Having My Way with Science Fiction Books

I do have a relatively limited intellectual availability of dealing with science fiction books. Time travel, spaceships coming from the future, extra terrestrial creatures...all of those aspects are rarely an encounter in my usual literary timelines, and this from a very early age. I was not that kind of kid getting lost into the fantastic worlds but rather interested to find out how this world works and even today, I think it is enough for a literary concern.

However, I will never cease to challenge myself intellectually therefore forcing myself into reading once in a while books that are not part of my usual reading menu. According to all the reviews and recommendations I've seen, All Our Wrong Todays by Elan Mastai was a relatively easy read. In fact, maybe a too easy for my tastes.

Let's start with the things that I really loved about the book: the writing is good, with sequential chapters - maybe it helped the fact that Mastai is a screenwriter. The information is relatively light, introduced in a very simple way which do not require additional scientific background. Besides the story itself: the history of the first time travel machine, created in July 1965 by Lionel Goettreider, that in 2016 Tom Barren, the son of a scientist whose life was dedicated to this machine is using for the first time in history - there is also an interesting discussion open up by the author regarding writing and the difference between novel - with an autobiographical aspect - and a memoir. The writing is what captivated me at the very beginning and kept me involved during the rest of the book.

Because, and now we are about to start reading about the part of the book that I did not enjoy it: the way in which story unfolds, with all the romantic element added does not do good to the sci-fi setting.Tom Barren is back in time to discover that his lost love is his and there to stay - in the first temporal sequence she committed suicide - and is doing everything in his power to keep her. The famous Goettreider is also using the time machine for love, in order to spend more time to a married lady he has an affair during his laboratory years. 

Although during the last 100 of pages I felt like giving up on the book more than once, I was brave enough to finish it. The book itself is not bad and as I said, there are interesting perspectives shared, the story didn't resonate with me at all, probably because maybe I was expecting something more spectacular and outwordly. I would probably recommend it and I am sure there are much more people enjoying it, but personally I've found it a bit too light for my usual tastes. 

Another positive experience of this last read is that after all, I might be more interested in sci-fi and right now I am looking for more serious, hard-core recommendations in this respect. PS. I've already read Dune and found it at the time relatively interesting.

Rating: 3 stars