Marking Time : The Immortal Descendants

Cool concepts

A different take on time-travel and keeping the timeline intact, that's what truly got into me and I'll remember this book because if it. I've seen a lot of takes in time-travel and timelines, even have a bunch of my own, but the ones in this beautiful novel were totally new.

The start was slow and I can say dragging. It took a while for things to make sense and the adventure to set in. But after that, I just kept in turning to the next page faster than I probably should. It was also a few years ago when I last read a story where only one character was followed. It was weird but also perfect. The story was about a person's growth and relationship with those around her.

And speaking of her, her knack in making names for others was brilliant. It was funny, it felt like it was her way to cope up with her world and lack of good relationships when she was a kid. It brought us timber world and how different it was to live a life constantly on the move.

The supporting characters were at the right place and at right time. They did not flooded the character but their importance was felt in their own unique ways.

Great!

I received this through as a First Reads winner through Goodreads.

This took me too long to read. It started out strong-Saira is a sassy, smart, independent 17-year-old teenager, fond of tagging and parkour. One day she inadvertently discovers that she can travel through time. It gets a little heavy-handed from there on out. There are vampires and werewolves (natch), war mongers (this part reminded me of Percy Jackson, in a really strange way. There is absolutely no similarity in writing style), other shapeshifters, people who can see into the future. And Jack the Ripper. Perhaps the book is overly rich in confusing characters (and so many different layers of mythology and history!) simply because it's the first in a series. Frankly, I hope so, as wading through all those people and their different skills became tedious at times. Hence, the length of time it took me to finish the book.

However, I did enjoy the vast majority of the book. Though it seemed like 80% of it was exposition, I'm not sure it was handled that poorly. Saira herself was an especially interesting character (would it have been worse in 3rd person narrative? Not sure about that), even though there was a little bit of that worn out teen fiction trope of "The Chosen One."

Overall, I'd say the book is entertaining, though it could have used some heavier editing. I will probably continue with the series, with hopes that some of those extraneous details get cut.