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The Time Traveler's Wife

Audrey Niffenegger

Why we're reading this: #70 on NPR's Top 100 SF/F novels of all time (2011 poll) http://www.npr.org/2011/08/11/1390858...
# on Loc…more
[close] #70 on NPR's Top 100 SF/F novels of all time (2011 poll) http://www.npr.org/2011/08/11/1390858...
# on Locus Magazines Best SciFi novels of the 21st century http://www.locusmag.com/2012/AllCentu...

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Apr 28, 2011 Marniy rated it liked it

This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here. There were some things I liked about the book and some things that really irritated me. The peaks and valleys of enjoyment averaged out to a three star rating.
Although it is a book containing time-travel, it isn't a science-fiction book about time travel. Instead, it is a story about the relationship between two people, one of whom time travels. It is important to understand the difference because if you are searching for the chewy, sci-fi, space-time continuum, self-determination, change the pa There were some things I liked about the book and some things that really irritated me. The peaks and valleys of enjoyment averaged out to a three star rating.
Although it is a book containing time-travel, it isn't a science-fiction book about time travel. Instead, it is a story about the relationship between two people, one of whom time travels. It is important to understand the difference because if you are searching for the chewy, sci-fi, space-time continuum, self-determination, change the past and/or future tropes, you won't find it here. What happens, happens. The end.
I spent most of the second half of the book feeling like the author was cheating me out of an exciting and interesting storyline and was quite disappointed until I accepted this fact.

The author wrote some very lyrical and captivating passages but also, managed to maunder on for pages with some really awful purple, overwrought dreck that made me cringe. The most engaging writing was simply the depictions of the everyday life of being Clare and Henry.

I *hated* the tedious descriptions of dream sequences. Dream sequences for fictional characters? Pretty much the dumbest thing ever.

The huge portion of the book taken up with the infertility issues could have been reduced to half and still had the same effect. Way overdone.

I thought that the author took the lazy way out and made it easy for us to accept Henry's fate by making it so we wanted him to die at the end. She not only made him prematurely aged, but he was sickly, gray, weak, and of course, had no feet. Wow, She should have given him TB, AIDS, and gout just to make absolutely certain we didn't have any doubts remaining that he might want to die.

Despite all this, I did like the book. I enjoyed the story enough to finish and was sad about the fates of the characters. There were times when a lovely turn of phrase would take me away to a thoughtful place to consider a mental vista I hadn't explored before. It's been a long time since I've read a book that did that. ...more

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