Time TravelTag Archives

Shadow of Night by Deborah Harkness

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Reason for Reading:

I also recommend:

  • Outlander by Diana Gabaldon
  • Darkfever by Karen Marie Moning

Summary from GoodReads:

Deborah Harkness exploded onto the literary scene with her debut novel,A Discovery of Witches, Book One of the magical All Souls Trilogy and an international publishing phenomenon. The novel introduced Diana Bishop, Oxford scholar and reluctant witch, and the handsome geneticist and vampire Matthew Clairmont; together they found themselves at the center of a supernatural battle over an enchanted manuscript known as Ashmole 782.

Now, picking up from A Discovery of Witches’ cliffhanger ending,Shadow of Night plunges Diana and Matthew into Elizabethan London, a world of spies, subterfuge, and a coterie of Matthew’s old friends, the mysterious School of Night that includes Christopher Marlowe and Walter Raleigh. Here, Diana must locate a witch to tutor her in magic, Matthew is forced to confront a past he thought he had put to rest, and the mystery of Ashmole 782 deepens.

My Review:

I loved A Discovery of Witches. I haven’t enjoyed a romance/paranormal book like it since I read Outlander back in the day. So, I was thrilled that when I got into it I had Shadow of Night standing by, ready to be read. However, I have to say it did not live up to its predecessor. Let me tell you why:

First, there are a lot of sidekicks in this one, y’all. Lots of people get added to the story in a dizzying mess of names and personalities. In fact, it’s so dizzying that at one point, I think you could easily swap three of the names of people in the text and you wouldn’t be able to tell the difference.

Second, the historical names. Don’t get me wrong, I love those little peeks we get into the lives of famous historical people, but I enjoy them more when the book is centered around them and when they are not used as props. I don’t want to spoil the book for any reading this, but I will say this – finish the book and see if you agree that the story would have been just fine (possibly even better) with anonymous names. And by the story, I mean the main course of the story, not the sides and extras.

And that main course is what kept me picking up the book. Those two are just two of many small annoyances I had with the book (how much can a couple moon over each other?) but when you get down to the nitty gritty, the story was still there and it was still solid. I love how Deborah Harkness builds her world of magic. The descriptions of the witches magic working was thrilling and I devoured those passages like no ones business. The introduction of more family of Matthews was also quite thrilling, as were other fictional appearances in the book. Those are what made the book enjoyable for me, not the implication that in order for things to get done, they must be done with the highest of the high.

Frankly, I’m a little torn on whether or not I pick up the next one when it comes out. I hope that Deborah goes back to what she did with the first book and really gives us solid, fictional characters and… dare I say it? Maybe Matthew and Diana will cool down a little bit too.

Don’t just take my word for it! Check out what these bloggers say!

The Picky Girl | The Garden of Books | S Krishna’s Books

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Lydia
20 July, 2012
reviews, Urban Paranormal
0 comments
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The Obsidian Blade by Pete Hautman

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Reason for Reading:
  • The cover caught my eye.

I recommend:

Summary from GoodReads

The first time his father disappeared, Tucker Feye had just turned thirteen. The Reverend Feye simply climbed on the roof to fix a shingle, let out a scream, and vanished – only to walk up the driveway an hour later, looking older and worn, with a strange girl named Lahlia in tow. In the months that followed, Tucker watched his father grow distant and his once loving mother slide into madness. But then both of his parents disappear. Now in the care of his wild Uncle Kosh, Tucker begins to suspect that the disks of shimmering air he keeps seeing – one right on top of the roof – hold the answer to restoring his family. And when he dares to step into one, he’s launched on a time-twisting journey- from a small Midwestern town to a futuristic hospital run by digitally augmented healers, from the death of an ancient prophet to a forest at the end of time. Inevitably, Tucker’s actions alter the past and future, changing his world forever.

My Review:

For a book that took forever to get actually moving, I was actually surprised at how disappointed I was in The Obsidian Blade. Here’s what my journey through this story looked like.

Confusion: First – a completely strange, utterly alien world was introduced. Fine, that I can deal with. But then it was shoved into a closet and I was thrown into a reality that, honestly, sent me back to the internet to find out what was going on with this books genre classification. It seemed like a typical, young adult, non-science-fiction book. But nope.. after what seemed like forever, I was thrown back into the science fiction realm.

Disbelief: Not only were historical events not sacred (World Trade Center) but religious stories were pulled into the mix and treated with a heavy hand. It’s one thing to express disbelief in the stories that are the foundation of a religion, but using them as a catalyst to make the story seem more interesting? Not cool – especially since it completely felt as if the stories were being used for mere shock value.

I was disappointed in this series, and definitely will not be investigating the rest of the trilogy. The science fiction elements seemed to be implemented merely as an excuse to use past events in a novel, and, as a result, were not very fleshed out in and of themselves. There was virtually no world building, no explanation other than a few vague paragraphs about the diskos, and no resolution of any sort. I understand it’s the first book of a trilogy, but you have to throw your reader a bone, you know? Make the book worth reading now, rather than having to wait.

Don’t just take my word for it! Check out what these bloggers say!

Emily’s Reading Room

Charlotte’s Library

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Lydia
15 May, 2012
reviews, Science Fiction, Young Adult
4 comments
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The Bone House by Stephen Lawhead

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Reason for Reading:
  • I enjoyed the Lawhead books I’ve read in the past, and decided to give him a go with this series.

I also recommend:

Summary from GoodReads:

An avenue of Egyptian sphinxes, an Etruscan tufa tomb, a Bohemian coffee shop, and a Stone Age landscape where universes collide …

Kit Livingstone met his great grandfather Cosimo in a rainy alley in London where he discovered the reality of alternate realities.

Now he’s on the run – and on a quest, trying to understand the impossible mission he inherited from Cosimo: to restore a map that charts the hidden dimensions of the multiverse while staying one step ahead of the savage Burley Men.

The key is the Skin Map – but where it leads and what it means, Kit has no idea. The pieces have been scattered throughout this universe and beyond.


My Review:

The Bone House is the book that made reading The Skin Map worth it.  I loved this book, for its adventure and its characters.  My only complaint?  It feels as if the story is being drug out for the series sake.

This is a problem that occurs when there are many storylines happening at once.  When you skip from character to character and pieces are put together.  Speaking of pieces put together, that’s another of my pet peeves – when characters are added into the book in such a way it seems as if they were added last minute in order to keep the story moving.  Does it make the story less exciting? No.  It just gives it that element of… “eye-rolling, whatever”, you know.. the unbelievable (even when reading about science fiction/fantasy things like time travel and magic).

I hope that all made sense.

Still, The Bone House took off running from where The Skin Map left off and left me wanting more answers at the end.  Lawhead is definitely a master when it comes to spinning a good tale, I have to say.  I’ll be right there on the list waiting for the next installment to come out.

Check out these reviews!

Footprints in the Butter

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Lydia
15 December, 2011
Christian, reviews, Science Fiction
0 comments
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The Skin Map by Stephen Lawhead

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Reason for Reading:
  • I enjoyed the Lawhead books I’ve read in the past, and decided to give him a go with this series.

I also recommend:

Summary from GoodReads:

Kit Livingstone’s great-grandfather has re-appeared with an unbelievable story–the ley lines throughoutBritain are not merely the stuff of legends but truly are pathways to other worlds. So few people know how to use them, though, that doing so is fraught with danger.

But one explorer knew more than most. Because of his fear of being unable to find his way home, he developed an intricate code and tattooed his map onto his skin. But the map has since been lost and rival factions are in desperate competition to recover it. What none of them yet realize is that the skin map itself is not the prize at the end of this race . . . but merely the first goal of a vast and marvelous quest to regain Paradise.

Enter the ultimate treasure hunt–with a map made of skin, a playing field of alternate realities, and a prize that is the greatest mystery of all.

My Review:

I don’t know what it is with all these books that deal with ley lines and time travel and alternate realities, but I’m totally digging it.  Stephen Lawhead splashes into this time-travel alternate reality thing with a bang, giving us a group of characters that are likeable and not so likeable and providing us with trips to Egypt, England and other fantastic places and times – no limits here!

There is a lot of set-up in The Skin Map, a lot of scientific explaining and figuring out how things work and, I won’t lie.. a lot of the Cosimo/Kit storyline had me bored to tears in places – but as I’ve learned in the times I’ve read Lawhead, it’s worth the payoff.

I think my favorite storyline deals with Wilhemina – it was just so perfect and had me giddy with happiness – but I won’t spoil it more for you.. just check the series out because it is worth it!

If you are a science fiction fan, or even wanting to be a sci-fi fan but are too afraid of the genre to dip your toes into it, then this is the perfect blending of history and sci-fi.  It moves slowly enough that it’s easy to grasp and has just the right amount of action in it to make it worth while.

Check out these reviews!

Inside the Wrong Mind

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Lydia
14 December, 2011
Adventure, Christian, reviews, Science Fiction
2 comments
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The Revisionists by Thomas Mullen

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Reason for Reading:
  • This is another example of the cover getting me.

I also recommend:

Summary from GoodReads:

Would you kill to make the world a peaceful place?

Zed is an agent from the future. A place where all of the world’s problems have been solved. No hunger. No war. No despair.

His mission is to keep that way. Even if it means ensuring every cataclysm throughout history runs its course, especially one just on the horizon.

Zed’s mission will ensnare the lives of a disgraced former spy named Leo; a young lawyer, Tasha, grieving over the loss of her brother; Sari, the oppressed employee of a foreign diplomat; and countless others. But will he finish his final mission before the present takes precedence over a perfect future? One that may have more cracks than he realizes?

My Review:

Lately I seem to be reading a lot of time manipulative books.  Between The Revisionists, The Map of Time and the newest Lawhead series, someone seems to have put out a memo screaming … “MESS WITH TIME, IT WILL MESS WITH YOUR READERS!”. Because that’s what messing with time does; it messes with my head.

The Revisionists is a fascinating look at “what if”.  What if you could go back in time to fix a wrong, to stop Hitler, to prevent the assassination of Lincoln.. you get the point.  What if, in fixing those wrongs and saving those lives – from one to millions, you changed a world that was “perfect” in the future to an “unknown” type of future.  Would it be worth it?  Who makes that decision?

Thomas Mullen deals with those questions and more in The Revisionists.  The “good guys” are those who are going back in time to stop the past from being rewritten.  There’s action, adventure, quite a bit of science and a whole lot of fun in this book.  But, again, it messed with my mind, as all time traveling stories seem to do.

I think, though, that The Revisionists puts a really new, interesting twist on it all.  It addresses new and old political crises, as well as puts the reader in the spot of needing to choose a side as they read through the story.  Fascinating book and I’ll be on the lookout for more from Mullen in the future.

 

Check out these reviews!

At Home with Books

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Lydia
29 September, 2011
Adventure, Literary Fiction, reviews, Science Fiction
5 comments
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Q: A Novel by Evan Mandery

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Reason for Reading:
  • A picked this one on a whim – it looked interesting!

I recommend:

Summary from GoodReads:

“Q, Quentina Elizabeth Deveril, is the love of my life.”

Shortly before his wedding, the unnamed hero of this uncommon romance is visited by a man who claims to be his future self and ominously admonishes him that he must not marry the love of his life, Q. At first the protagonist doubts this stranger, but in time he becomes convinced of the authenticity of the warning and leaves his fiancée. The resulting void in his life is impossible to fill. One after the other, future selves arrive urging him to marry someone else, divorce, attend law school, leave law school, travel, join a running club, stop running, study the guitar, the cello, Proust, Buddhism, and opera, and eliminate gluten from his diet. The only constants in this madcap quest for personal improvement are his love for his New York City home and for the irresistible Q.


My Review:

Q: A Novel is exactly what I think of when I think of a book that is just trying a little too hard to be witty, sarcastic and a bit satirical.  As a result, I’m really torn on if I enjoyed it or if it just was okay for me.

I will say I was enchanted by the beginning – the love story between Q and the narrator of this story was charming and enjoyable and I really loved it – but then the narrators future self steps in and things start to get a little too strange.

It wasn’t the science fiction aspect of the book that bugged me – I’ve read other books dealing with time travel and thoroughly enjoyed them, so I think it was maybe the sheer hopelessness of it all.  The narrators life keeps being changed and keeps getting significantly different from where he initially started out at and it made me really begin to think about just how dangerous knowledge of the future could be.

One other thing about the book that bugged me was the similarity between the author and the main character – both had knowledge in certain fields and the narrator even writes books in miniature within the pages of the story.  It was a little too much for me to be able to handle seriously.

Books like Q make me feel as if I’m either way too critical or just not smart enough to enjoy what should have been a thought-provoking story.  Instead I felt let down when I closed the book, and a bit relieved as well.

About the Author

  • Information regarding Evan Mandery:

For more reviews on Q: A Novel by Evan Mandery, please follow the book tour.

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Lydia
6 September, 2011
Contemporary, reviews, Science Fiction
1 comment
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The Map of Time by Félix J. Palma

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Reason for Reading:
  • The cover.

I also recommend:

Summary from GoodReads:

A Map of Time by Felix J. Palma. Set in Victorian London with characters real and imagined, The Map of Time is a page-turner that boasts a triple play of intertwined plots in which a skeptical H.G. Wells is called upon to investigage purported incidents of time travel and to save lives and literary classics, including Dracula and The Time Machine, from being wiped from existence. What happens if we change history?

My Review:

Before I talk about The Map of Time’s story, I want to talk about the binding and jacket of this book.

It’s stunning.

Seriously, this book should be owned just for the artwork and design.  I got chills when I opened the book and saw the first page, I was reverent when I took the jacket off and then cackled with glee at the beautiful lettering on the spine.  This is a book made for people who love books – and the story worked like that for me as well.

I think the summary is somewhat misleading, I will say.  I expected a great time-travel adventure centered around literary masterpieces, but in truth that was only a small portion of the story.  First, the setting and backdrop have to be set, and boy does Felix Palma set them.

At first, I felt a bit lost, but beginning a book with contemplated suicide is nearly always an attention grabber.  Before I knew it, I was turning the pages, aware with each turn that I was getting more and more frantic and just when I thought I’d get to a climax in the story……

… it’d slow down again.

This happened more than once.  It wasn’t necessarily a bad thing, though, as I think back on it.  I gasped out loud a few times, I shook my head in disbelief – because Palma had me eating out of the palm of his hand.  He was taking me through the story on his own terms, and I was helpless.  I had to know.

The reward was worth it – oh boy, was it worth it.  That said, I still don’t know if I can handle doing a re-read quite yet, or even thinking about one.  So for now, this beautiful book will sit on my shelves and, in a few years, maybe I’ll have forgotten enough to want to pick it up again and be teased through the story once again.

 Check these reviews!

At Home with Books

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Lydia
27 August, 2011
Literary Fiction, reviews, Science Fiction
4 comments
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Pathfinder by Orson Scott Card

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Reason(s) for Reading:
  • I’ve been a fan of Orson Scott Card’s writing since Ender’s Game.
I recommend:

Summary from GoodReads:

Only his father knew that Rigg possessed the power to see deep down the paths of people’s pasts. But it was only after his father died that Rigg discovers that he has another special gift: the power to change the past. Unfortunately, with that knowledge, all certainty and safety began to melt away. Thinking of it as a coming-of-age novel at triple speed.

My Review:

This is a tough book to process for me.  Orson Scott Card has done something so different and strange with time travel in Pathfinder and, while fascinating, it also made my head hurt, to be perfectly honest.

The story of Rigg was fascinating, as was the alternating story of Ram.  I was thankful for the hand-holding that each character did as the story progressed because, without it, I would have been perfectly lost.

It’s difficult to talk about the book in detail because the story unfolds in such a way that speaking, even just about the characters, reveals a bit too much.  I do have to say though that while, at times a bit unbelievable, Rigg was a fascinating character and one that had me firmly on his side at all times.

Fun, interesting science fiction book but a bit heavy for a younger teenager.  Although if that teenager enjoyed the Ender series then I would say they would love this one as well.

Check out these review(s):

Good Books and Wine

 

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Lydia
12 March, 2011
reviews, Science Fiction, Young Adult
0 comments
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