It's supposed to be a cool time action/adventure travel exploration of relationships, possible morals, potentially even death; about the life you live vs the life you should have had. It ends up being a hot mess of a romantic comedy, and I assure you the comedy is few and far between (although there are a few good moments). It can be adequately summarised as feeling about as romantic as a pre-pubescent wet dream from a house in the 1950's. And it is pretentious enough to give you a chapter every few chapters to summarise the chapters you just read. In case you can't keep up, I suppose.

The book suffers from several significant problems, that shouldn't have even been problems to begin with; Mastai knew which elements to use: the anti-hero (Tom), TWO female leads who could have been absolutely spectacular (Penelope/Penny), TWO mad scientists, TWO timelines (where ours is the dystopia)...sadly, ingredients do not make fine cuisine, the chef does.

First, the setting was made hard to swallow and the writing didn't help. Dropping in words like zygomatic to describe a smile...spare me. Same for dermatoglyphs. They don't fit, they don't add to the impression that Tom's maybe not as dumb as he thinks, and considering he later explains to you what GLITTER is, I think it's safe to say it was not that great of a writing device.

Then, there's the problem with the world building. I have a high level of suspension of disbelief for fantasy and sci-fi worlds, and I'm willing to forgive some slight incongruousness, especially for those who are not yet masters of the art form. But don't tell me how this world of universal plenty, where most work is in entertainment, with little corporate competition, no scientific rivals....so then why on earth is his father so hell-bent on being the first to do this, at this particular time, in order to please his investors. For the good of humanity? No. Additionally, the world is described as though there were almost no glitches in a transition to such a place - simply having free energy doesn't just erase human nature, nor does he ever address what happens if say, a country was dependent on resources for GDP.

Then Mastai, perhaps cleverly, made this Tom's memoir, and was sure that Tom was clear to tell us he was not a very a good writer and also, not very smart. The problem with this is of course, it doesn't really give an author an excuse for poor writing, and the book just isn't very good. You don't get a pass for telling a me a book isn't very good and then expecting me to be okay with that - when you want me to read your book as a finished product. It is perfectly fine to have an anti-hero who is unlikable, for the right reasons. Tom is unlikable because he's just a whiny, self-pitying nub and quite annoying. A character, even an unlikable one, has to make me want to know his story and I really didn't care how Tom's turned out. Worse, his apparent transformation -- isn't.

Part of the problem is the writing style. As Tom's memoir, the amount of 'telling' is just mind-numbing. More importantly, as Tom's memoir, Mustai uses Tom's entire "pity-me" personality to lampshade an overwhelming amount of misogyny, and I have no patience nor time for that.

-He sleeps with four women after his mothers funeral because "It's like the grief was an offering I to them in exchange for their bodies, and for reasons I'm not insightful enough to understand, my tears turned them on". Keep in mind, he explicitly mentions that they all say "I don't know if this is a good idea" - but hey they never say no, so it's all good. Oh and hey, let's not forget the classic, "Maybe pity is a strange aphrodisiac." Screw off.

-He keeps telling us he's such a unlikable screw- up, BUT
...as a teen, the first girl he really talks to makes out with him for 4 hours and then 5 days later they're pretty much doing it
...as an adult, Penelope, the genius astronaut, the one who had this very rare reaction to space travel that makes her mind go blank when she goes into space (which this super-advanced civilisation couldn't have possibly predicted...riiiiight), finds out she can't go into space, spirals into this massive self-destructive sexual behaviour, but then decides to become a time-traveller and she is the BEST ever, thinks of nothing else but her professional career, but then she sees Tom naked and he is just so bloody irresistible, she beds him, and even though she's been wildly promiscuous, Tom gets her pregnant. He seems to be the only one who was possibly capable of doing that, and now her career is ruined again, and because she obviously has no other choice, she commits suicide.

Props for the way she does it, sad as it is, the scene itself was well done.

Then, he has the balls to say that the baby could have fixed a lot. Yes, having a baby to a fucked-up life and a fucked-up relationship almost certainly fixes everything instantly. I think that's scientifically proven somewhere. And in case we missed it the first pregnancy - Mustai uses the same theory TWICE.

...then new timeline, and he meets Penny, the alt-Penelope, and she falls in love with him within days, even though he flat out sounds like a crazy-person, and she freely admits that, as though women's safety is really just a lark anyway

Figure out the take-away. What are we to get out of this book? That you can't change the past, do the best with the life you have, there's no right way to live it, but try to do as little harm as possible? Sure, noble enough. But the only redeeming features about the book is that the chapters are short (130 two-page chapters), and the it is a quick read.

Like setting my Kindle on fire.

I will forever be baffled by the high reviews for this book. Despite have three editors thanked in the credits, it just doesn't fulfil any of the criteria for anything it sets out to be.

**WARNING**I am putting this here as a warning to any survivors - there is a sexual assault in here, that is not only not called out by name, but is implied to be 'forgiven' based on a convoluted "it-was-me-but-not-me" time-space continuum bullshit, results in a pregnancy, and everyone is happy because even though it might of happened while "he-wasn't-him", it doesn't matter because babies make everything better. There is a second sexual assault that is forgiven, because...stuff happens and he seems like a nicer guy in the morning. And the second assault happens while he is still with the victim of the first assault, but that seems to not be a deal-breaker, either. And then, in case you weren't incensed enough, it's really about the fact that The Man feels really bad about it, and thinks for half a chapter that he is really just a sexist prick anyway, so we should feel badly for HIM and it'll be ok.

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Created Nov 25, 2017 at 3:34pm • Submit your own review...