So the book club won a competition and through my letterbox five beautiful hardback copies of An Ocean of Minutes by Thea Lim arrived. I practically needed a fork lift truck when I rocked up at the meeting last month, a swap system was quickly conjured up to ensure we could all read it before the next meeting and away we went.
I was not alone in loving the concept for the book - a deadly virus is sweeping the world, time travel has been invented and Polly willing agrees to travel forward to 1993 in order to save the love of her life Frank. They agree a time and a place to meet in the future only Polly arrives late and Frank is not there.
Don't let the concept of time travel and deadly virus put you off though, this book really isn't that kind of novel (although I do love a good apocalypse). One member of the group described it as an anti romance and was probably spot on.
I loved the flashbacks to the 80s when Frank and Polly first met. I thought in particular the section with Frank and the furniture was particularly beautiful. I would have been happy to read a whole book of just these parts but then it would have veered along the lines of all the other romance books out there and wouldn't have been the strange, different dystopia that it was.
I also liked the themes running throughout the book, particularly immigration and how the time travellers (who I think originally were all United States citizens) were classed as a different lower class than those who had never travelled. I thought Lim's point about how Polly was presumed white when a high level worker and not when demoted was a good one but would have preferred more subtlety to allow the reader to realise this for themselves instead of it being hammered home.
A few of us struggled with Lim's descriptions of her new world and the link ups between the plot but most struggled with Polly. We were frustrated by her lack of common sense at the start when signing up to travel and then again once arriving. We didn't sympathise with her and didn't feel the fear that she must have felt when arriving in the late 90s with no sign of Frank.
We were mixed about the ending - perfect for the book, not bothered (as not liking Polly enough), disappointed - which reflected really our views of the book in whole. A wide range of scores were given with it averaging a 4.
The link to the book at the top of the page takes you to the Facebook page of King's book shop in Callendar, a lovely second hand book shop stuffed full of every type of book imaginable minus the 7 I bought last time I was there.
Next book is The Monogram Murders by Sophie Hannah. Our first encounter with Mr Poirot!
I was not alone in loving the concept for the book - a deadly virus is sweeping the world, time travel has been invented and Polly willing agrees to travel forward to 1993 in order to save the love of her life Frank. They agree a time and a place to meet in the future only Polly arrives late and Frank is not there.
Don't let the concept of time travel and deadly virus put you off though, this book really isn't that kind of novel (although I do love a good apocalypse). One member of the group described it as an anti romance and was probably spot on.
I loved the flashbacks to the 80s when Frank and Polly first met. I thought in particular the section with Frank and the furniture was particularly beautiful. I would have been happy to read a whole book of just these parts but then it would have veered along the lines of all the other romance books out there and wouldn't have been the strange, different dystopia that it was.
I also liked the themes running throughout the book, particularly immigration and how the time travellers (who I think originally were all United States citizens) were classed as a different lower class than those who had never travelled. I thought Lim's point about how Polly was presumed white when a high level worker and not when demoted was a good one but would have preferred more subtlety to allow the reader to realise this for themselves instead of it being hammered home.
A few of us struggled with Lim's descriptions of her new world and the link ups between the plot but most struggled with Polly. We were frustrated by her lack of common sense at the start when signing up to travel and then again once arriving. We didn't sympathise with her and didn't feel the fear that she must have felt when arriving in the late 90s with no sign of Frank.
We were mixed about the ending - perfect for the book, not bothered (as not liking Polly enough), disappointed - which reflected really our views of the book in whole. A wide range of scores were given with it averaging a 4.
The link to the book at the top of the page takes you to the Facebook page of King's book shop in Callendar, a lovely second hand book shop stuffed full of every type of book imaginable minus the 7 I bought last time I was there.
Next book is The Monogram Murders by Sophie Hannah. Our first encounter with Mr Poirot!
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