nostoat's review against another edition
emotional
hopeful
slow-paced
4.0
You might be able to change the past, but can you fix it?
That is the key question swirling at the center of this intergenerational time travel story, and what a weighty question it is. I'm usually pretty reluctant to read time travel stories and for some reason completely missed that element the first couple times I read the summary. This book surprised me though! While it is a time travel story it's much more a story about generational cycles, trauma, the special kind of betrayal passed from mother to daughter, mother to daughter. This story is alive with the pasts presents and futures of the women at its heart, and I enjoyed it thoroughly.
eloisethebooklover's review
challenging
dark
emotional
mysterious
reflective
sad
tense
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
5.0
It is hard to put this book into words. The complexity and the depth are unlike anything I’ve ever read before. The story is devastating. I don’t think I’ve ever cried so much over a book! Barenbaum does a magnificent job of making you care about the characters. Watching the story unfold was like watching a catastrophe in slow motion- one I had no power to stop. The ending was well done and left me with all the right questions. It wasn’t a neat or tidy ending, which fits the rest of the book. Things are never black or white, right or wrong. Life is messy and I think this book is a magnificent portrayal of that messiness. I’ll be thinking about “Atomic Anna” for a very long time.
Ambience recommendation (I listened to this through the whole novel & feel it added a lot to my experience!): https://youtu.be/aYTeoqe0cNU
Ambience recommendation (I listened to this through the whole novel & feel it added a lot to my experience!): https://youtu.be/aYTeoqe0cNU
Content Warnings
Graphic: Drug use, Abandonment, Addiction, and Injury/injury detail
sara_c_reads's review
4.0
This was a great read! It was hard to follow at first but the dates identifying each section helped. My good friend recommended it and I would recommend it to others.
Sci-fi but borderline realistic too.
Sci-fi but borderline realistic too.
weaver's review
emotional
mysterious
reflective
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.5
tjwallace04's review
3.0
I was really anticipating great things from "Atomic Anna." It has such a great premise. I love time travel books, and I am fascinated by Chernobyl. (I read Adam Higginbotham's great nonfiction book "Midnight in Chernobyl" earlier this year and learned so much.) But I was underwhelmed.
"Atomic Anna" is much more a book about family and mother-daughter relationships than it is a book about time travel. And Chernobyl barely features other than as the impetus for the time travel research. (Additionally, some of the information shared about Chernobyl seemed wrong...it didn't immediately kill thousands of people or a bunch of children, etc.)
The book follows the lives of three main characters in three timelines (that are criscrossed by time travel, although not as much as you would expect): Anna, a nuclear physicist who helped create Chernobyl and feels responsible for the disaster; her daughter Manya/Molly, whom Anna sends to live with adoptive parents in America; and Molly's daughter, Raisa, a mathematical genius who might just be able to fix Anna's faulty time machine. Each woman struggles with their relationship with their mother and their romantic relationships. Throughout the book, they try to save each other from bad choices and outcomes (Anna tries to save Molly; Molly wants Anna to save Raisa), but life is too tangled for easy solutions. Nevertheless, the very end is presented on a platter with a flourish that seems too simple...and yet I wasn't even clear if they stopped the Chernobyl meltdown??
The writing was overall good, and I mostly liked the characters, but I think the ratio of family drama: exciting/thought-provoking time travel action was way off, and the book consequently felt too long.
"Atomic Anna" is much more a book about family and mother-daughter relationships than it is a book about time travel. And Chernobyl barely features other than as the impetus for the time travel research. (Additionally, some of the information shared about Chernobyl seemed wrong...it didn't immediately kill thousands of people or a bunch of children, etc.)
The book follows the lives of three main characters in three timelines (that are criscrossed by time travel, although not as much as you would expect): Anna, a nuclear physicist who helped create Chernobyl and feels responsible for the disaster; her daughter Manya/Molly, whom Anna sends to live with adoptive parents in America; and Molly's daughter, Raisa, a mathematical genius who might just be able to fix Anna's faulty time machine. Each woman struggles with their relationship with their mother and their romantic relationships. Throughout the book, they try to save each other from bad choices and outcomes (Anna tries to save Molly; Molly wants Anna to save Raisa), but life is too tangled for easy solutions. Nevertheless, the very end is presented on a platter with a flourish that seems too simple...and yet I wasn't even clear if they stopped the Chernobyl meltdown??
The writing was overall good, and I mostly liked the characters, but I think the ratio of family drama: exciting/thought-provoking time travel action was way off, and the book consequently felt too long.
booksandchicks's review
2.0
The idea of this book had such great potential! Time travel, saving lives, stopping the Chernobyl catastrophe, a comic book that depicts real life, and a generation of women working together to change the past.
What I got instead was a big jumble of not understanding what was going on, science and math in the time travel that wasn’t explained-I wanted more on that, a comic book that was never fully developed to enhance the story. We were given a lot of great ideas but they never quite hit home in the completion department.
I was left feeling confused most of the book. I had a hard time knowing what the goal of the stories were. I was really mad at a certain incident at the end that I’m still mad about. At the final end-I was left underwhelmed. To top it off it was much longer at 450 pages than I felt it needed to be.
I really can see a great author with some great ideas, I just needed more clarification and better direction.
Thank you to NetGalley and Grand Central Publishing for an advance e-copy in return for my honest opinion.
What I got instead was a big jumble of not understanding what was going on, science and math in the time travel that wasn’t explained-I wanted more on that, a comic book that was never fully developed to enhance the story. We were given a lot of great ideas but they never quite hit home in the completion department.
I was left feeling confused most of the book. I had a hard time knowing what the goal of the stories were. I was really mad at a certain incident at the end that I’m still mad about. At the final end-I was left underwhelmed. To top it off it was much longer at 450 pages than I felt it needed to be.
I really can see a great author with some great ideas, I just needed more clarification and better direction.
Thank you to NetGalley and Grand Central Publishing for an advance e-copy in return for my honest opinion.
mellymel35's review
5.0
Really enjoyed this book. It mixed my love of sci fi (time travel), history, and comic books...yes, I'm a nerd!
jjcurrie's review
5.0
I received a copy of an Atomic Anna ARC through a Goodreads Giveaway a few months ago where it sat on my shelf waiting to be read. Recently it finally made it to the top of my “to read” pile and by the second chapter I was hooked. This is the first ARC I had ever received and I deeply regret not putting it to the top of the pile the second I received it so that I could be among the first to tell everyone how incredible it was. Within a few chapters I tweeted out a quote and received a lovely response from the Author, Rachel Barenbaum hoping that I continued to love it. Well, I can tell you that I absolutely did. I fell in love with the main characters faster and harder than I have in any other book in a long time, and I once again found myself delaying the end of the book in order to continue savoring it. I cried when it ended, not because of the ending (although that played a role) but because I was so heartbroken that it was over and I wouldn’t see these characters again.
Please check out my full review on my blog: https://twospoonies.wordpress.com/2022/04/23/atomic-anna-a-book-review/
Please check out my full review on my blog: https://twospoonies.wordpress.com/2022/04/23/atomic-anna-a-book-review/
erinevelynreads's review
5.0
In 1986, nuclear physicist Anna Berkova awakens in the Soviet Union, at the exact moment Chernobyl’s reactor malfunctions. She is suddenly, temporarily transported to 1992. There she discovers her estranged daughter, Molly. Molly has been shot and is dying. With her dying breath, she tells Anna to save Raisa, Molly’s daughter, Anna’s granddaughter. Now with the knowledge that she has the ability to time travel, Anna must grapple with how to use this new technology. The more she travels, the more increasingly apparent it becomes that she must choose between her family and preventing one of the greatest nuclear disasters in history.
Part historical fiction, part science fiction, Atomic Anna asks the question how far would you go for the ones you love. The story opens with the Chernobyl disaster and jumps around the 20th century from 1930 to 1992 as it shows the three distinct yet interwoven narratives of Anna, Molly, and Raisa.
Anna is a scientist who grapples with her involvement in the Chernobyl disaster. Her research on nuclear energy was instrumental in building the facility. Now that she knows a disaster will occur, she is struggling to determine how to right her past wrongs.
Molly is Anna’s daughter who she gave up at birth. She is being raised in Philadelphia by Anna’s friends. Molly loves to draw and create comic books but struggles to adapt to the blend of American lifestyle and Soviet traditions. Her form of escape is creating a comic book called Atomic Anna, which depicts her nuclear physicist mother and her saving the world.
Raisa is Molly’s daughter. She loves math. When her mother Molly is convicted of a crime and sent to jail, Raisa is sent to live with her adopted grandparents in Philadelphia. She struggles to fit in given that she is quite the math prodigy and longs to meet her scientist grandmother, Anna.
More than anything this is a family saga, following three generations of women through their struggles with identity and acceptance. I loved the seamless blend of historical events with time travel. It’s such a gorgeous and fascinating story. I struggled to put it down, and once I finished, I desperately wanted more.
I highly recommend Atomic Anna to fans of multi-generational family sagas and historical fiction!
Thank you to Grand Central Publishing for the review copy! All opinions are my own.
Part historical fiction, part science fiction, Atomic Anna asks the question how far would you go for the ones you love. The story opens with the Chernobyl disaster and jumps around the 20th century from 1930 to 1992 as it shows the three distinct yet interwoven narratives of Anna, Molly, and Raisa.
Anna is a scientist who grapples with her involvement in the Chernobyl disaster. Her research on nuclear energy was instrumental in building the facility. Now that she knows a disaster will occur, she is struggling to determine how to right her past wrongs.
Molly is Anna’s daughter who she gave up at birth. She is being raised in Philadelphia by Anna’s friends. Molly loves to draw and create comic books but struggles to adapt to the blend of American lifestyle and Soviet traditions. Her form of escape is creating a comic book called Atomic Anna, which depicts her nuclear physicist mother and her saving the world.
Raisa is Molly’s daughter. She loves math. When her mother Molly is convicted of a crime and sent to jail, Raisa is sent to live with her adopted grandparents in Philadelphia. She struggles to fit in given that she is quite the math prodigy and longs to meet her scientist grandmother, Anna.
More than anything this is a family saga, following three generations of women through their struggles with identity and acceptance. I loved the seamless blend of historical events with time travel. It’s such a gorgeous and fascinating story. I struggled to put it down, and once I finished, I desperately wanted more.
I highly recommend Atomic Anna to fans of multi-generational family sagas and historical fiction!
Thank you to Grand Central Publishing for the review copy! All opinions are my own.