they are of course linked thematically and narratively. So the diary from the first story is found by the composer in the second story whose letters are sent to a protagonist in the third story which is a novel being read by a publisher in the fourth story, and so on. The novel does its best to logically explain the start and end of each segment to the activities of the characters in the neighboring stories.

While I can't say Mitchell is a master of all the genres he writes in here, it is the case that the disappointment I had at the beginnning of a new segment turned into compelling interest by the time the next rolled around, until I was juggling five cliffhangers in my mind during the sixth and central story. The cliffhangers unwind methodically, rationally, and almost too satisfyingly, but the end result is a well-written novel for the impatient reader.

There's much to say about the characters, themes, and prose but instead I'll point you to The Guardian's rave review and The New York Times tepid review and say that my opinions lie somewhere in between.