English language
Published 2024 by Simon & Schuster.
In the near future, a civil servant is offered the salary of her dreams and is, shortly afterward, told what project she’ll be working on. A recently established government ministry is gathering “expats” from across history to establish whether time travel is feasible—for the body, but also for the fabric of space-time.
She is tasked with working as a “bridge”: living with, assisting, and monitoring the expat known as “1847” or Commander Graham Gore. As far as history is concerned, Commander Gore died on Sir John Franklin’s doomed 1845 expedition to the Arctic, so he’s a little disoriented to be living with an unmarried woman who regularly shows her calves, surrounded by outlandish concepts such as “washing machine,” “Spotify,” and “the collapse of the British Empire.” But he adjusts quickly; he is, after all, an explorer by trade. Soon, what the bridge initially thought would be, at best, a seriously …
In the near future, a civil servant is offered the salary of her dreams and is, shortly afterward, told what project she’ll be working on. A recently established government ministry is gathering “expats” from across history to establish whether time travel is feasible—for the body, but also for the fabric of space-time.
She is tasked with working as a “bridge”: living with, assisting, and monitoring the expat known as “1847” or Commander Graham Gore. As far as history is concerned, Commander Gore died on Sir John Franklin’s doomed 1845 expedition to the Arctic, so he’s a little disoriented to be living with an unmarried woman who regularly shows her calves, surrounded by outlandish concepts such as “washing machine,” “Spotify,” and “the collapse of the British Empire.” But he adjusts quickly; he is, after all, an explorer by trade. Soon, what the bridge initially thought would be, at best, a seriously uncomfortable housemate dynamic, evolves into something much more. Over the course of an unprecedented year, Gore and the bridge fall haphazardly, fervently in love, with consequences they never could have imagined.
Supported by a chaotic and charming cast of characters—including a 17th-century cinephile who can’t get enough of Tinder, a painfully shy World War I captain, and a former spy with an ever-changing series of cosmetic surgery alterations and a belligerent attitude to HR—the bridge will be forced to confront the past that shaped her choices, and the choices that will shape the future.
An exquisitely original and feverishly fun fusion of genres and ideas, The Ministry of Time asks the universal What happens if you put a disaffected millennial and a Victorian polar explorer in a house together?
Time travel - if considered a genre, is a favorite of mine. (I especially enjoyed The Psychology of Time Travel and If/Then). I found this was such a cool premise, having people return from centuries past and see how they adapt to the modern world, however, it was slow going. For me it picked up a little toward the end.
I was excited to read this as the premise is brilliant. Sadly, I found it a bit of a dud. The story got progressively less engaging and incorporated a “twist” I found trite, and the middling resolution made the whole story weaker. No characters were particularly engaging and I found the arctic chapters and the musings of the main character more of a distraction than an enhancement. I didn't particularly care for the writing style, and also lampshading something doesn't magically make it not bad. All told, an ok read but not a book for me.
I'd be curious what genre readers enjoy this, as it choppily blends historical fiction, romance, time travel, spy thriller, and reflections on genocide. Only the first two seem a strength here, and they're not my taste, but I would have settled in more easily for a slow burn romance across the last few centuries if the author hadn't kept interrupting me with the rest.
2.7 stars
I received this book for free, this does not affect my opinion of the book or the content of my review
'We have time-travel,’ she said, like someone describing the coffee machine. ‘Welcome to the Ministry.’
Set some time in the not too distant future, The Ministry of Time opens up with an intriguing concept, time travel exists and the United Kingdom's government controls it. Told all from the point-of-view of a woman who previously worked in the languages department, she applies for an internal job wanting the higher pay. When the Ministry section of the government hires her to be a “bridge”, her life changes. I thought this started off strongly with an intriguing concept, The Ministry has selected people from different timelines that from recorded history, they know die in their own timeline. Our narrator's a bridge (someone who stays with the “expat” for a year …
2.7 stars
I received this book for free, this does not affect my opinion of the book or the content of my review
'We have time-travel,’ she said, like someone describing the coffee machine. ‘Welcome to the Ministry.’
Set some time in the not too distant future, The Ministry of Time opens up with an intriguing concept, time travel exists and the United Kingdom's government controls it. Told all from the point-of-view of a woman who previously worked in the languages department, she applies for an internal job wanting the higher pay. When the Ministry section of the government hires her to be a “bridge”, her life changes. I thought this started off strongly with an intriguing concept, The Ministry has selected people from different timelines that from recorded history, they know die in their own timeline. Our narrator's a bridge (someone who stays with the “expat” for a year to help them transition) for a Commander Graham Gore. Graham's an actual real historical figure which I thought gave this a slight fanfiction feel, to it's scifi and speculative fiction.
Ideas have to cause problems before they cause solutions.
It's all a little murky as to why the government has decided to pick these people and what exactly they're doing, our narrator's a company woman and doesn't question too much in the beginning. After I thought was a strong scifi start, the middle stagnated in pace and we get lost in our narrator's head for awhile. There's the transition of assimilating a man who died in 1847 to a twenty-first century London, along with the narrator's attraction to him. A lot of the attraction was already built as she's read his personal letters, knows his story, and romanticized him through this knowledge and liking a daguerreotype existing picture of him. For Graham's part, since we don't have his pov, he's a not a clear readable character; it seems he could be attracted to her but it could also be him trying to play his cards right. I've seen Outlander comparisons and I would caution reading this for the romance because you'd probably be disappointed (there were a few open door scenes but those alone do not a romance make).
The middle also explored inherited trauma and warring with helping your country but not enabling their same made mistakes. Our narrator is the daughter of a Cambodian refugee and she carries some of her mother's trauma which creates some push and pull in “just following orders”. We get introduced to some of the other bridges and expats, with two of them, a WWI soldier and black plague survivor playing bigger secondary character roles. Through their experiences to the new world, we get some discussions on gay rights and feminism.
The truth is, it won’t get better if you keep making the same mistakes.
After the more sluggish middle, the latter second half picked up speed with the building spy thriller aspect and what The Ministry is actually trying to do. There are some hints sprinkled throughout that you could kind of guess where the story is going (I wasn't hundred percent correct) and we get some action and takes on climate change. When dealing with time travel, there are always going to be some holes, this had those with some of the “whys” not fully answered and the “hereness” and “thereness” not completely making sense. The romance wasn't the strongest and the thriller aspect waiting around too long to fully hit, giving some of a rushed ending feeling. The discussions and takes on racism, trauma, sexism, imperialism, and other issues had some mealy mouth, I get the narrator is working through them herself, but it left me feeling like not a lot was said when done. This was a whole bunch of elements mixed together that I'm not sure all fully got realized and created a got lost on it's way middle that really slowed the pace and dented it's impact for me.
Time travel stories usually follow the exploits of someone rocketing through time to change history. This person ponders the various time travel paradoxes or wrestles with the implications of an ever-splitting multiverse. All of which is to say that Kaliane Bradley’s The Ministry of Time is a unique look at the perils of time travel. Instead of travelers deliberately injecting themselves into history, a mysterious British Agency has used a recovered time machine to “rescue” five Britons from the past from their inevitable deaths by pulling them into a future ravaged by climate change. Our narrator is one of the few civil servants in on the secret, selected to help acclimate one of the “expats” to life in the twenty-first century...
Read the rest of my review at A Bookish Type. I received a free copy of this book from the publisher via NetGalley, for review consideration.
