catsflipped's review
adventurous
challenging
dark
emotional
funny
hopeful
informative
inspiring
lighthearted
mysterious
reflective
sad
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
5.0
The book you never want to end, and when it does you just want more. This final half of a series that started with Blackout, we follow immediately on from the first book. This isn't really a 2 book series, more of a single book that was split in two. I recommned reading them back to back.
Trapped in London during the Blitz, Polly, Mike & Eileen must first survive and then find a way home.
As this is a book about time travel prepare for things happening in a non-chronological order. Lives are lost in one time stream only to be saved in a later one. The space-time continuum has a plan to ensure history is as it should be and every action taken has a reason.
The early chapters move between 1940 and 1944 but the relevance of what is taking place does not become clear until the second half of the book when little by little everything starts to fall into place.
Willis' writing is pure genius as she intermingles lives across the years. I find myself already mourning the end of the amazing Oxford Time travel series.The book you never want to end, and when it does you just want more. This final half of a series that started with Blackout, we follow immediately on from the first book. This isn't really a 2 book series, more of a single book that was split in two. I recommned reading them back to back.
Trapped in London during the Blitz, Polly, Mike & Eileen must first survive and then find a way home.
As this is a book about time travel prepare for things happening in a non-chronological order. Lives are lost in one time stream only to be saved in a later one. The space-time continuum has a plan to ensure history is as it should be and every action taken has a reason.
The early chapters move between 1940 and 1944 but the relevance of what is taking place does not become clear until the second half of the book when little by little everything starts to fall into place.
Willis' writing is pure genius as she intermingles lives across the years. I find myself already mourning the end of the amazing Oxford Time travel series.
Trapped in London during the Blitz, Polly, Mike & Eileen must first survive and then find a way home.
As this is a book about time travel prepare for things happening in a non-chronological order. Lives are lost in one time stream only to be saved in a later one. The space-time continuum has a plan to ensure history is as it should be and every action taken has a reason.
The early chapters move between 1940 and 1944 but the relevance of what is taking place does not become clear until the second half of the book when little by little everything starts to fall into place.
Willis' writing is pure genius as she intermingles lives across the years. I find myself already mourning the end of the amazing Oxford Time travel series.The book you never want to end, and when it does you just want more. This final half of a series that started with Blackout, we follow immediately on from the first book. This isn't really a 2 book series, more of a single book that was split in two. I recommned reading them back to back.
Trapped in London during the Blitz, Polly, Mike & Eileen must first survive and then find a way home.
As this is a book about time travel prepare for things happening in a non-chronological order. Lives are lost in one time stream only to be saved in a later one. The space-time continuum has a plan to ensure history is as it should be and every action taken has a reason.
The early chapters move between 1940 and 1944 but the relevance of what is taking place does not become clear until the second half of the book when little by little everything starts to fall into place.
Willis' writing is pure genius as she intermingles lives across the years. I find myself already mourning the end of the amazing Oxford Time travel series.
eggjuices's review against another edition
4.0
I so wish Blackout/All Clear could have been edited into a singular book. Excellent story but much too long!
glitterbomb47's review
4.0
Great conclusion to the story started in Blackout. It was a beautiful tribute to the everyday heroes on the home front during WWII.
xeniaaaaaah's review
4.0
I love Connie Willis' work, but I should know at this point in my digestion of her words that not all of her works are as cheery as "To Say Nothing of the Dog".
I've gotta stop reading when I'm overemotional, haha.
I've gotta stop reading when I'm overemotional, haha.
isigfethera's review against another edition
4.0
I loved ‘Blackout’ and ‘All Clear’. I really cared about these characters and couldn’t put the books down until I found out what happened to them. I see there’s a lot of criticism and I can understand that- they are long books, and at times the tension can get a bit repetitive, but I thought it was very effective in capturing the state of uncertainty of the characters- their hopes and anxieties. They are very immersive and it feels very real.
Connie Willis can be a bit of a slow burn writer, and she uses that slow burn to set the scene and build her characters beautifully. I particularly enjoy the time travelling perspective- it immerses you in the past, but the main characters are as out of place there as you, the reader and that’s a refreshing way to experience historical fiction.
Connie Willis can be a bit of a slow burn writer, and she uses that slow burn to set the scene and build her characters beautifully. I particularly enjoy the time travelling perspective- it immerses you in the past, but the main characters are as out of place there as you, the reader and that’s a refreshing way to experience historical fiction.
mdpenguin's review against another edition
adventurous
emotional
informative
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? No
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
2.75
This book hits on a number of my pet peeves. It relies a whole lot on really smart people doing dumb things, not knowing things about the period of time they supposedly specialized in, and keeping information back from each other for no particularly sane reason. The characters are more differentiated than in the first book, but only when the story is told from Polly's perspective. And when it is, they're just totally inconsistent. For example, Merope is treated like she's terribly naive and fragile despite the fact that she's a trained, time-traveling post-graduate historian who's completed a very tough mission by being tougher and smarter than everyone around her. And then when you get the story back in her perspective all of the differences between the characters go away again and she's suddenly very competent, confident, and clever again.
And that's without going into the fact that the whole point of time traveling historians is to learn about things that you can't learn about through archival research and interviews, and yet they keep going to England in WWII, which is so insanely well documented that there are tons of very realistic books set in it (including these two).
The ending almost is good but the author lays it on way too thick and keeps throwing more and more little tidbits in until it becomes unbelievable. It definitely has its moments that got me excited and/or emotional, but then it would just keep going beyond what was needed for either the scene or the story and it would all just become a bit too contrived for me.
Overall, this is better than fair and maybe even a decent read. I think that if the duology had kept the plot points related to time travel a little more simple and focused more on telling the story of regular English people during the war then it could have been great. It comes across as though that was the real story that Willis wanted to write about anyway.
eandrews80's review
challenging
emotional
informative
mysterious
reflective
tense
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
4.25
As with Blackout, I maintain that this is TOO LONG and needs quite a bit of editing. That said, I loved the ending so much that it earned itself a higher rating. After reading both books right in a row, I feel like I've been with these characters FOREVER, and while I'm relieved to finally be done, I'm also going to miss this world a lot. There are some truly beautiful moments in this book and I think it will stay with me for a long time to come.
charlibirb's review
4.0
My main problem with this series is that many of the characters have multiple names that have NO similarity, so I had trouble remembering who was who. It would have been nice if aliases started with the same letter or something.
Other than that, really really cool concepts about time travel, and great time-line. Very well thought out. I just wish I could tell Polly & Eileen's characters apart :(
Other than that, really really cool concepts about time travel, and great time-line. Very well thought out. I just wish I could tell Polly & Eileen's characters apart :(
leavingsealevel's review
4.0
I must say I *loved* Willis's (apparent) decision to stay true to the time travel technology she dreamed up in pre-web 1993 when she started writing in this universe. The "net" and "coordinates" -- and all the frantic phone calls on land lines -- are adorably quaint in our mobile-crazed world.
There are so many unexpected twists and turns in these 2 books that I feel almost compelled to start reading again from the beginning, now that I know where and when everyone is. Definitely reading Doomsday Book and Fire Watch, not sure about the other one. Awesomeeeeeee.
There are so many unexpected twists and turns in these 2 books that I feel almost compelled to start reading again from the beginning, now that I know where and when everyone is. Definitely reading Doomsday Book and Fire Watch, not sure about the other one. Awesomeeeeeee.
karrynnagel_author's review
3.0
I really enjoyed the beginning, but after about 200 pages of just having your main characters "What if" all the time, it was getting draining. Also, there's no, NO explanation or backstory in the book as to what's happening in 2060 when the historians go back, or what different terms mean in relation to this story, ie, slippage, divergence point, etc. I'm a pretty smart cookie, too. So it was a bewildering.
But the story was excellently written in terms of the character development, and yes, I absolutely felt as if I was there. This was the work of the author's painstaking attention to detail.
But the story was excellently written in terms of the character development, and yes, I absolutely felt as if I was there. This was the work of the author's painstaking attention to detail.