This is a very interesting book. I love this idea of being able to travel back in time to grab historical items, and to learn about history. I also loved that Rabbit was kind of able to deal with some past mistakes that had been haunting him over his career. I also enjoyed that this book was realistic, in the manner it was laid out, as realistic as a time travel book could be. I already have started recommending this book to a couple of different people who I think will just fall in love with this book and its concepts.
Thank you so much to St. Martin’s Press and Netgalley for allowing me to read an advance copy of this title.

Time travel is crazy in Splinter Effect. Andrew Ludington takes us on a wild ride into the past. Dr. Rabbit Ward has been time traveling for thirty years. Laws are in place regulating time travel, but now “illegal” travelers are competing for artifacts. Complications ensue for Rabbit as one traveler stalks him and steals the artifacts before they can retrieve them in real time.

I love the history told here. It was fascinating and I do have to say that I agree with one of the audience members that a historian should go back in the past because of the knowledge to be learned. Wow. The descriptions are beautiful. I wanted to go back in the past too except history is not kind to women (shrug).

The action is plentiful. The author keeps us hopping. I kind of guessed the “big twist”, but the ride is still a good time. If you like Alan Quartermaine type stories, then read Splinter Effect. I can’t wait for the next wild ride as Goodreads says this is the first in the series.

What if one could travel back in time and save artifacts lost to time? The caveat is that you can not alter events or the timeline will splinter, and you might forever lose the item gone back for. That is the premise of this story about a time traveling archeologist. Throw in a woman doing the same thing for an organization with its own nefarious agenda. The story does give some highlights of one point of time in history. Definitely action, adventure, and suspense as the reader isn't sure if everything will come out ok in the end. It's an enjoyable read.
I received an ARC copy from NetGalley and the publisher. All opinions are my own.

Splinter Effect is a time travel novel, with a twist: historians go back in time to find historical objects that were lost to history, hide them somewhere, then return to their own time and dig them up for display. The time travel equipment they use is strictly regulated, and travelers can only return to their own time via a specific decay point - the same point from which they entered the past. Miss your decay point, and you'll live out your life in the past... or so the science says; no one has ever tested it, because the risks are simply too high. Likewise, travelers are not to make any significant changes to the past - which is why they look for lost treasures - lest the time line splinter and create a new reality.

Dr. Robert "Rabbit" Ward is one such traveler, seeking a lost menorah from the time of the Romans, around 550 CE. But his first attempt at retrieving the menorah goes horribly wrong, including leaving his mentee in the past so he can get back himself. Will a second attempt be more successful? You'll have to read the novel to find out.

This novel is appropriate for older teens and adults, in part due to the political implications of some of the story; those unfamiliar with the history of the Jewish people during Roman times may have difficulty understanding some of the finer details, and some may find it difficult to read.

I voluntarily read and reviewed an advanced copy of this book provided by Netgalley. All thoughts and opinions are my own.

In Splinter Effect, Rabbit Ward is an experienced time traveling archaeologist who has made one too many mistakes in his past. A mentee, the impetuous young son of his founders, has been left in the past. A rival has stolen half of his treasures on his most recent visit to the past. He has one last chance to redeem his reputation. On this trip, he is looking for the Jewish menorah of the Second Temple in 535 BCE Constantinople. Rabbit will meet many famous people and have many adventures during his search for the artifact.

I loved the idea of mixing a Dan Brown history-based thriller with a science fiction plot. However, this book lagged quite a bit with long passages about ancient history that I personally didn’t care about at all. There was very little explanation of how the modern world discovered and regulated time travel. In fact, the present had almost no world-building at all.

As a science fiction fan, I wouldn’t recommend this book. It works for thriller fans who are willing to skip long paragraphs of historical data. Splinter Effect will suit historical fiction fans especially those interested in Ancient Greece and Roman history the best. For me, 3 stars.

Thanks to NetGalley and Minotaur Books for providing me with an advanced review copy.

Andrew Ludington’s "Splinter Effect" is a masterfully woven narrative that elegantly dances between the past and the present. This dual-timeline approach provides a rich tapestry of events that keep readers engaged from start to finish.

Set against a backdrop of mystery and intrigue, the story follows the protagonist's journey, revealing secrets and unraveling truths that have been buried for years. Ludington's ability to seamlessly transition between timelines is impressive, offering glimpses of the protagonist’s past while juxtaposing them with the present-day consequences of those actions. This structure adds depth to the characters and amplifies the emotional impact of their journeys.

The writing is crisp and evocative, with vivid descriptions that bring each scene to life. The pacing is well-maintained, ensuring that the reader is never lost or overwhelmed by the shifts in time. One of the standout aspects of "Splinter Effect" is Ludington’s character development. Each character is meticulously crafted, with motivations and backstories that feel authentic and compelling.

This debut novel is set in a world just like our own, but where time travel exists and is used mostly by government agencies and private sponsors to recover artifacts. Main character Rabbit is an archaeologist still haunted by losing a young coworker twenty years ago on a mission to ancient Rome to recover a special menorah from Jerusalem. When he finds out there is another possible mission to retrieve it from ancient Constantinople, he gets himself involved but things are complicated as many people are vying for it.

This was such a fun read, combining historical fiction, adventure, and time travel. Imagine if a Dan Brown book was crossed with the tv show Timeless. I literally know nothing about ancient Constantinople but this book made me feel like I could picture it and I enjoyed the many twists and turns of the plot. Would make a great tv show or movie, and I’ll definitely be on board to read the sequel this book seems to be setting up for.

I love time travel books!
This book felt like a history lesson at times. I was really wanting more time travel. I did think the last third of the book was more interesting. There were surprises I wasn’t expecting. I would be interested in seeing where this series goes.

A thrilling archeological adventure with a side of time travel, capitalism, and systemic religious oppression. I loved the concept of this one - chronoarcheologists trained not just in history but in combat go back in time to find precious objects that have been lost in time, hiding them in a place they can be dug up in the future. Of course, this all works because they aren’t changing things that are well known in history, they are simply relocating objects that they know have been missing for centuries, aka doing what has already happened. These objects were always lost/hidden, they just didn’t know where to find them until they sent the archeologist back to do the losing/hiding.

Of course, sometimes you might accidentally change something major, and that’s when the splinter effect comes in - the timeline splinters, and from that point forward, everything in that past is a new timeline, and when you jump back, you’re in your original timeline, with no access to the splintered universe. So you can’t just, say, go back in time and kill Hitler, or steal the Mona Lisa, or tell Hamilton not to throw away his shot. There are real limitations and ramifications for messing things up in the past.

And it’s not all fun action and adventure - if you don’t make the jump point back in time, you are stuck forever, and if you leave someone behind, you live with that guilt forever. Our “hero” Rabbit isn’t always a likable character, but you can see why he acts the way he does and how he changes throughout the course of this book, as he is truly forced to confront the ramifications of his lifetime of work and had to decide what kind of person he wants to be from that point on.

I loved getting to spend time with our mysterious co-archeologist, Helen, and my primary complaint about this book is we don’t get to know her nearly well enough. The things she says to Rabbit hint at her connection to people from his past and some sort of reason she might be working illegally when she has the knowledge and skills to be legit, but we don’t get any answers, even when Rabbit interacts with people from her secret organization.

As for the primary mystery of this book, I don’t want to spoil any of the twists and turns but there are definitely some that I did not see coming, but make total sense plot wise (and I’m sure other less oblivious readers will catch on before I did). I loved going back into the past and experiencing with Rabbit what it might be like to live in a different time and place. There would be some advantages to knowing what was coming, obviously, but there would also be plenty of things that would be difficult to adjust to. The menorah as the primary objective was an interesting one - an object of religious, political, and artistic significance, both in the past and present, would be a great find, and you can see how people could become fanatically obsessed with recovering it.

All in all, this was an easy adventure to read, and I’m hoping there will be a sequel or a series of some sort, because I want more Helen!

Thanks to NetGalley and Minotaur for an advance copy of this book for review purposes. You can grab it in stores or your local library beginning this week!

Splinter Effect by Andrew Ludington

This was a very promising debut!
I have been trying to read outside my comfort zone - I try to make sure I don’t get into a rut where I only read the same authors all the time. Also, I’ve been reading a lot of fantasy lately and I decided to more actively seek out more science fiction books.

So a few months back, when I got an email from NetGalley telling me I was auto-approved for a bunch of books by authors I had never heard of, I decided to say “what the heck!” And I downloaded all of them, thinking maybe I’d find something good, maybe I wouldn’t. So I was very pleased when I started reading and realized/remembered that this was a time traveling archeologist book!

In premise, this book felt like it was trying to be Connie Willis mixed with Indiana Jones.

Now, I absolutely adore Connie Willis and her Oxford time traveling historians, and the premise revealed in To Say Nothing Of The Dog that items about to be destroyed in history can be removed from their original time and brought back to the present/future. At first I thought this book might be in conversation with that book, but I don’t think so. I don’t think this author is that familiar with a lot of other SF books, because this book often felt like a trope-fest crossed with a Byzantine history course - But fun! I’m not adequately conveying how much fun this book was or how much of a page turner it was. Even though the main character was too morose and too good at everything, and the twist was able to be seen a mile away, and the science of the time travel did not seem well thought out, I didn’t want to put this down! I really enjoyed it, flaws and all, and look forward to the next book in the series.

Splinter Effect by Andrew Ludington
Splinter Effect #1

Time travel is a fascinating thing to contemplate. I think my first time related book was The Girl, The Gold Watch & Everything by John D. Macdonald loaned to me by my father and it made me think about being able to stop time and move through it to rob or play tricks or basically become invisible. Every time travel book I’ve read has the theory that changing anything in the past will change the future and rewrite history, as does this book. I wonder sometimes how hard it would be to show up in the past without the proper clothing, language skills, and deal with all that would need to be dealt with.

Dr. Robert “Rabbit” Ward is an archaeologist with mixed results in finding the artifacts he is sent for that are only to be found in the past. He also has a competitor-thief named Helen to deal with. Rabbit reminds me of another book my father loaned to me, The Adventures of Hiram Holiday by Paul Gallico. Hiram was an unremarkable man in appearance but surprisingly skilled and able to function admirably in dangerous situations then win the fair maiden in the end. Rabbit, too, is average in appearance, has skills to assist him, and seems to get along with women as well as others.

This book is not what I was expecting. It didn’t grip me and draw me in but as I was skimming it I could see that the plot and writing were solid, the history plentiful, action scenes were provided, and ultimately had me thinking “what-if.

I have a feeling that many readers will enjoy this series and will eagerly await each book. I hope that future books will give more of Rabbit’s backstory, information about time travel and what it is used for in Rabbit’s world, mention whether or not one can also travel into the future, and further flesh out the time travel aspects of the books.

Thank you to NetGalley and St. Martin’s Publishing - Minotaur for the ARC – this is my honest review.

4 Stars

Rabbit Ward is an archaeologist, who happens to use time travel to search for and recover priceless items lost to time.

Rabbit is a difficult person, and he's never played all that well with others, including possible patrons. He's also still reeling with guilt for leaving a young colleague behind on a job several years ago.

Given a chance to recover a menorah, he heads to sixth century Constantinople, meets a sympathetic and young soldier, has an audience with the king and his advisor, and also has to outwit a frequent competitor, Helen, whose methods are a little suspect, but who has been highly successful in the past.

It's clear author Andrew Ludington knows this time in history, as the time spent in Constantinople felt lived in and real. There is action, intrigue, violence, betrayals, and a surprise in store for Rabbit.

Though this story was not really my thing, despite its premise of a time travelling Indiana Jones. I could appreciate the historical detail, the action, and the intrigue in the novel, however.

I have a feeling that we'll be seeing Rabbit again, based on the ending.

I went back and forth between the text and the audio, and voice actor Roger Wayne did a good job voicing Rabbit, but I found his Helen a little less convincing, which is too bad, because Helen is clearly the more interesting of the two characters. I did like Wayne's work as the king's advisor.

Thank you to Netgalley, St. Martin's Press and to Macmillan Audio for these ARCs in exchange for my review.

Splinter Effect is the time-travel debut from Andrew Ludington.

"Rabbit Ward is a chrono-archeologist for the Smithsonian. He travels back in time to preserve artifacts before they are lost to history. He jumps at the chance to fix his biggest mistake. He lost a valuable Menorah and his assistant back in time. When evidence shows it popping up in Constantinople, he rushes to find it. But there is a time crunch and others are out to find it first."

Rabbit is a great character. (You get the story of his nickname later in the story.) He is desperate to correct his big mistake. He struggles trust the one person that can help him the most.
Lots of facts about Romans and ancient Constantinople. Ludington is right on the line about over-explaining what it was like then. It's all interesting but could probably be dialed back just a bit. There are plenty of twists and surprises. I loved the ending. Hopefully, this is the start of a new series. We need more of Rabbit (and Helen...you'll see)

Nice debut from Ludington

A very solid debut, and a fun read. There were places that could have used more character development (like how Ward got the nickname Rabbit, that fell a bit flat as if it wasn't fully thought out), but this was a quick paced read set in an interesting part of our past. There was much to like in this book.

The exploration of our past, and whether can be changed (by design or otherwise) is an interesting one. Ward as a character didn't shy away from reflecting on what his actions might mean, and it also meant that reflection gave him numerous places for character growth.

SPLINTER EFFECT has a fascinating plot with memorable characters, incredible place descriptions and the requisite happy ending of all series. For some reason, none of those desirable elements engaged me, despite reading the beginning multiple times. While I finished the book, I am disappointed that this book was not more compelling or mesmerizing. There’s a flatness to the writing that kept me at a distance. I was not fully engaged with the material, as good time travel tales usually produce. I received my copy from the publisher through NetGalley.

SPLINTER EFFECT mixes several plot lines into this original historical fiction, and adds the thrills we got when Indiana Jones burst onto our screens. The definition of a splinter effect is when a timeline splits when the history is changed. The butterfly effect, only in the past. This is the first book in what promises to be a thrilling series. The possibilities are limited only by our imaginations. Being the first book in the series, this one will move at a steady pace, introducing us to Rabbit's community and supporting characters. As the story builds steam, the tension picks up as Rabbit becomes familiar to us.

Rabbit Ward is a time travelling archeologist.....what a job title!!! He moves through history rescuing precious artifacts before they are irretrievably lost. He has an impressive success rate but Rabbit only counts his failures. At one time, he missed the retrieval of a menorah and has been looking for it ever since. When he receives information on the item's location, he will move carefully to gain access, causing as few "ripples" as possible. This was such an original story that I found it very hard to step away. The plot takes readers through time, increasing possibilities as timelines are changed or twisted.

It's a second chance to save a bit of history...

...and maybe to earn redemption for a previous mission gone bad.

Dr. Robert "Rabbit" Ward is a chrono-archaeologist for the Smithsonian whose work entails taking on missions in which he travels back in time to secure objects before they can be lost to history forever. He's quite good at his job, one of if not the best in his line of work, but one mission two decades earlier still haunts him. His task back then was to locate a particular menorah, but not only did he fail to find a safe place for it to be secreted he also returned to the present without Aaron, the young man whom he was mentoring. Suddenly a new lead has appeared on the existence of that same menorah, and Rabbit willingly seizes the opportunity to try to correct his past mistakes. But he is not alone in the hunt....a mysterious woman named Helen (who is a sort of freelancer in Rabbit's field and who has twice popped up during his journeys back in time) is interested in obtaining the ancient object, as is an unknown someone on the ground where it is purported to be in 6th century Constantinople who seems willing to do whatever is necessary to be the one who takes possession of it. Throw in civil unrest in the local population in the time where the menorah may be found and Rabbit has a daunting task before him.. Can he overcome the compounded errors he made previously, outsmart the competition, and maybe even discover what happened to Aaron?
A quick glance at the cover of Splinter Effect gives the reader a hint at one of the inspirations for the novel...a silhouette of a man in a hat (possible a fedora). Hmmm....an archaeologist wearing a fedora who goes on adventures seeking treasure, where have I seen that before (cough, Indiana Jones, cough). There's an added twist here, though, with the introduction of time travel Rabbit is smart, funny and resourceful, an engaging protagonist to be sure, and the story unfolds briskly with plenty of action scenes to keep the adrenaline flowing. Author Andrew Ludington seems to straddle the intertwined genres of time travel and historical elements without falling too deeply into the weeds of either, which should make it of broader appeal to a wider audience. I am generally not a huge fan of science fiction stories, but here I was able to appreciate the elements of that genre which contributed to the overall adventure yarn. There's even a hint of romance between Rabbit and Helen which, if this turns out to be the first in a series featuring Rabbit (as I suspect it might be), could be developed down the road. All in all, I found Splinter Effect to be an engaging adventure, perhaps a bit formulaic in some elements and a bit rushed in the end, but a fun read nonetheless. Readers of authors like Jodi Taylor, Kage Baker, Steve Berry and James Rollins might find it worth their while to pick up a copy of the book. My thanks to NetGalley and St. Martin's Press/Minotaur Books for allowing me access to an early copy in exchange for my honest review.

This was such a fun, fresh take on the concept of time-travel, and just absolutely packed with action scenes and relevant historical factoids. I’ll add a small trigger warning that there are historical mentions of anti-semitism that may be upsetting to some readers, particularly as it relates to recent events/conflicts. With that being said, I thought it was a fantastic read, and feel like it’s totally made for fans of Indiana Jones or Jack Ryan!!


SYNOPSIS: chrono-archeologist Dr. Rabbit Ward holds a prestigious position with the Smithsonian Institute, but after one-too-many failed missions, the funding from his generous donors is starting to dry up. His position allows him the unique ability to take advantage of recent advances in time travel in order to secure artifacts from the past, provided that he follows some basic rules of physics and doesn’t cause a splinter: an alternate future caused by a major historic change. Unfortunately, while he is playing by the rules of time travel and keeping everything above board, there are other organizations with quicker access to the necessary funding and no such legal constraints. In order to continue his work, he is forced to beg for slush money, and in doing so is offered a second chance at a spectacular screw-up from 20 years prior in which he lost not only a priceless menorah, but also his young partner Aaron. But when Rabbit arrives in 6th century Constantinople, things are not as they seem. The city is on the edge of revolution, Rabbit has found himself on the wrong side of the law, and someone else is interested enough in the menorah to kill for it. To save his work and his reputation, Rabbit has to retrieve the menorah once and for all… and make it back alive.

I love a good archeological tale, and this one is no exception. Rabbit Ward is a chrono-archeologist, a time traveling archeologist. He goes back to Constantinople to search for a lost menorah. He had previously sought it out, and a colleague was lost in time. I liked the no-nonsense, yet descriptive style of writing. Themes of grief and redemption were found in the novel. A solid, though sometimes confusing novel.

This has kind of a YA adventure feel to it. That's not a bad thing. It's all golly-gee-whiz with a fast enough pace that you almost miss some of the plot holes. I do expect that some of those could be filled in the next book. This isn't really my style, but I can see a whole audience of people that love it and can't wait for the next one. I wish them a happy series!