This Is How You Lose the Time War - Amal El-Mohtar & Max Gladstone

This Is How You Lose the Time War

By Amal El-Mohtar & Max Gladstone

  • Release Date: 2019-07-16
  • Genre: Science Fiction
Score: 4.5
4.5
From 726 Ratings
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Description

* HUGO AWARD WINNER: BEST NOVELLA * NEBULA AND LOCUS AWARDS WINNER: BEST NOVELLA *

“[An] exquisitely crafted tale...Part epistolary romance, part mind-blowing science fiction adventure, this dazzling story unfolds bit by bit, revealing layers of meaning as it plays with cause and effect, wildly imaginative technologies, and increasingly intricate wordplay...This short novel warrants multiple readings to fully unlock its complexities.” —Publishers Weekly (starred review)

From award-winning authors Amal El-Mohtar and Max Gladstone comes an enthralling, romantic novel spanning time and space about two time-traveling rivals who fall in love and must change the past to ensure their future.

Among the ashes of a dying world, an agent of the Commandment finds a letter. It reads: Burn before reading.

Thus begins an unlikely correspondence between two rival agents hellbent on securing the best possible future for their warring factions. Now, what began as a taunt, a battlefield boast, becomes something more. Something epic. Something romantic. Something that could change the past and the future.

Except the discovery of their bond would mean the death of each of them. There’s still a war going on, after all. And someone has to win. That’s how war works, right?

Cowritten by two beloved and award-winning sci-fi writers, This Is How You Lose the Time War is an epic love story spanning time and space.

Reviews

  • Don’t give up halfway through!

    5
    By ellenaut98
    This book definitely started out pretty confusing for me, but I kept reading. Not like I didn’t enjoy it until the end, there were just some mysteries that hadn’t been revealed yet. The prose itself is gorgeously written, and the love that blooms from writing letters to each other is so beautiful. The characters are strong and frightening at times in such a cool way too. The reveal towards the end makes everything click together and it makes me want to reread the whole book now that I have this new understanding.

  • everything, everything

    5
    By TePrometo
    I’ll read this a thousand times, at least. I’ll whisper pieces of it into my own wrists to steady me while I embody bravery. This story belongs in me. Mayhap it belong in you too.

  • The perfect cure for an aching heart.

    5
    By bleedredstars
    The perfect cure for an aching heart. If the purple prose intimidates you at first, know it has meaning behind it that will eventually be revealed. I had to put it down myself a few days and come back fresh eyed until it clicked. Beautiful.

  • Heart aching and Beautiful.

    5
    By munchnikin
    I would give this book more stars, if only possible. The concept of loving another through time and space has always broken my heart. But, when those two are enemies on opposing teams in a time war; it's brilliant! I would recommend this book to my dying breath, and I recommend anyone who reads my review to open up this poetic and new story to anyone who needs something fresh.

  • Amazing

    5
    By not ryan leary1
    Beautiful

  • Full Circle

    3
    By Richard Bakare
    The real beauty of this book rests with its broad and engaging lyrical descriptiveness. Our authors bring a depth of perspectives that really put you into the seat of our time traveling protagonists. The spaces and times we travers through given just enough description to give the narrative a three dimensional texture. While minimal in breath the story is expansive in scope, philosophical perspectives, and all the imagery that fills the space of the things left unsaid. El-Mohtar and Gladstone are elusive and work hard to keep us from relying on a single anchoring point in time or event. This approach makes us all the more invested in the fates of our dueling protagonist. For all the conflict, it was refreshing to navigate through this intentionally stilted and imaginative love story along the way. The story resembled a time traveling Romeo and Juliet retelling. It was refreshing story telling that made you rethink spy craft. The only knock on this read is that it could have had better exposition.

  • Pretentiously Awful

    1
    By I love you too kid city name
    If you want to spend a few hours listening to two pretentious self-appointed “literary savants” say nothing about anything, ignoring any responsibility for satisfying the reader’s curiosity about time-traveling and world-building, have at it. This was truly awful.

  • Resilience, beauty, and a sapphic love story all rolled up into one.

    4
    By pugthelouie
    Wow. I have just finished reading Time War and I'm really impressed with the way that this book can simply grip the reader's heart with such ferocious precision and emotion. While Time War is honestly not my favorite book to sit down and read, as a lot of the story is obfuscated by strange stylistic choices and confusing poetry, it was a wildly enjoyable story which lead me to keep wanting to read it despite the difficulty. Blue and Red are two which I deeply enjoyed the company of — their letters are works of pure genius, as the two authors genuinely wrote these letters to one another and modeled the novel after their own emotional responses to each letter. This is the strongest thing Time War has going for it: you're ALWAYS looking to read the next letter between Blue and Red. They're enjoyable, full of personality, and so well written. If you need a book which will captivate you and send you on an emotional rollercoaster, This Is How You Lose The Time War is your next favorite read. My heart rate was genuinely high during parts of this book. I felt, understood and internalized the emotions of Blue and Red as if I was reading their exchanges from their perspective. I took a star off though, as the writing is genuinely hard to read and complicates the story wildly. I felt like I had to seriously sit down and think about the meanings of a lot of the terminology in this book, as it's never quite explained how Blue and Red are jumping between timelines and who/what the Agency/Garden is, or why they're warring.

  • AWAHHHH!!!!!!

    5
    By Bible_study
    READ THIS RIGHT NOW!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! OH MY GOD!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! IM GOING TO EAT MY DRYWALL!!!!!!!!!!!! AND MAYBE A TEACUP OR TWO!!!!!!!

  • Beautiful but a little slow at times

    4
    By NickLabans
    Two time agents on opposite sides of a war fall in love through hidden letters. Fantastically original. It’s a little slow at times but there is so much there, you feel compelled to find out what happens at the end.

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