Review by mimsyb - The Ministry of Time

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mimsyb 's review for:

The Ministry of Time by Kaliane Bradley

2.0

funny mysterious sad medium-paced

Plot or Character Driven: A mix

Strong character development: No

Loveable characters: No

Diverse cast of characters: Yes

Flaws of characters a main focus: Yes

I adored the beginning of this book. I love the concept so much, I found the beginning engaging, and I really enjoyed the writing style. Consequently I will read Bradley's short stories, and an excellent sequel would make me increase this rating significantly. I love the cover. Unfortunately the book by itself was ultimately quite disappointing to me. The author described the book's take-away as

"we don't need time travel to change ourselves, look to the future, and make the future more beautiful."

I wish I agreed. Only the very last page addresses that, and I struggled to believe it given everything that had happened. What am I missing? The book left me feeling that

the future would stay bad or worsen, change is hard, and some people are doomed to failure.

Not true, but depressing.

Good: There is a lot of clever, humorous skewering of racist remarks and micro-aggressions the main character had experienced. The author uses a lot of fun vocabulary words and interesting descriptions. If the British slang, words drug from long gone historical eras, and arcane vocabulary get a little dense and sometimes ungoogle-able, or if a few descriptions didn't land--well, I want to see more of this style, so I can overlook that. I wish I hadn't googled vocab so much.

Detailed, frequently lustful descriptions of several people's bodies are rampant. That was especially frustrating given the general lack of character development. I kept wondering if the plot was building towards person x and y being in love, or x and z, or z and y, etc. ***Mood spoilers for the ending and very general allusions to plot in the rest of this review***

While one of those romances does suddenly happen

, we never seem to learn the things about these characters that the book teasingly hides from us-- things that would make the romances or friendships so much sweeter. In fact the MC acknowledges her lack of insight about the other characters numerous times; nothing changes.

Worse, I felt the events in the last 25% of the book really ruined any enjoyment of the romance because

the MC continues to treat her lover badly, never really reforms, and he understandably hates her and leaves her for it.

The very end of the book is

somewhat ambiguous and potentially hopeful

but I struggled to feel that a few vague paragraphs really offset the second half of the book. I felt unsatisfied and disappointed. The MC spent so much time discussing racism and the way that racialized people should or shouldn't act, but it was ultimately very hard to tell what her ultimate conclusions were or if she had changed as a result of her own self-flagellations. It reminded me of Katniss Everdeen's attitude at the end of the Hunger Games, which seemed problematic given that the MC, unlike Everdeen, recognizes she's made a lot of mistakes.

Of course it's a nuanced subject, the author doesn't necessarily owe us anything, the passages probably weren't written for white people to understand!, the MC was part of

a horrible system that bears a lot of blame

, and is a complex, flawed person. Perhaps I'm missing something. Ultimately it was confusing, very sad, and unsatisfying that the (at first) lovable MC is

morally gray and never really reforms

. That's how life is, but I just didn't want to read about that in fiction today, hence my rating.

Content Warnings