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Ashton's Bride
4
4.0 (1 Ratings)
Book Rating
I have mixed feelings about this book. It was well-written, Margaret and Ashton were sympathetic, but I hated the way she time-traveled. It started off well enough until that point and I had a hard time getting past it. (I'll talk more about that in a hidden spoiler) Other than the time-travel, which is a big part of the book obviously, I enjoyed it. The relationship between Margaret and Ashton was pretty realistic and loving. So as far as time-travel romances, it's not one of my favorites, but it is still a good love story. In some ways, I think it might have been better strictly as historical romance.

Be warned! Massive ranting ahead!
<spoiler>
1. Like I said before, I hated her time-travel method. I don't quite get even how she time-traveled and the part I hate the absolute most is that she's in someone else's body. I just recently read a short story that had the same time-travel method, except that it was explained. I just find it disturbing and creepy, not to mention the amount of times it is said in the book how beautiful and perfect her looks are. Pretty nauseating. I just don't know how you could get used to looking in the mirror and not seeing yourself. That'd just be weird to me, even if I did happen to enter into a drop-dead gorgeous body. And Margaret acted like she was some freak of nature when she was in 1993. Boo hoo. Be happy with yourself for goodness sake! It seemed somewhat like the author was saying that you're not good enough if you're not beautiful. At least, that's the impression it gave to me.

2. It seemed to me that Ashton was infatuated with Mag. He couldn't have possibly actually loved her the way she was before Margaret entered her body, but he said he had. He really had to have fallen in love with Margaret, not Mag, and the blurriness there bothered me.

3. They're cousins. Okay so Margaret actually isn't, but the body she's in is. So what about children? Not a major point since cousins marrying isn't all that odd back then, but because of my other problems, it creeped me out more here.

4. Margaret's whole "revelation." She says now her parents and siblings never went to Cape Cod and are alive after all since they only went because of her and now she's back in time, and her parents only had two kids and not three. Umm no. If her parents never had her, then it would be impossible (yes, so is time-travel, but that's beside the point) for her to have gone back in time at all! She would have disappeared; she couldn't just be there now! Am I the only one who can see that?! Remember the photo featuring disappearing McFly's in Back to the Future? What comes around goes around. There's a few instances of that, but this is the one that bothers me most.

5. How did the papers show up? Seemed really unnecessary just to have Ashton believe her.

Had the back cover described how exactly Margaret time-traveled (like a mention of waking up in a strange body, perhaps?), maybe I wouldn't have had such a hard time with the concept and the other stuff wouldn't have bothered me as much. Who's to know?</spoiler> I promise, I'm really not crazy, even if my rants point to the contrary. I really think it could have been a great story, and I'm sure others will enjoy it, I just was left very disappointed.
  
C(
10
10.0 (1 Ratings)
Book Rating
Disclaimer: I was given an e-copy from the author in exchange for an honest review.

I am definitely in love with this book. Case closed. There's time travel, vampires, merpeople, shifters, and a mystery to solve before something huge goes down. And did I mention the love triangle? I have yet to decide who I want to win Sage's heart, because I like them both!! This story has action, suspense, drama, romance, humor, and it's just such an amazing book, I couldn't put it down! (Seriously, I read it in one afternoon, I couldn't tear myself away!!) I'm looking forward to the day when a sequel is released, because I just can't deal with that ending, I need closure!

*Sorry for all the exclamation points, but I just loved it so much! =)*

5 stars through the roof
  
The Ministry of Time
The Ministry of Time
Kaliane Bradley | 2024 | Contemporary, Fiction & Poetry, Science Fiction/Fantasy, Thriller
10
10.0 (1 Ratings)
Book Rating
This book is everything I love about reading. I read to escape (mainly, but not solely!), and so science fiction/ fantasy has always appealed to me. Now I’ve discovered speculative fiction, and it seems to be like both of these things wrapped up in a package with a label saying: “This Seems Plausible”.

The Ministry of Time is a clever book - it uses time travel and science fiction, with a touch of history that actually happened, and mixes it up with a hefty dose of romance, thriller and literary fiction. It doesn’t sound like it will work, but I’m here to say that it really DOES!

Ok, so a quick, yet vague, synopsis: the British Government has come into possession of a device that can go back in time and find particular people in the past. It’s been decided that the people they take are all in life-threatening situations. Those plucked from their time are placed with a “Bridge”; someone who will facilitate their integration into modern society.

The main pair is that of Graham Gore, a Polar explorer from the Erebus expedition, and his Bridge, a woman whose mother escaped the Khmer Rouge in Cambodia. Not an easy adjustment for a Victorian man. This Bridge is the narrator.

Graham Gore adjusts quickly to modern life, but is modern life willing to accept him? And what affect does it have on him and his fellow time travellers, to be so out of time?

There was so much to think about whilst reading this - I was completely immersed, and it ended FAR too quickly!