Blackout

Blackout by Connie Willis is another of her Oxford time travel books. It has a sequel, All Clear. While not as silly as To Say Nothing of the Dog, Blackout is more lighthearted than Doomsday Book. Three Oxford researchers in 2060 are preparing for their trips back to WWII. Time travel works like the old days of scheduling time on the supercomputer. Time is precious and limited in the Net and budget cuts are making access to it even more tenuous. The rescheduling of launch times and the need to scramble to prepare sets the tone for this book. Going unprepared to the past, combined with the dreaded time slip, gives each of the three researchers an impossible task — conduct the research and make it to their pick up location at the agreed up on date. Blackout is the longest and most complex of the Oxford time travel stories. There are some slow bits and some incorrect details — I still found it a compelling read. I think it helps to have an understanding of how academic research works — and how it is often affected (for better or worse) by budgetary concerns.

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I am a huge Connie Willis fan and I was really excited when I heard she had finally written a new book (the first since 2002). I actually have mixed feeling about "Blackout". Willis is the best time-travel author ever but this book really did drag on a bit, especially the first part of the book, where Willis repeats herself quite a lot. Things do pick up in the second part of the book, which {very frustratingly} ends with a cliffhanger. I was very much surprised by the ending as I didn't know that "Blackout" was only the first part of the story and that it was to be followed by "All Clear". The characters are very likeable (an added bonus: it's great to read about characters from "Doomsday book" and "To say nothing of the dog"!) and Willis is as witty as ever. Despite its obvious flaws, "Blackout" still is an enjoyable read. It's just not as gripping as other books Willis has written in the past.

Couldn't believe that the entire plot of the story doesn't unravel until the next book, which I won't read!

The tension will drive you wild in this novel but if you realize at the outset that most of this novel is actually 'middle' and the ending is nowhere in sight, it makes more sense. It was originally one novel (including All Clear) and it was so huge that they had to break it up into two. (Blackout and All Clear). The point is, this is another exceptional novel by Connie Willis and I've already started the second one.