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A review by skyggsja
Just One Damned Thing After Another by Jodi Taylor
adventurous
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
2.75
TLDR: cool idea for a story but amateur writing style made me roll my eyes quite often unfortunately.
I was intrigued by the summary and topics in this book and though I usually don‘t read sci-fi this book promised to be a fun, light sci-fi x fantasy read. throughout the first third of the book i was quite into it and thought the idea of a secret history organization that could time travel was quite a remarkable idea with huge possibilities and i was quite enjoying myself while reading.
throughout the last third of the book i was often rolling my eyes into the back of my head on some occasions.
The only way I could endure reading this book is by actually imagining it played out in my head like a netflix series because that‘s what reading this felt like: A mix between the diary videos that the woman names Grace takes in Avatar by James Cameron, and Gossip Girl.
It‘s super fast paced. People die and it‘s described in 3 sentences and maybe one more on the next page. They travel back in time, with a really interesting task, and it‘s story for 15% of the book and a couple of references in the last third of the book. It really feels like they‘re shooting a netflix show and told the main actress „put yourself in the situation then write down what happens and what your character might think. And make it funny.“
Sometimes there was a situation going on and half a page later there‘s suddenly something else going on. It feels a bit amateur-ish to me. Also the entire plot- In this book she gets her Job at the history department, trains to be a „historian“ who travel back in time, and they travel to the Dinosaurs. Something crazy happens which also involves her work partner, after the end of the mission it‘s revealed that something deeper had been going on in the background and she presents 360°holographic images from millions of years ago… oh and there‘s a rescue mission. This could have been Book 1. Make it 500+ pages, craft the characters well and get someone professional to read it over. I would‘ve bought it, it would‘ve been such a cool story.
Instead this is just the first 70% of the book and then she the discovers something crazy, then within 2 hours or 2 months (no idea cuz this book doesn‘t do well with time either. which is funny because it‘s about time ) they work out her plans and then they go on another crazy mission…which would‘ve been a cool plot for another 400+ page book, nice with many details and new characters and all. But ok, cram it into the last 28% of book 1.
I just cannot help but think about the plot as something like a season. The book as it is in the hands of a good Netflix SHow producer would make a pretty rad show, I‘m not gonna lie. For me personally it just doesn‘t work well as a book that‘s meant to be read and enjoyed.
Some characters feel super shallow. The main character isn‘t the worst but I also didn‘t really like her. it feels a bit ridiculous how on the one hand she seems to be a walking catastrophe, everything she touches goes wrong - and on the other hand she’s of course the only one who’s able to think deeper, spots the connections, encounters the right coincidences that end up in groundbreaking discoveries… and she’s the biggest hero as well. the guy she ends up with - naturally he‘s pretty much perfect. He cares. He cries. He asks her the right questions. He has a hard life story and he‘s also great in bed - a stallion indeed - and after they first do it there‘s no end to sexual innuendos. Yay, not personally a fan of that. And then they have that really bad bitch that nobody likes. There‘s not much more to her, she‘s just greatly disliked, will go out of her way to ruin everyone‘s day (especially, of course, the main character‘s day) and they have somewhat of a life-or-death showdown in the middle of an actual showdown with explosions and all that follows right after another showdown. there are a lot of showdowns, a lot of things also go wrong all of the time and it the end all of this got a bit boring.
I got confused with the names as well because there are quite a lot of people. In the end I just went with it and accepted that I‘ll just have no idea who‘s who. Funny though, up until I was like 72% through the book I remembered the main characters first name.
The way this book was written made it difficult for me to read it - in several ways. the language is very colloquial and i (who‘s not an english native but understands english fine enough and reads mostly english books) didn‘t understand some of the stuff that was going on, except by reading between the lies and guessing what the author meant.
The sentences are really short, short sentence follows on short sentence, follows on another short sentence. I know this from American stories and it can sometimes be funny. I remember that in the first third of the book I did find it funny in places but later on I was just like gurlll… pls write normal, i beg you.
it‘s funny when it‘s done in the right places, you know. Not almost all throughout the book ugh.
These short sentences plus the ever present ironic or sarcastic remarks really made some points of the story rather ridiculous. Sometimes in a good way, most times in a bad way, unfortunately.
The conflicts also often felt quite ridiculous. Sometimes the plot even feels ridiculous. For example when a bomb of literal shit explodes. Might work in some stories but in this one I just thought…bro why.
Oh and in the very end it turns out somebody might literally be a Muse, daughter of Zeus???? like, how random???? idk idkkkk what??
to be fair, it was a thought the main character had and she was a bit funky in the head at that moment but it was neither completely confirmed nor denied…
I‘m a little disappointed because I had fairly high hopes. I might actually read book 2 in the future, because i‘m a little curious on what they‘ll see next but if I don‘t read on it won‘t be a loss either.
I was intrigued by the summary and topics in this book and though I usually don‘t read sci-fi this book promised to be a fun, light sci-fi x fantasy read. throughout the first third of the book i was quite into it and thought the idea of a secret history organization that could time travel was quite a remarkable idea with huge possibilities and i was quite enjoying myself while reading.
throughout the last third of the book i was often rolling my eyes into the back of my head on some occasions.
The only way I could endure reading this book is by actually imagining it played out in my head like a netflix series because that‘s what reading this felt like: A mix between the diary videos that the woman names Grace takes in Avatar by James Cameron, and Gossip Girl.
It‘s super fast paced. People die and it‘s described in 3 sentences and maybe one more on the next page. They travel back in time, with a really interesting task, and it‘s story for 15% of the book and a couple of references in the last third of the book. It really feels like they‘re shooting a netflix show and told the main actress „put yourself in the situation then write down what happens and what your character might think. And make it funny.“
Sometimes there was a situation going on and half a page later there‘s suddenly something else going on. It feels a bit amateur-ish to me. Also the entire plot- In this book she gets her Job at the history department, trains to be a „historian“ who travel back in time, and they travel to the Dinosaurs. Something crazy happens which also involves her work partner, after the end of the mission it‘s revealed that something deeper had been going on in the background and she presents 360°holographic images from millions of years ago… oh and there‘s a rescue mission. This could have been Book 1. Make it 500+ pages, craft the characters well and get someone professional to read it over. I would‘ve bought it, it would‘ve been such a cool story.
Instead this is just the first 70% of the book and then she the discovers something crazy, then within 2 hours or 2 months (no idea cuz this book doesn‘t do well with time either. which is funny because it‘s about time ) they work out her plans and then they go on another crazy mission…which would‘ve been a cool plot for another 400+ page book, nice with many details and new characters and all. But ok, cram it into the last 28% of book 1.
I just cannot help but think about the plot as something like a season. The book as it is in the hands of a good Netflix SHow producer would make a pretty rad show, I‘m not gonna lie. For me personally it just doesn‘t work well as a book that‘s meant to be read and enjoyed.
Some characters feel super shallow. The main character isn‘t the worst but I also didn‘t really like her. it feels a bit ridiculous how on the one hand she seems to be a walking catastrophe, everything she touches goes wrong - and on the other hand she’s of course the only one who’s able to think deeper, spots the connections, encounters the right coincidences that end up in groundbreaking discoveries… and she’s the biggest hero as well. the guy she ends up with - naturally he‘s pretty much perfect. He cares. He cries. He asks her the right questions. He has a hard life story and he‘s also great in bed - a stallion indeed - and after they first do it there‘s no end to sexual innuendos. Yay, not personally a fan of that. And then they have that really bad bitch that nobody likes. There‘s not much more to her, she‘s just greatly disliked, will go out of her way to ruin everyone‘s day (especially, of course, the main character‘s day) and they have somewhat of a life-or-death showdown in the middle of an actual showdown with explosions and all that follows right after another showdown. there are a lot of showdowns, a lot of things also go wrong all of the time and it the end all of this got a bit boring.
I got confused with the names as well because there are quite a lot of people. In the end I just went with it and accepted that I‘ll just have no idea who‘s who. Funny though, up until I was like 72% through the book I remembered the main characters first name.
The way this book was written made it difficult for me to read it - in several ways. the language is very colloquial and i (who‘s not an english native but understands english fine enough and reads mostly english books) didn‘t understand some of the stuff that was going on, except by reading between the lies and guessing what the author meant.
The sentences are really short, short sentence follows on short sentence, follows on another short sentence. I know this from American stories and it can sometimes be funny. I remember that in the first third of the book I did find it funny in places but later on I was just like gurlll… pls write normal, i beg you.
it‘s funny when it‘s done in the right places, you know. Not almost all throughout the book ugh.
These short sentences plus the ever present ironic or sarcastic remarks really made some points of the story rather ridiculous. Sometimes in a good way, most times in a bad way, unfortunately.
The conflicts also often felt quite ridiculous. Sometimes the plot even feels ridiculous. For example when a bomb of literal shit explodes. Might work in some stories but in this one I just thought…bro why.
Oh and in the very end it turns out somebody might literally be a Muse, daughter of Zeus???? like, how random???? idk idkkkk what??
to be fair, it was a thought the main character had and she was a bit funky in the head at that moment but it was neither completely confirmed nor denied…
I‘m a little disappointed because I had fairly high hopes. I might actually read book 2 in the future, because i‘m a little curious on what they‘ll see next but if I don‘t read on it won‘t be a loss either.
Content Warnings
Moderate: Miscarriage, Sexual assault, and Vomit
Minor: Misogyny