Synopsis
No solution saves everyone. Only one keeps us human.
The hope of a dying Earth rests on a crew of astronauts. Their find a new home. But when they touch down on a distant planet, a time-bending anomaly traps them in a situation that no one could’ve predicted, causing them to question the nature of humanity, the snare of destiny, and the shape of time itself.
Time’s Ellipse spans generations, orbiting the lives of the scientists and astronauts involved in this historic mission as they discover that escaping the planet is simpler than evading its legacy.
Review
“I was going to have a lot of work to do with Oscar if I was going to marry him. I’d got him to the point where always did what I suggested to him, but it was always such a lot of effort. When we were married, he’d have to be a lot quicker about doing what I told him.”
This was a great read. I loved most of the characters and the science. The Earth is in a very bad state because of climate change and six astronauts have to travel light years away to find a solution. Fans of the movie Interstellar will love this.
It has a very unique narrative structure. We cross thousands of years across different POVs and we see so much change and adaptation within the individuals and the collective. So many themes are packed in so well, especially the science of discovery and how human society works from social connections and cultural setting, to language, to social class, to religion and we see why there are patterns repeated in our history. We travel across 10 different characters and 2000 plus years and nowhere was it slow.
My favorite character amongst this large cast was Kirk and I’m so glad we got a lot of time in this character’s POV in the beginning. He is a mathematician with a dark secret and is very quippy. I loved how the author has captured uniquely the varied character voices. I was bursting out laughing at some and felt moved by some and was angry at one.
“Grammar in the space program was so stupid. ‘We are a go for launch’ made absolutely no sense whatsoever. I knew it was tradition, and everything. But how could a linguist ever hold down a job in space? It was bad enough for me, and I was a mathematician.”
The writing was also very, very engaging. At no point did I feel like I had to put the book down unless I had to. Usually I find myself having a small disconnect in multi-pov books and I want to return to my more favorite characters but I didn’t have that in this book. I do have my one most favorite character as proclaimed above but the story and writing were so good that I just constantly wanted to move forward through the different character POVs. It also encompassed more than two millenia- so a lot of time skips. But for most part the time skips do not feel jarring in the least. Special mention to June and Cassandra’s chapters where grief is explored really, really well. I don’t think I can recall it being done so well in the 50 other books I read this year.
I also loved the ending and we left the story at a very satisfying place. My only qualm is that there is a gap between original settlers and new residents of Trappist 1 E and we see the behavior and culture being very different. Technically there is a 400 year gap between those events and it is very plausible that the society changes so much in that much time but I’d have liked it being explored a bit more. I am however very happy I got to read this one and will definitely be picking up more Frasier Armitage in the future.
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