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4.12 AVERAGE
4.12 AVERAGE
adventurous
challenging
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:
Complicated
"You were my family before any of them. I've missed you even when I didn't remember you. Everything I've done since losing you has been about getting back to you".
This book hurt so badly in the best possible way.
Joe felt very real to me. He spent the whole book lost and hopeless. His love for his daughter was so touching and emotional.
Okay, I did figure out his identity before the big reveal but I don't care. The moment he lost his memory just about killed me. It was so sad. It was such a nice wrap up.
If you like confusing and mind bending reads that also make you cry this is the book for you!
This book hurt so badly in the best possible way.
Joe felt very real to me. He spent the whole book lost and hopeless. His love for his daughter was so touching and emotional.
Okay, I did figure out his identity before the big reveal but I don't care. The moment he lost his memory just about killed me. It was so sad. It was such a nice wrap up.
If you like confusing and mind bending reads that also make you cry this is the book for you!
adventurous
emotional
mysterious
slow-paced
adventurous
challenging
emotional
mysterious
reflective
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
adventurous
mysterious
fast-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
Plot
Strong character development:
Yes
Loveable characters:
Yes
Diverse cast of characters:
Yes
Flaws of characters a main focus:
Complicated
An excellent time travelling/alternate universe historical fiction that really sucked me in! It jumps between times and perspectives and has some epistolary writing as well, all of which was very fun to piece together. I picked up a copy in Edinburgh and the world-building was extra special having explored the city and castle it describes. And who doesn’t love some gay sailors/pirates?
Content Warnings
Graphic: War
Moderate: Panic attacks/disorders, Physical abuse, Racism, Self harm, Slavery, Fire/Fire injury
Minor: Child death, Sexual violence, Suicide, Murder
adventurous
emotional
hopeful
reflective
sad
medium-paced
adventurous
challenging
dark
emotional
mysterious
sad
medium-paced
Plot or Character Driven:
A mix
Strong character development:
Complicated
Loveable characters:
Complicated
Oh man, I have so many thoughts and feelings about this book! And knowing my limited skills as a reviewer, I probably won't be able to verbalise them to anyone's satisfaction, but I'll give it a go! I try very hard not to outright spoil anything, but you will want to know as little as possible going in so MILD SPOILER WARNING I guess.
First of all, from a technical standpoint, I have no complaints! I found the writing enjoyable and engaging from jump, and the slow unwinding of the mystery was deftly handled. The beginning was a bit slow, but the author did a good job of throwing intriguing hooks at the reader just often enough to propel me forward pretty painlessly. I will say, though, that the slow rationing of information was a little bit transparent at times. Like, when there's, say, a letter with a lot of information, but then there's always a reason why the protagonist has to stop reading partway through so that everything isn't revealed in one go. That's pretty blatant, but honestly I just made myself be okay with it. Much like when I read N. K. Jemisin's The Fifth Season, I just had to be like "right, I don't get what's going on and clearly the author doesn't want me to know yet so I'm just along for the ride until she deems it's time to tell me". Which is kind of a funny way to approach a book, but it works for me. The twist in this book shouldn't be hard to figure out, but I guess I didn't really put very much effort into it either because it hit me real hard when it happened. And I'm glad I didn't because when everything finally clicked into place, I was ABSOLUTELY DISTRAUGHT, and I'm glad I didn't spoil that for myself by wasting time trying to outsmart the book. Or maybe I'm just dumb, who knows! Either way, I win.
The timeline hopping did get a bit complicated and I definitely should've drawn myself a timeline. I don't have a head for remembering years, so every time the narration hopped around, I had to check back to an earlier chapter to see where we were, relative to the rest of the story. That did get a bit annoying, but I suppose that's mostly on me. I also never really fully grasped the historical timeline and the changes that were happening, which was probably a bit unfortunate, but didn't mar my enjoyment too badly in the grand scheme of things.
Okay, now for the plot and character stuff. Again, no major spoilers but proceed with caution!
I don't really know quite what to say about the characters and their dynamics because that shit got SO COMPLICATED. I will say, I really loved the main characters. They were pretty terrible, but oh how I loved them. I was, however, pretty bothered by the speed at which characters were introduced and often discarded. There was something pretty chilling about the fact that a relatively major character would die, and it would be glossed over so fast that I would have to go back and re-read that paragraph like three more times to make sure I hadn't misunderstood. The book was also pretty violent in many instances, and the violence was not just committed by "the bad guys", nor always even for good reasons or causes. To root for the main characters - and the main romance - you had to make yourself okay with some pretty disturbing stuff. And I'm not usually great at that. But I honestly feel like this book was pulling the same kind of timeline-changing-memory-erasing shit on me as it was on its characters, because it was surprisingly hard to remember all the terrible things the characters had done by the end. Blame the biased point of view character, I suppose. Or perhaps it just became easier to understand and sympathise with, even if it didn't make it okay.
I was expecting this book to be a lot more romance-focused and initially was a bit bummed that it wasn't, but in hindsight it makes perfect sense. This book could not have leaned any harder on the romance without running into some serious informed consent issues - as one often does with time travel shenanigans - so I'm glad it was handled the way that it was. And it WAS romantic! More in a Greek tragedy kind of way than a swoony, steamy fantasy romance kind of way, but it reeeallly got to me. It's honestly kind of irritating that apparently all you have to do to get a five star out of me is make me cry, but legit I BAWLED at the end of this book. And then for a good 30 minutes afterward, which has been rare lately! I haven't cried this hard at a book since I last re-read The Lord of the Rings in October, and that does weigh quite a bit when it comes to my metrics for impactful books. Just... the way the twist threw the entire book in a different light and suddenly everything that happened in the earlier parts just became twice as heartbreaking... I couldn't stop thinking about it for a long time afterward, which was NOT IDEAL because it was past 3 am and I should've been sleeping. This is definitely one of those books that I wanted to start over again immediately once I was done, because I just knew I would bawl from cover to cover the second time around. I haven't been interested in reading books that are all sadness porn or grimdark lately, because who has that kind of energy, but I can't tell you how good it felt to be utterly destroyed by a book again. And this wasn't a sadness-fest all the way through, mostly it was just mysterious and intense and a bit confusing, and then the author drew the curtain and hit you in the face with a frying pan made of GRIEF.
So yeah, it hit me super hard. But again, to be that invested in the central characters and their relationships, you have to look past some pretty effed up shit. I am not surprised if some people run into a serious morality issue on whether one or both of the main characters even deserve a happy ending or a romance. I cannot say that I'm confident they do. But I don't know what to tell you, my morality hurled itself overboard about 30% in and then I was just okay with it I guess. But it wasn't that kind of a romance book anyway, so I think you can still enjoy it without rooting for the characters, per se.
The ending itself I found pretty anticlimactic, though. Not enough to ruin the book for me, clearly, but it rushed to tie a pretty neat bow on a really messy tangle of string and I'm not 100% satisfied with how that was handled. It seriously felt a bit like someone just slapped an "And then they lived happily ever after" sticker on the ending, which was... a bit underwhelming after such an intense and messy story. But oh well, I think we all did kinda needed the catharsis at that point.
Maybe I'll come back with more points in the future (because I will, undoubtedly, keep thinking about this book for a WHILE), but for now: I am destroyed, I want to cry for a million years, Natasha Pulley has murdered me, a good time was had.
First of all, from a technical standpoint, I have no complaints! I found the writing enjoyable and engaging from jump, and the slow unwinding of the mystery was deftly handled. The beginning was a bit slow, but the author did a good job of throwing intriguing hooks at the reader just often enough to propel me forward pretty painlessly. I will say, though, that the slow rationing of information was a little bit transparent at times. Like, when there's, say, a letter with a lot of information, but then there's always a reason why the protagonist has to stop reading partway through so that everything isn't revealed in one go. That's pretty blatant, but honestly I just made myself be okay with it. Much like when I read N. K. Jemisin's The Fifth Season, I just had to be like "right, I don't get what's going on and clearly the author doesn't want me to know yet so I'm just along for the ride until she deems it's time to tell me". Which is kind of a funny way to approach a book, but it works for me. The twist in this book shouldn't be hard to figure out, but I guess I didn't really put very much effort into it either because it hit me real hard when it happened. And I'm glad I didn't because when everything finally clicked into place, I was ABSOLUTELY DISTRAUGHT, and I'm glad I didn't spoil that for myself by wasting time trying to outsmart the book. Or maybe I'm just dumb, who knows! Either way, I win.
The timeline hopping did get a bit complicated and I definitely should've drawn myself a timeline. I don't have a head for remembering years, so every time the narration hopped around, I had to check back to an earlier chapter to see where we were, relative to the rest of the story. That did get a bit annoying, but I suppose that's mostly on me. I also never really fully grasped the historical timeline and the changes that were happening, which was probably a bit unfortunate, but didn't mar my enjoyment too badly in the grand scheme of things.
Okay, now for the plot and character stuff. Again, no major spoilers but proceed with caution!
I don't really know quite what to say about the characters and their dynamics because that shit got SO COMPLICATED. I will say, I really loved the main characters. They were pretty terrible, but oh how I loved them. I was, however, pretty bothered by the speed at which characters were introduced and often discarded. There was something pretty chilling about the fact that a relatively major character would die, and it would be glossed over so fast that I would have to go back and re-read that paragraph like three more times to make sure I hadn't misunderstood. The book was also pretty violent in many instances, and the violence was not just committed by "the bad guys", nor always even for good reasons or causes. To root for the main characters - and the main romance - you had to make yourself okay with some pretty disturbing stuff. And I'm not usually great at that. But I honestly feel like this book was pulling the same kind of timeline-changing-memory-erasing shit on me as it was on its characters, because it was surprisingly hard to remember all the terrible things the characters had done by the end. Blame the biased point of view character, I suppose. Or perhaps it just became easier to understand and sympathise with, even if it didn't make it okay.
I was expecting this book to be a lot more romance-focused and initially was a bit bummed that it wasn't, but in hindsight it makes perfect sense. This book could not have leaned any harder on the romance without running into some serious informed consent issues - as one often does with time travel shenanigans - so I'm glad it was handled the way that it was. And it WAS romantic! More in a Greek tragedy kind of way than a swoony, steamy fantasy romance kind of way, but it reeeallly got to me. It's honestly kind of irritating that apparently all you have to do to get a five star out of me is make me cry, but legit I BAWLED at the end of this book. And then for a good 30 minutes afterward, which has been rare lately! I haven't cried this hard at a book since I last re-read The Lord of the Rings in October, and that does weigh quite a bit when it comes to my metrics for impactful books. Just... the way the twist threw the entire book in a different light and suddenly everything that happened in the earlier parts just became twice as heartbreaking... I couldn't stop thinking about it for a long time afterward, which was NOT IDEAL because it was past 3 am and I should've been sleeping. This is definitely one of those books that I wanted to start over again immediately once I was done, because I just knew I would bawl from cover to cover the second time around. I haven't been interested in reading books that are all sadness porn or grimdark lately, because who has that kind of energy, but I can't tell you how good it felt to be utterly destroyed by a book again. And this wasn't a sadness-fest all the way through, mostly it was just mysterious and intense and a bit confusing, and then the author drew the curtain and hit you in the face with a frying pan made of GRIEF.
So yeah, it hit me super hard. But again, to be that invested in the central characters and their relationships, you have to look past some pretty effed up shit. I am not surprised if some people run into a serious morality issue on whether one or both of the main characters even deserve a happy ending or a romance. I cannot say that I'm confident they do. But I don't know what to tell you, my morality hurled itself overboard about 30% in and then I was just okay with it I guess. But it wasn't that kind of a romance book anyway, so I think you can still enjoy it without rooting for the characters, per se.
The ending itself I found pretty anticlimactic, though. Not enough to ruin the book for me, clearly, but it rushed to tie a pretty neat bow on a really messy tangle of string and I'm not 100% satisfied with how that was handled. It seriously felt a bit like someone just slapped an "And then they lived happily ever after" sticker on the ending, which was... a bit underwhelming after such an intense and messy story. But oh well, I think we all did kinda needed the catharsis at that point.
Maybe I'll come back with more points in the future (because I will, undoubtedly, keep thinking about this book for a WHILE), but for now: I am destroyed, I want to cry for a million years, Natasha Pulley has murdered me, a good time was had.
emotional
hopeful
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
Absolutely adored this. It broke my brain in the best way and was all I could think about while reading. I went into it with very little information, which I think is the ideal reading experience. Pulley is exceptionally good at mirroring the main character's amnesia and confusion by just dropping the reader into an unfamiliar world and builds the perfect tension for the reader between needing to understand everything and knowing that the truth will almost certainly be devastating. The secondary characters were beautifully drawn and I'd read spinoffs about any and all of them - my kingdom (pun intended) for a Revelation Wellesley sapphic romance, and the detail about the duck on his daughter's nightshirt will stick with me for a long time. Some more thoughts behind a spoiler tag, but I strongly recommend going in blind!
As with all things timey-wimey, it's best not to think about it too hard, but the story's internal logic makes sense and Pulley stays committed to it, minus the slightly too-convenient return of Joe's memories at the end. I also appreciated that this would be nearly impossible to convert to a visual medium, barring some kind of Fight Club-esque bait and switch. With a lot of cultural focus on TV/movie adaptations of successful books, it's satisfying to experience a piece of art perfectly suited to its medium. My only quibble is how neatly the twins seemed to slot in as Joe's lost children - with his memories returning, I think there would be some more trauma to grapple with at his losses. But I recognize that the characters had already been through a lot at that point, so the happy ending still felt earned and deserved.
Content Warnings
Graphic: Violence, Fire/Fire injury
emotional
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