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Books about Non-Consensual Time Travel
Jan. 21st, 2011 08:04 amWhy yes, I do read so much fantasy/science fiction/pulp that I can have a category that specific :)
The problem with try-before-you-buy books is that the first quarter of the book may not reflect the whole. I loved the first quarter of Jerry and Sharon Ahern's Written in Time so much, I considered buying that month's webscription, just so I could get dribbles faster. The premise was so cool! Modern author receives a picture of his family -- in perfect 19th century clothes. They come to believe they really will travel back in time at some unknown future point and start planning how to best prepare for this. What a great setup! Unfortunately, the Aherns slide through all the fun logistic challenges this poses and instead add a villain and science fiction-y plot twists. *sighs*
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james_nicoll's journal recommended L. Sprague de Camp's Lest Darkness Fall as the very bestest, most realistic time travel story. In retrospect, I think I'd've enjoyed it more if they hadn't praised it so highly, but then again, considering I couldn't get it at the library, I probably wouldn't've read it if they hadn't. Yes, it treats clothes-on-your-back time travel more realistically than most - the main character never builds a gun, for instance - but it's still not =great=. Actually, he gets his seed money from teaching Arabic numerals to the clerks of sixth century Rome and uses that to make a brandy distillery. I still don't understand why brandy would be such a hot commodity, but ok. If you liked A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court, you may be okay with how he escapes and befriends the authorities and changes the course of history, but it was definitely more pulp-y than I expected. Maybe that's just the way they wrote in the 30s. Many thanks again to he who got me the latter.
The problem with try-before-you-buy books is that the first quarter of the book may not reflect the whole. I loved the first quarter of Jerry and Sharon Ahern's Written in Time so much, I considered buying that month's webscription, just so I could get dribbles faster. The premise was so cool! Modern author receives a picture of his family -- in perfect 19th century clothes. They come to believe they really will travel back in time at some unknown future point and start planning how to best prepare for this. What a great setup! Unfortunately, the Aherns slide through all the fun logistic challenges this poses and instead add a villain and science fiction-y plot twists. *sighs*
james_nicoll's journal recommended L. Sprague de Camp's Lest Darkness Fall as the very bestest, most realistic time travel story. In retrospect, I think I'd've enjoyed it more if they hadn't praised it so highly, but then again, considering I couldn't get it at the library, I probably wouldn't've read it if they hadn't. Yes, it treats clothes-on-your-back time travel more realistically than most - the main character never builds a gun, for instance - but it's still not =great=. Actually, he gets his seed money from teaching Arabic numerals to the clerks of sixth century Rome and uses that to make a brandy distillery. I still don't understand why brandy would be such a hot commodity, but ok. If you liked A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court, you may be okay with how he escapes and befriends the authorities and changes the course of history, but it was definitely more pulp-y than I expected. Maybe that's just the way they wrote in the 30s. Many thanks again to he who got me the latter.