Yes, I do live. I haven’t been stricken down by the plague yet. And I have the newfound ability to have whiskey in my coffee as of last week, so we’re all good here. xD ❤

Time for a book review! Which I haven’t done in way too long. And this certain book I just finished feels apropos, given my current WIP, and the world’s current events. So let’s get into it, shall we?

 

The Doomsday Book

Synopsis:

For Kivrin, preparing an on-site study of one of the deadliest eras in humanity’s history was as simple as receiving inoculations against the diseases of the fourteenth century and inventing an alibi for a woman traveling alone. For her instructors in the twenty-first century, it meant painstaking calculations and careful monitoring of the rendezvous location where Kivrin would be received.

But a crisis strangely linking past and future strands Kivrin in a bygone age as her fellows try desperately to rescue her. In a time of superstition and fear, Kivrin–barely of age herself–finds she has become an unlikely angel of hope during one of history’s darkest hours.

Good stuff:

• Characters

All the characters felt very real, and it was genuinely interesting to follow them. It was sort of a split POV between Kirvin in the middle ages, and her mentor, Mr. Dunworthy, back in the present. And I enjoyed both of their narration styles a lot. 

They were clearly front and center, but honestly everyone who stepped onto the page had something about them that made them interesting, or had some way that they added to the story (even if it might have seemed a little muddled right at the beginning. xD)

The time-travel-crew in the present, and all the medieval characters back in the past were all awesome. (My personal favorite was Father Roche.)

So yeah, as always, I approve of good characters. 

• Writing quality

Willis just has a very readable writing style. From moment to moment, she’s great at keeping interest. The details she chooses to describe are really interesting and unexpected. 

• Educational

I learned… a lot about the middle ages, suffice it to say. xD And not just the polished up details, it felt very real and like “oh wow, they really lived like that?” 

It was just really cool. I feel more informed on living conditions and how life went on in the 1300s now. 

• Cool time travel

Smaller thing, but I thought the way they worked with time travel and how it functioned was very cool. ❤

Bad stuff:

• Slow middle act

The novel is divided into three “books”, and just… yeah, in my opinion, book two could have been either shortened, or we really needed an extra short-term-goal in there, and less of just people being worried on phone calls. We went a really long time without really finding out anything important and I got kind of impatient at times. 

I’d just say a bit of skimming around the middle is definitely justified. xD

• Depressing/gross at times

Spoilers, so I won’t say… too much? But we get some rather gory details that were a little disturbing to read. 

Plus given all the situations we get here… honestly I just wouldn’t recommend reading this right now. Lots of hopelessness and pandemics. xD I was certainly a little down while reading it. 

 

 

So, that’s the Doomsday Book!

Hope you guys enjoyed my review, and I’ll hopefully be back with a few more reviews soon. ❤ 

What’s your personal favorite fictional version of time travel? Let me know in the comments!

See you all later, hang in there!

~writefury