This Is How You Lose the Time War by Amal El-Mohtar & Max Gladstone

Wow. I know it’s not the most scholarly way to start a review of a novella this intellectually interesting. Just in case I don’t give this title justice in the writing that follows, here it is. When You Lose Time Like This I was intrigued enough to buy War after reading early reviews that were really positive and used words like “epic” (unusual for a novella). Could artful, poetic prose transmit hard-core, gripping science fiction?

It has been done, as Amal El-Mohtar and Max Gladstone have shown. And by doing so, the possibilities for developing the setting and the characters as well as the readers’ emotional involvement can be greatly expanded. Ten centuries prior to first contact, she plants defanged replicas of European superbugs in the Strand 9 Amazon Basin. As a result, when conquistadors arrive, they are met by millions of thriving, resilient people.

I felt like I was being pushed on a regular basis, both in terms of the time-traveling concept and the characteristics of the various worlds, fighting groups, and even the main characters themselves. I was pushed to step outside of my usual thought patterns and investigate new alternatives. Red and Blue are of what gender? Is it important? Even so, do they have a gender? She cuts her finger after taking off her glove. Blood from the rainbow wells up, spills, and turns grey.

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Epistolary Narrative

They learn about each other’s personalities and experiences through the exchange of letters, which are painstakingly written and carefully hid so the other will find them years or even millennia later. Not events, but structures, are letters. I have a home inside of yours.

Authors El-Mohtar and Gladstone shatter conventional notions of not only the time travel genre but also romantic drama and suspense with each tantalising letter written between the two. It becomes more and more voyeuristic to read Red and Blue’s painstakingly penned letters, which are filled with wit and fertile metaphor.

Nevertheless, This Is How You Waste Time There will be some who do not enjoy war. The book largely relies on its poetical language style, a plethora of rich imagery, and playful wordplay, which occasionally produces a knuckle-gnawingly inflated sentence, according to James Lovegrove of the Financial Times. One gets the impression that the two authors were more interested in impressing one another with their fancifulness than in keeping the reader entertained.

I agree that this novella has certain flaws. There were times when I became engrossed in the language to the point where I couldn’t remember which character was writing the letter. There is obviously literary excess, but it is frequently done in a humorous way. The lighthearted jabs at individuals who produce such beautiful prose were amusing. A fugitive becomes a queen or a scientist or, worse, a poet.

Additionally, Red and Blue (the characters) are attempting to win each other over with their literary works. Every meaningful word is clung to by them. In that sense, this novella reads as a celebration of open-mindedness and communication’s beauty and power.

This is How You Lose the Time War by Amal El-Mohtar and Max Gladstone is a memorable book if you enjoy language and ambitious, thought-provoking fiction. A worthy recipient of the Best Novella Hugo Award for 2020.

About The Book

A note is discovered by a Commandant agent among the ruins of a dying world. Burn before reading, it says. Thus begins a strange dialogue between two antagonistic agents determined to ensure the best future for their opposing factions. What was just a taunt or a brag on the battlefield has evolved into something more. something amazing something love-related that which has the power to alter both the past and the future.

However, each of them would perish if their relationship was discovered. After all, there is still a battle going on. And that conflict needs to be won by someone. That is how war functions. Right? This Is How You Lose the Time, a famous and distinguished sci-fi novel, was cowritten by two authors. The narrative of love in war spans both time and geography.