A review by miak2
The Time Traveler's Wife by Audrey Niffenegger

challenging dark emotional reflective sad slow-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? A mix
  • Strong character development? No
  • Loveable characters? No
  • Diverse cast of characters? No
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.5

 
"My whole life is one long déjà vu " p. 175


In all honesty, closer to a 3-star read, but I'm giving it four because the concept is so unique and really fleshed out.

I'll start with what's great about this book, which is its concept. Generally, any piece of media that involves time travel is usually pretty wonky with its rules, but this one has very rigid rules and refuses to waver from them. And it's not complicated either - he time travels, involuntarily, usually to the past but occasionally to the future. Every time he does, he arrives completely naked, no clothing, no possessions, nothing artificial. He has no ability to change events, only witness and experience them (I was going to put a time-travel reference here but, as I stated earlier, most things play it pretty loose with the rules of changing the past).

And Niffenegger is freaking ingenious with the way that Henry's time traveling impacts his life - scenarios he might end up in, the advantages and disadvantages that befall him, etc. Seriously, the concept is already creative to start with, but what she does with it is really tremendous. Major kudos.

But, unfortunately it was a unique story told around a couple that I wasn't invested in in the slightest. Neither Henry nor Clare were all that likeable, and while I'm all for an unlikeable narrator when it serves a purpose, I was meant to root for this couple and I found that I really couldn't care less about either of them. As you'd expect, I really enjoyed parts of the book that involved his time traveling, but I felt the book really dragged when it was taking place in the present (and with a 500+ page book, I'd expect every page to either be entertaining or serve a purpose because that's a big commitment). And despite its length, I thought several parts of the book were severely underdeveloped, such as Henry's relationship with Ingrid, or his meetings with Ben (which were important for all of, like, three pages, and then Ben showed up later and I was like...who's this?)

Also, Niffenegger included a lot of sex, but not in, like, a porny way, but in a "hey author, are you okay, this seems to be an unhealthy obsession that maybe you should talk to someone about" kind of way. At one point Clare was thinking about, and I quote, "the feeling of being permeated by [Henry]. p. 423. Shudders . The characters would fairly often just...I don't know, slip into thinking about (to use the words she frequently used) 'c*cks' and 'c*nts'. I wish I'd read this on an e-reader just to easily see how many time she used these words.

Like I said, without the creativity and diligent effort the author put into the time traveling aspect, this book would barely scratch three stars for me, but I enjoyed those parts so much that it really saved an otherwise slow and frustrating novel. 
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