July 2021: An Ocean of Minutes

[Reera, Bookmaster]

Happy July! This month we will be reading Thea Lim's time travel dystopia An Ocean of Minutes .

Set in America amidst a deadly flu pandemic, the book follows Polly, who signs a contract with a time-travel company to be sent on a one-way-trip into the future to work as a bonded laborer in exchange for life-saving treatment for her boyfriend, Frank. But when Polly is re-routed an extra five years into the future, she is left stranded in a transformed and divided America, with Frank nowhere in sight.

This book was shortlisted for the 2018 Scotiabank Giller Prize. Obviously, it'll be a much darker read from last month's rom-com, but that's the fun of being a part of this book club. We diversify our reading!

[Nina]

An Ocean of Minutes is a poetic and beautiful story. Lim manages to not only describe in detail Polly's experience navigating life after time travel, but also makes the reader feel the constant tension of 1) things never going the way we intend, 2) how relentlessly little control Polly has over her life the moment she decides to use it to save Frank, and 3) the realization of things never being the way they once were.

I'm sure we've all had experiences where we go back to somewhere from our past and realize that it has lost the magic that made it what it was. The melancholy of knowing things will never be as they were is a constant background to An Ocean of Minutes.

I really desperately wanted Polly and Frank's happy ending, but I'm not disappointed with how Lim decided to resolve their relationship. I'm going to be thinking about this book for days to come.