Reviews tagging 'War'

The Ministry of Time by Kaliane Bradley

147 reviews

adventurous emotional funny mysterious reflective fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven: A mix
Strong character development: Yes
Loveable characters: Yes
Diverse cast of characters: Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

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adventurous funny medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven: A mix
Strong character development: Yes
Loveable characters: Yes
Diverse cast of characters: Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

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adventurous challenging dark emotional informative mysterious reflective sad tense slow-paced

Beautiful writing. The ending felt a bit rushed.

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adventurous mysterious medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven: A mix
Strong character development: Yes
Loveable characters: Yes
Diverse cast of characters: Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

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adventurous emotional funny reflective fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven: Character
Loveable characters: Yes
Diverse cast of characters: Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

Alright its a five stars, but also broke my heart

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adventurous challenging funny mysterious sad tense medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven: A mix
Strong character development: Yes
Loveable characters: Yes
Diverse cast of characters: Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

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adventurous emotional funny mysterious reflective sad medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven: A mix
Strong character development: Complicated
Loveable characters: Yes
Diverse cast of characters: Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus: Complicated

This was so good, I don’t know why it took me months to review. I already know this will be one of my favorite books this year. 
Beautiful composition, balancing the fun time travel adventure romp with more grave issues and ideas. 

As an EFL speaker, I really do not understand why everyone is complaining about the vocabulary in this. The style of narration fits the MC perfectly and your reading flow isn’t hindered by not knowing exactly how the rain is falling. 


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adventurous emotional mysterious tense medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven: A mix
Strong character development: Yes
Loveable characters: Yes
Diverse cast of characters: Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

Listen, I'm not a sci-fi girlie, but I wanted to branch out from my go-to genre (romance)--and this was said to have some romance so I thought it was a good starting point.

Maybe it's just because I don't read this genre often, but I found the first two-thirds so hard to get into. There are only 10 chapters (plus a few pages before each that give an account from Graham's perspective), and they're LONG, which made it feel like it was taking forever to get through. Sometimes it got hard to follow plot-wise, but that's only partly because of the long chapters and mostly because I'm not a sci-fi girlie.

That being said, I really liked the characters--especially Graham and Maggie--though I found the narrator kind of felt a bit like an unreliable narrator at times (though maybe that was the point?). And I was genuinely surprised by a few of the plot twists at the end!

TLDR: I didn't dislike it, but it's not something I'll reread. Chapters were too long, but really liked the characters.

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adventurous dark emotional funny mysterious reflective slow-paced
Plot or Character Driven: A mix
Strong character development: Yes
Loveable characters: Yes
Diverse cast of characters: Complicated
Flaws of characters a main focus: No

The time travel in this book makes little sense. But that's okay, because it's simply a device to reach the point, which is less about time travel and more about people.

There are some very well-presented insights into culture and cultural transition. Some of my favourite parts of this book were when past and present attitudes were compared.

The pace was a bit off in the middle - lots of rehashing the same ground. But the end made up for it. A solid 4/5.

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adventurous funny fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven: A mix
Strong character development: Complicated
Loveable characters: Yes
Diverse cast of characters: Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

I wish the book had had a stronger single thesis, or perhaps I am simply reading it wrong. 

The first half was delightful and because I had seen only mixed reviews about the book I kept wondering "what is going to go wrong in the second half?"

Then I guessed something that, I'm not certain the author is really hiding from the reader, and I thought I know what would mar the ending. But that element was used more interestingly than I expected. 

What really made this a three star for me and not something higher is that the first 70% or so of the book felt like it was building towards something narratively and thematically but ultimately that was messy. I think the messiness might work for the narrative but I wanted more clarity around theme.

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