April SFFKIT: Time Travel

We're reading time travel books in April! It's an older genre than you might think, with plenty of famous precursors that predate the 20th-century heyday of science fiction and fantasy:



While SFF certainly dominates the world of time travel, and there will be at least some hint of those genres in any time travel story, you can find time travel in other genres, too!

There's romance...



...mysteries and thrillers...



...and books for children and young adults.



But yes, it's SFF where we'll find most of our action.



Not in the mood for a whole novel? There are anthologies and single-author collections of shorter stories to choose from:



Why read stories about time travel? That's easy:



If you have a moment, we hope you'll update the wiki with your time travel choices:
https://wiki.librarything.com/index.php/2024_SFF_KIT#2024_SFFKIT%20

I'll start looking on my shelves!

Two possibilities off my shelves are The Drums of Autumn by Diana Gabaldon and Doomsday Book by Connie Willis. I also have some SFF anthologies which may or may not include time travel stories.

I’ve been dithering between The Paradox Hotel, the audiobook of which has been waiting for me to listen to, and Doomsday Book, but one of my personal categories is classic SF, so now I’ll be adding Lest Darkness Fall, The Stars My Destination, and Hawksbill Station to the contenders.

Great introduction, thanks! I won't be making plans until after my Easter holiday, though.

I'm planning on finally getting around to Doomsday Book, which I've been meaning to read for ages.

I'm planning on the Oppenheimer Alternative which has time travel as a tag so...

I have Time and Again by Jack Finney on my calendar for later in the year, so I think I will pick up one of the anthologies.

There are a lot of novels that I love in that intro post, though. In particular, both Replay and All Our Wrong Todays should be better known than they are.

My favourite! I have so many to choose from! But I am hoping to find one set in a country I need to read for Eurovisionathon in April, so that narrows it down somewhat.

I'll use this to continue with my Outlander reread.

I am planning on reading The Little Shop of Found Things by Paula Brackston. I don't know much about this book but it is tagged as "time travel" so I'll give it a try.

>1 KeithChaffee: I also meant to say that I really enjoyed your introductory post, thank you so much! You included so many interesting titles.

>12 MissBrangwen: Oh, thank you! I had fun putting it together.

It's April! Welcome to time travel month!

I love time travel and have so many to choose from, it will be difficult to decide which to read! I have at least 16 that are tagged time travel. I'm a little behind in my planning for April, but I'll come up with something shortly.

I cheated a little and started listening early to the audiobook of Paradox Hotel by Rob Hart, but I didn’t finish until today, so I’m counting it as an April read. If I have time, I might try to squeeze in Hawksbill Station later this month.

I read Opposite of Always, a YA romance with a Groundhog Day-esque time loop.

I have both Slaughterhouse Five by Kurt Vonnegut and Kindred by Octavia Butler lined up for April.

>11 DeltaQueen50: I've read this and really enjoyed it. It is the first book of a great book series. I think there are 4 books.

I'm reading The Book of Doors by Gareth Brown

Oh! I have a collection called Adventures in Space and Time that has a lot of short stories. And since April is over soon, I'll pick the most time-travel-ly ones to read for this month.

>1 KeithChaffee: Joining in the kudos for your excellent introduction to this month's theme.

May thread is up.

I read From Time to Time by Jack Finney which was a follow up to Time and Again.

>19 marquis784: I have just started it and I am hooked already!

I just read The best of all possible worlds which contains time travel, thereby accidently meeting this months challenge;-)

I wouldn't call it a time travel book as such, since the time travel is a minor element, but I'll count it towards this challenge anyway.

I wouldn't recommend it either. Although the writing was mostly adequate, the worldbuilding was atrocious and the plot very, very thin.

I pretty much dedicated my whole day to reading The Little Shop of Found Things by Paula Brackston. It was a fun read and the first of a series. I am looking forward to continuing on with the story.

For what it’s worth, I did finish Hawksbill Station as well. I didn’t care for it much: it seemed pretty dated, and the time travel seemed like a gimmick.

I'm reading Slaughterhouse Five, which I thought I might've read back in high school, but I don't think so now! I'm not enjoying it as much as I had hoped, but it's also a 1001 book, so I'll get another bang for the buck!

Finished Slaughterhouse-Five by Kurt Vonnegut this morning; I liked it better than when I started it, but it wasn't the most amazing book in the world, lol. The part about Billy Pilgrim's time in WWII was very interesting, especially his survival of the firebombing of Dresden. The time travel nature of the book is described as Billy Pilgrim becoming unstuck in time - traveling backwards and forwards along his own timeline.

I finished The Mammoth Book of Time Travel SF, edited by Mike Ashley. A very fine collection of stories. It wouldn't be my first recommendation -- that would still be the VanderMeers' The Time Traveler's Almanac -- but if you want more after reading that, this is a strong supplement.

Sadly, I was not able to complete a time travel short story for this challenge.

Finally finished A Quantum Love Story. I admit I hit 'pause' on it for a few days, but I'm really glad I read it. Full review below.

I should say that I never would have read this book if it had been written by another writer. But Mike Chen's writing and storytelling are among my favorites, so I couldn't quite resist, much as I tried.

Fact 1: I'm super-picky about time travel stories. More often than not, they leave me grumbling about plot holes, with a headache, or just plain annoyed.
Fact 2: I sometimes read romance, but I avoid the more dramatic and sappy stories entirely. I much prefer action and/or humor.
Fact 3: I hated The Time Traveler's Wife so much that it's among a very short list of books which I so disliked that I not only swore off the author, but was physically mad at her for writing the book. Through angry, sobbing tears and disgust at myself for finishing the book, I swore (this was in 2010) that I'd never again read another book which tried to tackle both time travel and romance at the same time.

And I kept that promise...until this book showed up on my doorstep. You see, I'd pre-ordered it without paying much attention to the blurb, because again, it's MIKE CHEN. How could I not want to read whatever he wrote? But then I read the blurb, and put it aside. And read the blurb again a month later, and put it aside. And read the blurb again...

And I told myself, time loops aren't quite time travel, right? And I always search out books that deal with memory. And again, it's time loops, not time travel. Time loops, not time travel....

So, I read the book.

And honestly, I'm glad I did. In the end, I adored it. It was heartbreaking at so many moments--and I'm sure I'll never read it again, to be fair--and I saw some of the heartbreak coming, which made it all the harder to bear, but Chen injected enough humor and science(ish) into the work that the drama and heartbreak weren't allowed to hold the greater story back, and the story itself was pretty wonderful. It's ultimately my least favorite of Chen's works (though I've got one more to read that I'm saving for a proverbial rainy day), but I'm glad I semi-intentionally broke my promise to myself and read it. I'd certainly recommend it.

But if you think I'll ever read another book that bridges time-play (loops or travel) and romance...well, that's not happening. Not until one of my favorite authors (gulps) decides they have to write such a thing, too. Hopefully, it'll be at least another 14 years before that happens.