A review by katylv
Q: A Novel by Evan Mandery

2.0

I remember seeing this book as a hardback cover when it first came out a few years ago, and I was instantly interested in it. For reasons unbeknownst to me, it took me a very long time to get round to reading it. It's a very easy read, taking me only about 7 hours to read it all, and Q is a very likeable character, but that is where my praise for this book ends I'm afraid. Despite being in the title of the story, Q only features very briefly in the novel, at the beginning and end. The rest is most certainly, a story of time travel, and love rarely features in it. I thought this would interest me, but I found myself becoming more and more annoyed by the protagonist's choices involving the time travel. For one, he does not seem at all perplexed when he realises he is seeing his future self for lunch - I for one would be perplexed at this. What irritated me the most however, was the protagonist's complete belief in his future self, regardless of the form it took. Every time one came and told him to do something, he did it. Meaning that, often, he was told to do something, only to be told to do the opposite not too long after! One would think that he would realise he should choose his own path after a while, but that doesn't appear to occur to him. As well as this, I was immensely bored by his historical chapters, which presumably are meant to be the protagonist's own writing. Towards the end of the book, one of his many incarnations tells him his writing is and always will be
terrible, so why oh why does the author feel the necessity to inflict his writing onto us?! I also thought the ending was a cop out, as a writer, I felt incredibly let down by the lackluster last chapter.