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3.69 AVERAGE
3.69 AVERAGE
dark
emotional
mysterious
tense
fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
No
Diverse cast of characters:
N/A
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Complicated
Satire
In Time’s Arrow, Martin Amis attempts to tackle the horror of the Holocaust in a story told backwards. Opening with the death of an elderly doctor in the USA, it rewinds his life through relationships, his career and name changes before returning to the secrets of his past. It is narrated by an impotent detached soul-like consciousness that seems constantly baffled by the backwards-running world around it, never passing judgment on what it witnesses. This literary conceit goes some way to exposing the horrific absurdity of genocide but it ends up placing the reader too far removed from the reality, making it more of a clever narrative device to be deciphered and admired.
challenging
dark
sad
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Character
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
No
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
devastating images and deeply ironic makes u realize how life is so meaningless and nonsensical plus there’s a crazy twist ending 4.5/5 <3
challenging
dark
funny
fast-paced
I came to this short book expecting a unique but easy, breezy read-through that I could use to decompress from some of the thicker, denser novels I'd finished lately. Boy was I wrong. In under 200 pages, this book manages to be funny, profound and quite challenging, something which I needed to carefully think about after reading a dozen pages in each sitting rather than something I could easily inhale in a day. The premise of this book is that we experience life through the eyes of powerless narrator in a world in which nourishment comes from the toilet, material possessions arrive via divine fire and the abyss of the trash heap, men break up with women before starting their relationship, and everyone, everywhere always seems to be giving you money. The narrator is a consciousness moving backwards in time beginning at the end of the 20th century, entirely ignorant of the natural way of arranging cause and effect, slave to the ignorant whims of his host: Tod Friendly, incapable of any action beyond thought and observation.
This is not the first time I've seen a premise like this, but it is the first time I've seen a book commit to this idea to such laborious extent. The result is a truly strange thought experiment that is so contrary to the way we understand stories and requires us to constantly and actively think in order to decipher what is happening in the perspective of someone travelling backwards. But more than a thought experiment, it rises to a fine novel in it's own right, which manages to construct such a strange and poignant series of observations by flipping one dimension on its head. The beginning of the book is charming in the narrator's wonder, his curious innocent observations and his sad bewilderment with the incomprehensible nature of the world. The writing is well-thought and intelligent, but after the first hundred pages a reader might ask if there's anything more to this book: sure it's entertaining and occasionally thought-provoking to witness the 20th century in reverse, but is it at all cogent or applicable to our cause-effect world? Is it any more than creative but irrelevant fantasy? Yes. Because rather than being just a more fleshed out version of that famed reversed film-reel in Slaughterhouse V in which atrocities and wars become visions of healing and restoration, the book forges ahead into events of historic horror, in which the direction one perceives both cancels out its atrocity and accentuates it to a heady degree. I must remain vague for plot purposes, but it works to such a breathtaking creative effect, sticking to the rules established in the book, but changing the effects dramatically.
The story is thought-provoking and rarely cheats its own rules, however I find the prose to be a bit of a weakness. It is clearly trying, reaching for profundity in occasional philosophical moments, but these never work all that well and these sections become awkward and unwieldy in their confused imagery and zany sophomoric imitations of stronger post-war writers like Vonnegut, Roth and Updike. The story provides much depth to stew over and works magically, in spite of a somewhat ambitious but cluttered style of prose.
This is not the first time I've seen a premise like this, but it is the first time I've seen a book commit to this idea to such laborious extent. The result is a truly strange thought experiment that is so contrary to the way we understand stories and requires us to constantly and actively think in order to decipher what is happening in the perspective of someone travelling backwards. But more than a thought experiment, it rises to a fine novel in it's own right, which manages to construct such a strange and poignant series of observations by flipping one dimension on its head. The beginning of the book is charming in the narrator's wonder, his curious innocent observations and his sad bewilderment with the incomprehensible nature of the world. The writing is well-thought and intelligent, but after the first hundred pages a reader might ask if there's anything more to this book: sure it's entertaining and occasionally thought-provoking to witness the 20th century in reverse, but is it at all cogent or applicable to our cause-effect world? Is it any more than creative but irrelevant fantasy? Yes. Because rather than being just a more fleshed out version of that famed reversed film-reel in Slaughterhouse V in which atrocities and wars become visions of healing and restoration, the book forges ahead into events of historic horror, in which the direction one perceives both cancels out its atrocity and accentuates it to a heady degree. I must remain vague for plot purposes, but it works to such a breathtaking creative effect, sticking to the rules established in the book, but changing the effects dramatically.
The story is thought-provoking and rarely cheats its own rules, however I find the prose to be a bit of a weakness. It is clearly trying, reaching for profundity in occasional philosophical moments, but these never work all that well and these sections become awkward and unwieldy in their confused imagery and zany sophomoric imitations of stronger post-war writers like Vonnegut, Roth and Updike. The story provides much depth to stew over and works magically, in spite of a somewhat ambitious but cluttered style of prose.
emotional
reflective
sad
tense
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
No
Diverse cast of characters:
No
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Yes
Time's Arrow was absolutely bizarre. This book is about a man's life going backward in time. Literally backward. Including the dialogue. It was 168 pages of pure confusion, but absolutely a writing feat. I am also a sesquipedalian, so I was super impressed by the vocabulary used in this book. It takes place during World War II so it was an interesting take on events in a unique format.
Well written, but somehow ended up feeling trite. Do we need a gimmick to make us understand? I don't think so.
Rating~ 3 stars.
I read this as part of my book club in college. The book is told in such a way that everything is happening backwards as the protagonist goes back in his own timeline. Some parts of the book were quite confusing but nevertheless it was an interesting read.
I read this as part of my book club in college. The book is told in such a way that everything is happening backwards as the protagonist goes back in his own timeline. Some parts of the book were quite confusing but nevertheless it was an interesting read.
Wow. This is a book that stays with you. The concept is incredible, the writing is intense and I am feeling rather dumbfounded. Definitely a read worth investing in. It isn't long and it will blow your mind.