3.75 - a quarter more for literary quality, a quarter less for actual enjoyment.

This was quite a disturbing read - not so much because of the murders, but for the almost familiar arguments the Comstockers use to convince women in the beginning. Things get a little less believable over the course of the book, but then we're seeing some extreme time-line manipulation at work.

Among the novel's strengths are the depiction of the geological time machines. I've rarely seens such an evocative method of time travel, down to the rhythmic rock tapping. It's sad that the actual mechanics seem a little muddled - though notably less than in some other TT plots. Still, I wasn't sure how the taking along people seemed to work sometimes and sometimes it didn't.

The 19th century collective action plot amongst the exotic dancers of the Chicago World's Fair was also very well written, interesting and enlightening. I also really liked the split storyline with the younger self, which was still hauntingly disturbing, but not quite as much as the "I don't remember a timeline where abortion was legal" of the main plot.

All in all, I enjoyed it in the end. Be warned that there are some pretty harsh plot twists in there. I hated some of those in other authors' work, but Annalee Newitz manages to tread the very fine line between horror and disgust without crossing it. Some people won't like the authors' more extreme historical divergences (like early votes for women catapulting Harriet Tubman to the Senate), but I agree with them - it all has to be seen on the background of timeline manipulations and there were already factors and movements in place that had a small chance to make early women's suffrage possible.

As a parting shot: The book acts as a very nice rebuttal to the Great Men school of historical thought.