This was such a fun ride. It was like a sci-fi adventure. The characters and the stakes felt very real. Real enough to have me in the edge of my seat and look forward to what came next. This was a great read.

A truly unique story about time travel the government and friendship. How do you navigate the modern world when you are from the past. How does one protect while trying to introduce them to the new world. And a slow burn romance too.

I’m shocked this book doesn’t have higher ratings on Goodreads. I don’t usually like time-travel books, but this was brilliant. The (near future) main character is assigned as a cultural liaison to 19th-century Graham Gore. Unique premise and blend of genres. Very fun read!

Special thanks to NetGalley and Avid Reader Press / Simon & Schuster for providing this digital reviewer copy.

A compulsively readable time travel novel. It uses a very similar plot point as the John Varley story "Air Raid" (adapted to film as Millennium), but otherwise it felt like a very fresh take on time travel tropes. I was hooked right from the start, and my interest never wavered. It's definitely one of the best debuts I've read in a long time. And hey, Barack Obama loved it too, if you need another reason to read it.

A unique story. The time travel elements of this provided so many twists and turns. Completely unpredictable.

There are parts I loved and parts I struggled with. The characters were wonderful and could be quite humorous as they struggled to adapt to "today." It started strongly as each expat and bridges are introduced and we learn aspects about them and the reader thinks the novel is going in a particular direction before the last fifth of the book takes some sharp dips and turns that unravel the story into a bit of a mess that leaves the reader in a WTH frame of mind at the end of the novel. There are so many questions with just vague notions of what could be.

The marketing was well done, because I expected so much more. The novel could have improved with better editing at the end of the book, maybe even allowing the author to flesh out some of those possibilities.

I received a copy from NetGalley and the publisher for an honest review.

So much of this is stellar on paper, and works so well on a micro-level (there were countless lines that stood out to me, and so many questions being asked that I found to be incredibly thought-provoking outside the text), but ultimately it fell a little bit flat.

This is such a strong, ambitious debut executed with such a light touch that I cannot wait to see what else Bradley does in the future.

Like so many books that I received free advanced reader’s copies for review, I wound up purchasing a copy of this book before reading the ARC because the plot looked so intriguing to me! So, my review is based on my purchased copy, not my ARC, although I do thank NetGalley, Kaliane Bradley, and Avid Reader Press for giving me a chance to read the ARC. As always, my review is voluntary.

This is an extremely ambitious first novel, combining history, romance, time travel, intrigue, murder, humor — you name it, this book’s got it! It’s a genre defying panoply of a book, sure to tickle a bit of most people’s fancy because it is very well written and very well done. It’s replete with several interesting twists and turns that kept me on my toes and guessing until the very last page. I can’t wait to see what miss Bradley has next up her sleeves for me to read.

Great prose and character development and a, to me anyway, believable romance made this a novel to remember (as long as I don't study that plot too closely).

I wanted to love this book. I wanted to love it so badly, and yet I did not. I love time related books with a love story looped in but this one just did not do it for me. It started off strong but I didn't love the flashbacks to his expedition and I felt that the author told me rather than showed how the FMC fell for/loved the MMC and it came out of nowhere. It was just a near-miss and the whole thing was sort of strange. But, if you like time travel, history, sociology, romance, suspense etc give it a try as it may be the book for you! There were a few side characters that I enjoyed getting to know and I was glad I saw one of the major surprise twists coming in advance haha. I fear that I had been wanting to read this for so long and saw some good reviews (President Obama) that maybe it was overhyped since I've read alot of books in this subgenre. Thank you to NetGalley and Simon & Schuster for allowing me to read an ARC and apologies that health issues made it take this long!

What a wonderful read! Mixing humor, romance and the traditional sci-fi theme of time travel into a mystery novel,
Bradley kept me interested from start to finish.

A young woman, an ordinary civil servant, is one of several people hired by a new British ministry to help - to act as "bridges" --
to a handful of persons pulled from various eras in England's past to adjust to the new world of the present. Why pull individuals from earlier eras? Why were the bridges chosen? What is the Ministry's plan? That's part of the mystery that slowly unfolds. But before the reader gets there
we are treated to an imaginative, creative and humorous description of how those plucked from the past, with different speech patterns, unfamiliarity with technological advances or what is history to us, might try to adjust.

I love a good time travel yarn and even though this one wasn’t for me, I can totally understand the compelling appeal! My heartfelt gratitude to NetGalley, Avid and Simon & Schuster for providing an eARC in exchange for my honest opinion!

This was a fun read! Time travel is always tricky to write and I appreciated some of the cultural shocks that someone from the past would encounter. Thanks for the opportunity to read this ARC!

I was experiencing a silly time travel. Ogle but was pleasantly surprised by the depth of this. A spy thriller on the surface but the first person point of view brings up a lot of discussion of family history and trauma and how we relate to other people. Some of the time travel elements didn’t quite work for me in the end but really helped enjoyed it nevertheless.

This was a great book! Unique and has real staying power. I thoroughly enjoyed it. Thank you NetGalley and Avid Reader Press for this ARC!

I finished the book, but I wasn't totally pulled into the narrative behind the main character's experience. The ending felt abrupt and slightly unfulfilling.

The description of this book's plot was so intriguing! Unfortunately, the actual story left me a bit disappointed. It seemed the author was trying to do too many things at once, with multiple competing genres. I also found some of the word choices distracting since they didn't seem to flow naturally. The British humor and interesting world-building were my favorite parts, but ultimately I found it hard to get to the finish of this one.

I found this book to be wholly enjoyable and had a very quirky premise. The main character and Gores relationship evolved naturally and had many funny moments that I was sharing with my friends as I read it. I found the mystery at the end by complete surprise and I’m glad because sometimes I can tell the ending early on but not for this one. I’d recommend it to any sci-fi lover out there, such as those who enjoyed This is How You Lose A Time War.

Genre: Sci-Fi

Format: Audio

3.5🌟 - it was fine!

I really expected to be obsessed with this one, but it made me feel nothing 🫠. I think objectively the writing is good, but something about this was not for me!

3.75 stars

I really enjoyed this! I liked the idea of a government agency testing the bounds of time travel and the logic behind who they chose for test subjects. It makes sense and isn't something you see much of in time travel books. Those early days of figuring things out were probably very messy (as we see).

I loved the narrative voice! It's very unique and a compelling way to tell the story. It's first person past tense; our narrator knows what happens from the very beginning. I love that she isn't named. And I thought the challenging balance of governmental complicity and duty to resistance was well executed. It turned this story into more of a social commentary than just a thrilling time travel novel and I deeply appreciated that.

The characters are darling! Arthur and Graham and Maggie and the narrator were beautifully realized and individualized. I can't imagine the work that went into them to make each of them feel specific to their periods. I wanted to be friends with their group and just tuck them safely away.

Everything started to fall apart for me in the last 20%. It started to feel like a different story and I think that's partly due to the limits of the narration. The narrator knows what happens but is walking us through it as if for the first time. So there's not enough foreshadowing to make the last chunk feel cohesive. It gets chaotic and messy.

I'd still recommend this because I did truly enjoy it!

<i>Many thanks to NetGalley, Avid/Simon & Schuster, and the author for providing a copy in exchange for an honest review.</i>