Science Fiction | Book Chatter

The Map of Time
By Felix J. Palma
(Atria Books, Hardcover, 9781439167397, June 2011, 624pp.)

The Short of It:

Victorian goodness with some sci-fi and mystery thrown in for good measure.

The Rest of It:

First, a bit about the story itself. Andrew Harrington has fallen in love with a prostitute by the name of Marie Kelly. Andrew comes from money, so falling in love with a working girl was not what his father had in mind. Nevertheless, he falls hard for her. Unfortunately, she is Jack the Ripper’s 5th victim and Andrew arrives too late to save her. Staggering away from the murder scene, he is stricken over what’s happened and plagued by his inability to save her.

Eight years later and influenced by books such as The Time Machine by H.G. Wells, he decides to travel back in time to change Marie’s fate. What follows is a genre-bender like no other.

This book is either brilliant, or a total sham! At 624 pages, it starts off innocently enough, but then by the end of book one, it takes a completely different turn and then heads into the future with a new set of players. Although the story seems to shift underneath you, it’s clear that Palma has something up his sleeve and that the stories are in fact connected in some way.

This book is far from predictable. Every time I turned the page I pondered what just happened. Not because it was confusing in any way, but because I could not imagine how the author kept it all straight while writing the story. There are trips to the past, trips to the future, trips to parallel universes, there’s a murder (actually more than one), thuggery (I came up with that term), fraud, a budding romance…okay, more than one and appearances by all sorts of folks including: The Elephant Man, Henry James, Bram Stoker and H.G. Wells himself.

When I say that this book was a wild ride through time… I am not kidding. It was an adventure and from those very first pages, I found myself hooked. Mainly because I HAD to know how it ended, plus I love Victorian London and sci-fi. However, by the end of the book I was left with my mouth gaping open. I read this with another blogger and we were both either incredibly impressed or royally ticked. We weren’t sure. I’m still not sure.

If you like the elements I mentioned, enjoy a genre-bender every now and then, and don’t mind being pulled through a lot of different subplots to partake in the adventure, then you’ll love this book. After spending some time thinking about it, I am leaning more toward it being brilliant, but it’s was a slow realization for me.

Note from Ti: The hardcover edition is GORGEOUS! The cover is partially matte, partially glossy which you can’t tell from the image. It also includes end papers depicting the Map of Time itself. It’s all very well done.

Source: Sent to me by the publisher.

Disclosure: This post contains affiliate links.

How to Live Safely in a Science Fictional Universe
By Charles Yu
(Vintage, Paperback, 9780307739452, June 2011, 256pp.)

The Short of It:

Time travel is an entertaining subject in and of itself, but at its core, this book is a collection of moments. Moments of realization, moments of disappointment and moments of loss and regret.

The Rest of It:

Charles is a time machine repairman on Minor Universe 31. Technically, he is like the auto club for time machines. When a machine fails, he travels across time to fix it. But, these “repairs” are often needed because people go back in time to change the past, and that’s something that should never be done. He runs into all types of people, with his robotic dog by his side, but he’s got problems of his own. In a moment of rash judgment, he shoots his future self. Now, THAT’s a problem. To further complicate things, he comes across a book he’s written, a survival guide for living in a science fictional universe. But at the point of discovery, he’s already gone against much of what it recommends.

How to Live Safely in a Science Fictional Universe was wonderful but in a totally weird, quirky way. Parts of it were absolutely touching and sweet and parts of were complete mind benders.

It’s really a book about so many things. The relationship between Charles and his family is achingly sad. Charles yearns for so much more, and he doesn’t really understand where things went wrong, so he re-lives moments over and over again in order to gain an understanding. It’s a book about self-discovery, about love and loss but it’s also very funny. There are lots of funny moments to chuckle over.

Fans of science fiction will certainly enjoy this one, but readers who enjoy “what if” scenarios will enjoy this one too. I found myself working stuff out in my head (sort of like what I did when I watched Back to the Future III and thought, wth??)

This was a fun, completely different book. The story was very unique and thoughtful. I’m so glad I read it.

Side Note: I was looking up information on the author and came across this article. Turns out that Yu is a director for the Oscar-winning Digital Domain, a visual effects company. This article also includes Yu’s top ten time travel books. Very interesting.

Source: Borrowed.