Dispel Illusion (Impossible Times, #3)

by Mark Lawrence

Life in general, and human intelligence in particular, had once seemed an inconsequential complication in the world of physics; but the more we learned, the more intelligence had revealed itself to be a fundamental mystery at the heart of everything, deeper than the dances of stars and galaxies.

‘Well, normally, if you go back in time you vanish and nobody – past, present or future – ever sees you in your timeline again. That’s because the act of you arriving back in the past splits off a new timeline. So you can murder your father before you were born, should you be moved to do so, and there’s no paradox because you arrived from a different timeline where he remained unmurdered.’ ‘Is unmurdered a word?’ Mia asked. ‘Big picture. Keep your eyes on the prize.’