The Ministry of Time never made me as excited as similar titles in the genre. It felt as though Kaliane Bradley wanted to write a Matt Haig or V.E. Schwab book but never reached the goal. Her writing is good but never feels elevated above okay.

The Ministry of Time is beautiful, sad, and a bit mind-bending. I adored it.

If you like the idea of a bureaucrat thrust into espionage combined with a time-traveling romance, this is the novel for you. As Stefan SNL would say, it's got everything — a plague victim on dating apps, Sir Franklin's lost expedition, futuristic weapons, and a hot Victorian/modern love affair. Bradley's prose is also gorgeous.

I don't want to say more because I feel like this one is best enjoyed going in knowing little. It is one of my favorite books of the year so far. You should read it. That is all.

Thank you to NetGalley and Simon & Schuster for the ARC.

This reminded me of a childhood favourite movie, Kate & Leopold, mixed with Men in Black, but make it literary and also make it examine topics like colonialism, race, and trauma.

In the near future, the government has discovered time travel, and a newly created Ministry is gathering "expats" from across history to examine the effects on their bodies and the fabric of time. The Ministry assigns employees to monitor and help acclimate the time travelers, and one employee is assigned to a Victorian arctic explorer named Commander Graham Gore. Comedy, slow-burn romance, and spy thriller shenanigans ensue.

Watching Graham adapt to the modern century (Spotify, Google, weed, platonic and not so platonic cohabitation, among the highlights) was so entertaining. I fell in love with him just as the main character did. I fell for the other expats too, and really enjoyed their found family dynamic. The expats' experiences were moving, funny, and heartbreaking. I enjoyed the spy element less than the comedy and romance, but it was effective in creating an urgency and foreboding in an otherwise tender and introspective novel.

I gotta be honest, I did feel like some of the political rhetoric was too smart for me, and some things went over my head. But this still charmed the crap out of me and I can't stop thinking about it.

Read if you like:
🕰 Time travel
🚢 Charming, repressed Victorian men
🔫 Escaping spies, dismantling corrupt systems, and a little bit of paperwork 📎
👤 Themes of identity, belonging & trauma
✨️ Beautiful writing

The Ministry of Time is an exploration of time travel and how, if at all, it would really work. Weaving together mystery, humor, and slice-of-life moments, it is a thrilling and romantic journey that feels wholly original. With charming and witty prose, Bradley effortlessly traverses genres by combining science fiction, romance, comedy, and espionage into a seamless narrative. This book is perfect for both fiction and genre readers looking for something fun and distinct.

After a slow beginning, I enjoyed The Ministry of Time. The main character, whose name is not given throughout the novel, is the child of a Cambodian mother and a white father, something continually pointed out. She had originally been working in the language department of the Ministry when she was recruited to become a "bridge," someone who works with persons who have been brought to this time period from the past, where they would have died. She is assigned to Graham, who had been pulled from 1847. There are other people taken from other times - the Ministry calls them expats. There's a mystery about why they were pulled and someone called The Brigadier who seems to want to kill the narrator. There is so much going on in this story after the 50% mark.

I was frustrated by the "woke" agenda, constantly bringing up race and racism, talking about how the narrator had the "privilege" of passing as white. Then when the narrator is talking to her coworker Simellia, who is black, towards the end of the novel, Simellia tells her about how The Brigadier came from the future and said that climate change was destroying the world and that sub-Saharan Africa would suffer with refugees being killed, and that, "How hard did you try to be a white girl that you're asking me whether racism exists?" Ugh! IMHO, not everything is about race and calling people racist, oppressed, or marginalised serves no purpose. I liked when the narrator told Simellia that she wasn't a victim and she did not give people the opportunity to make her a victim.

Why not four or five stars? Pretentious language! I'm a college grad and I think I have a healthy vocabulary - why use a word that the majority of people have to look up? It got so ridiculous that I began to keep track of them - gelid (cold), elucidate (explain), moved sepulchrally (like death? or darkly?), palaver (trouble?), perspicacity (shrewdness), clement weather (how about just saying nice or pleasant), penumbral (almost shadow?) - you get the idea. And those are just the ones I noted after about halfway through the book when I was getting frustrated.

Thank you to the NetGalley and the publisher for an ARC of this novel in exchange for an honest review.

I feel like I’m going to be thinking about this book for a long time. I was very quickly absorbed by the whole concept.

I would describe this as a time travel thriller with an element of romance. I liked that it was unpredictable and I wasn’t quite sure where the story was going. I read the first 3/4 really quickly and then slowed down. I didn’t want the story to end. I will be very interested to see what this author does next.

Thanks to NetGalley for the advanced copy!

I really loved the idea of this book—so imaginative and creative to have a premise where people are brought back from history.
The problem for me is that, apart from the main two characters, I couldn’t latch on to anything about them past their physical attributes (or sexuality?). With a cast this large, I need more than hair color to remember why and how this person matters to the story.
I’ve heard this is already going to be adapted for the screen, which I think is fantastic. I’ll definitely watch.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for providing me an advance copy of this book in exchange for an honest review!

"The Ministry of Time" by Kaliane Bradley is one of the most unique and engrossing books I've ever read. I really enjoyed this book, even though it often made me anxious and kept me on my toes. There were lots of twists and turns, especially in the latter half of the book. I got a little confused at the denouement and had to reread sections a few times. Highly recommend you do not read anything more than the back-of-book summary prior to reading this story.

UPDATE: many people have pointed out that the plot of this novel is mysteriously similar to a Spanish TV show by the same name, yet I see no evidence that the publisher has publicly addressed allegations of plagiarism, This is unfortunate, and sadly, I must change my review/rating until this has been acknowledged and addressed.

I was thoroughly charmed by this book, which is in part science fiction, in part literary romance. The protagonist is an unnamed female junior agent for the British Ministry of Time, who has been assigned as “bridge” to an “expat” brought through time from the Victorian era to time of the story, which occurs sometime in the not-so-distant future. The reader is told that the British government is experimenting with time travel by bringing people out of the past who had experienced untimely death: essentially rescuing them from their early demise in order to discover how the shift through time will affect their bodies.

The bridge’s job is to help transition their expat into the modern era, and our protagonist is assigned to live with a British Royal Navy officer named Graham Gore, who had previously been destined to die during a doomed polar expedition to discover the Northwest Passage in 1847. Over the course of a year following his removal from the nineteenth century, romantic tension develops between Graham and the narrator. Meanwhile, there are revelations at the ministry which cause her to begin questioning whether her assigned mission is ethically sound.

I was entirely absorbed by the plot of this story and didn’t want to put it down. The characters are all great fun and well developed, and the period-specific dialogue for each of the expats was spot on. I enjoyed watching their relationships with one another develop and they each began to feel like friends to me. I would like to hang out with these people in real life.

The prose in this novel is magnificent! The descriptions are vivid and compelling in a way few authors are able to fully capture. There were so many sentences that I read over and over again, just because they were so lyrical and well written.

This book asks some serious philosophical and ethical questions, particularly about an ongoing colonialist/imperialist approach to scientific advancement. It has a heavy feeling to it overall, but I think it ends on a hopeful note that leaves room for readers’ interpretation. While there were parts that made me giggle or laugh out loud, the vibe is actually rather serious and it will make you think.

Thank you Netgalley and Avid Reader Press for an ARC copy in exchange for my review!

A gorgeously complex, heartbreak of a book. Every single character ripped my heart out, the plot compelled me and writing was both tender and funny. I'm beside myself that it is so far still from this book's release because I want to shout about it to everyone!

Not the type of book I usually read but on a recommendation I requested and was approved an ARC.
It’s a time travel, romance spy novel kind of a story and for the life of me I cannot remember the girls name, was she even named? She is recruited by a government agency called The Ministry. Their aim is to recruit people from across history to see if time travel is feasible, and what effects it has on the persons mind, body and well being. The girls job is to be a ‘bridge’ between her time traveller and the agency. She will document how they cope with this new life and all the interactions they have. The travellers are named by the year they were taken from and this story focuses on the Bridge and her traveller (who is a real person from history) 1847 or Commander Graham Gore. He was part of an expedition to discover the northern passage from Uk to Asia for trade. His expedition never made it and the ship and crew were never found. The Ministry obviously took him before his death and now he is living with the bridge in present day Uk and finding his feet in this new world.
There is a lot going on in this novel with quite a few characters and all of them are wonderfully drawn. With the Bridge the narrator of this story we see her falling in love with Gore, and at odds with the Ministry.
It’s a fun read with a mix of genres and ideas.

#TheMinistryOfTime. #NetGalley

Unfortunately, this was a dnf. It was very slow without as much humor as I was hoping for. However, I think it will be great for plenty of readers and will definitely recommend it to others. Thank you NetGalley and Avid Reader Press for the advance copy.

An exciting, romantic, and heartwrenching novel. The last thing I ever expected from this reading experience was to care so deeply about a dead Arctic expedition leader, and yet here I am. Beyond that, the Ministry of Time makes beautiful commentary on displacement (both geographically and in time), identity, and duty.
10/10 would recommend,

This books makes me want to be a better writer. I love the way the story is crafted and how the author examins everything around the characters without it getting in the way of the story. This is such an amazingly cozy read. can't wait to see what else she does. i loved it.

Interesting concept and story which moved well. I was skeptical that the story would be cliched time travel story. I enjoyed the character development and plot.

I thoroughly enjoyed this book! Receiving an advanced copy was a delightful surprise. I believe both existing fans and newcomers will find it equally enjoyable.

I reviewed an advanced uncorrected proof. It is my genuine hope that the most egregious error in this text is corrected before being brought to print. In reference to feeling aware of an incoming uncomfortable topic of conversation, the main character is said to be on “amber alert.” I believe this must have been mere ignorance to have included this as a.) Amber alerts are named after a real person, Amber Rene Hagerman, and b.) this terminology is recognized internationally in its adoption. There is no way an Amber alert fits the context of the novel, and it should be changed. If it becomes brought to my attention that this content is removed, I will happily update my review to remove this area of concern from my review.

When I started reading this book, I was under the impression this author wrote a fanfic about a dead commodore from an infamously doomed Arctic expedition based upon a “foxy” daguerreotype, and honestly, I was here for it. I have found the mystery of Franklin’s expedition curious since I read about it as an example text on a standardized exam many years ago. The fact I never developed a crush on one of the crew members seems in retrospect a missed opportunity.

I wanted to like this, but it is trying to do too many things without fully realizing any of them. This book asks you to suspend your disbelief a lot more than I found I could. For example, is it realistic that our narrator could teach Commodore Gore to be less racist? No, at least not in my experience with old racist white people today. I doubt someone from the 1800s is going to be more flexible than grandpa, born only slightly before the Civil Rights movement. This is more of an issue than time traveling, for which the science is either ambiguous or so obtuse that I simply skimmed through it as I have no memory of the tech being explained at all.

The romance I expected is nonexistent. From early on, the needlessly unnamed narrator describes Gore both as her “overgrown son” alongside notes about his erotic appearance and manners. This happens more than once throughout the novel. When the romance does appear about 66% of the way through the novel, it is fast, hard, and abrupt, not at all the slow burn I had expected from previous reviews.

There is so much cigarette smoking described in extreme detail down to how much ash is produced at a time and where they are depositing it. Maybe this just bothered me, but I was annoyed at being told about the habit on what felt like every page.

The writing style is unique. Metaphors are lengthy and creative, but also they are often ineffective. If my complexion is “fungal,” does that mean like a mushroom or like a yeast infection? And also, what does either one look like?

The most interesting part of this story for me was about our narrator’s struggle with her family’s assimilation to the UK and the legacy of her mixed heritage. I would like to have read more of that instead.

Thanks to NetGalley and Avid Reader Press for an advanced copy of this book to review.

I'll be honest: if this was billed as just a straight time travel romance, I wouldn't have even picked it up. Time travel usually confuses me and, though I did try to read and watch Outlander, I just never bought into the craze like some of my friends did. BUT seeing that The Ministry of Time promised to be "a time travel romance, a speculative time thriller, a workplace comedy, and an ingeniously constructed exploration of the power of truth" drew me in. That, and Kaliane Bradley has a number of impressive short story publications under her belt. I decided, on a lark, to take a chance, knowing that I would probably be sorely disappointed.

But, oh boy, was I wrong. First off, Bradley delivers on every single one of those premises which is, in and of itself, an impressive feat. Second off, her writing is so fluid and flexible that it is impossible not to get sucked in. Third of all, she made me fall in love with a 19th century explorer. What magic is this?

If you go in expecting a plain romance or a spy thriller or a workplace comedy, I think you will be disappointed (hence, as of writing this review, the 3.6 stars on Goodreads). Because TMoT is none of those things and all of those things at once. In true litfic fashion, Bradley probes at the seams of everything she writes. I would liken this to Ling Ma's excellent Severance, so if anyone here liked those diasporic themes, this one is for you. And, like in Severance, Bradley writes characters and scenarios so well that it is impossible not to feel them coming to life around you.

Bradley's England, even though it's set in the near-distant future, feels real and palpable, and her twist at the end had my heart racing. Although the middle, which felt very "slice of life," as other readers have noted, started to lose me a little bit, when I got to the end, I understood it all: it's not slow-paced, it's TENSE, with the subtlest of clues that something is off (and, of course, adorable scenes of Graham Gore falling in love with Spotify and discovering the joys of motorcycle riding). This is the kind of book that I immediately want to go back and re-read for everything that I missed, and that I desperately want to get my English major self back into gear for, annotations and all. I will be recommending this to everyone I know who likes their books sexy, smart as hell, and utterly heartbreaking.

This is not going to be everyone's cup of tea, but it was CERTAINLY mine.

Many thanks to NetGalley, Avid Reader Press, and Kaliane Bradley for gifting me this e-ARC in exchange for my honest feedback! The Ministry of Time is one of the strongest debuts I've read in a while and I will be eagerly anticipating Bradley's next work.

My thanks to NetGalley and Simon & Schuster for the ARC of The Ministry of Time by Kaliane Bradley.

I loved this book so much! I hope it gets made into a movie. Consider its recipe: time travel, historical fiction, romance, spy thriller. YES, PLEASE. Turns out Capt. Graham Gore was a real person in the doomed Franklin expedition. Bradley imagines a scenario in which Gore is plucked from his own timeline by a secret ministry in the UK, whose goal is partly to fix climate change before it occurs. He is not alone though, because the Ministry pulls several other characters from different centuries in too, all of who become a cohort of acclimation to the twenty-first century. To make that transition, each is assigned a “bridge,” an officer responsible for living with the “expat” (I.e., time traveler) and teaching them about modern life and the history they missed.

But it turns out that Gore is the stuff of a Bond foil: ruggedly handsome (think Tom Hardy), charismatic, charming, likes to cook, learns to ride a motorcycle in leathers (please cast Tom Hardy in this film), can draw, plays the flute, and eventually, and unsurprisingly, becomes a hot, hot lover. For a time, the expats and bridges make friends, go clubbing, and have fun.That is until they realize they are being hunted by the future at the same time.

I hesitate to say more because I don’t wanna spoil so much that is wonderful about this book. Anyone who enjoys books liked Kindred (this imagines the time traveler moving forward in history but similarly having to grapple with historical problems and ethics), spy, novels (feels a bit Mr and Mrs Smith at moments, sexually tension, both highly trained agents, etc.),, or the recent Emily Wilde (similar romance) fairy books, will probably enjoy this book. Read it!

ok I was very excited abut the plot but this book ended up being kind of confusing. Things jumped around a lot and many things were left without being fully explained. The characters fell a little flat for me and lacked depth but I still found myself intrigued enough to not be able to put it down - so I guess that's something! The ending was also a little confusing and I wish I understood it more but I also did kind of like the art of the vagueness ?