By Amal El-Mohtar, Max Gladstone
I wrote this in October, 2020, so forgive the writing style lol
Time War is difficult to categorise. It occupies that heady zone between soft science fiction, fantasy, and romance, every bit as complex and diasporic as its two main characters, Red and Blue.
Red and Blue are time-travelling agents from different factions, who flit up and down the strands of time, seeking to divert its stream to benefit their respective factions. Red’s Agency, a technological universe, tendrils of thought sailing through the void, every cubic centimetre of space filled with connections, every mind separate and yet constantly linked to the collective network. Blue’s Garden, an organic grand unification, with vines stretching between stars, planets full of genetically engineered organisms, intelligence permeating the air, ground and water, all life joined in a hive mind.
Every event can be changed, every goal achieved, if only you go far back enough in time. This is the butterfly effect, which the book takes and spins into a miasma of mesmerising ideas. Carve a notch in this bone, and in twenty years a monk will hear a whistle as the wind blows, which will make him build a travellers hut, which in two centuries will shelter a mother and her son, who will grow to be a famous mathematician, who…
This is the agents’ purpose – to leap up and down the timestream, moving this stick here, turning a dial there, in a meticulously crafted dance of a butterfly’s wing.
The true beauty of the book is in the letters between the agents. They are left not as ink on paper, but in the bubbles of a jar of water in an MRI machine, the rings in a tree used in Khan’s war machines, the pattern of spots on a seal’s skin, in the sharp taste of a poisonous seed, in the ephemeral scent of rose-hip tea. Starting off as a challenge, from one master of the art to another, they morph into a mutual respect, and then into a fierce love that (apologies) transcends time and space. Finishing it, you will see letters and colour everywhere. It is one of the highest compliments that I can give, to say that Time War changes how you see the world.
To be fair, Time War is a challenging read. It’s written in a style that requires concentration to understand, and is full of references I had to google to understand the nuance of. But it’s rewarding, and deeply so. Despite the setting, it’s one of the best love stories I’ve ever read, and simultaneously a fantastic piece of speculative fiction, offering insight into the future apotheosis of life.