A review by ratgrrrl
Timekeeper by Tara Sim
3.0
Very Charming with Some Serious Issues
For the most part this is a genuinely lovely young adult alternative history fantasy romp with a fascinating approach to time that is both amusing and sad. I do wish it had explored this a little more and made more of a connection between the whimsical introduction of the strangeness of time and the more central aspects of time and the clock towers.
There is an absolutely gorgeous little Queer story here that brought me a lot of joy, but the decision to set this in alternative historic England with some right on, but largely handwavy comments on homophobia and colonialism were very clunky. If these weren't things that the book didn't really want to acknowledge or deal with appropriately, simply porting Big Ben into a fictional setting or making the world significantly different, beyond low steampunk and time oddity, as in the Oxford and beyond of His Dark Materials.
I thoroughly enjoyed this book and the narration was wonderful (putting me in mind of a more well-behaved Tim Key), but with the above, the thoughtless acceptance of prison as a solution (prison abolition now, ACAB), and the way it ends with a character self-harming to get attention from their lover, something already addressed as not being OK in the book, played off as actually rather charming and cute, rather than incredibly abusive and indicative of someone needing serious mental health support, meant that an enjoyable read ended rather sourly and I don't think I will continue the series.
For the most part this is a genuinely lovely young adult alternative history fantasy romp with a fascinating approach to time that is both amusing and sad. I do wish it had explored this a little more and made more of a connection between the whimsical introduction of the strangeness of time and the more central aspects of time and the clock towers.
There is an absolutely gorgeous little Queer story here that brought me a lot of joy, but the decision to set this in alternative historic England with some right on, but largely handwavy comments on homophobia and colonialism were very clunky. If these weren't things that the book didn't really want to acknowledge or deal with appropriately, simply porting Big Ben into a fictional setting or making the world significantly different, beyond low steampunk and time oddity, as in the Oxford and beyond of His Dark Materials.
I thoroughly enjoyed this book and the narration was wonderful (putting me in mind of a more well-behaved Tim Key), but with the above, the thoughtless acceptance of prison as a solution (prison abolition now, ACAB), and the way it ends with a character self-harming to get attention from their lover, something already addressed as not being OK in the book, played off as actually rather charming and cute, rather than incredibly abusive and indicative of someone needing serious mental health support, meant that an enjoyable read ended rather sourly and I don't think I will continue the series.