Connie Willis

To Say Nothing of the Dog

Andrew John Kinney

I enjoy the occasional sci-fi novel, and this one is an entertaining page-turner.

From Connie Willis, winner of multiple Hugo and Nebula Awards, comes a comedic romp through an unpredictable world of mystery, love, and time travel...Ned Henry is badly in need of a rest.  He's been shuttling between the 21st century and the 1940s searching for a Victorian atrocity called the bishop's bird stump.  It's part of a project to restore the famed Coventry Cathedral, destroyed in a Nazi air raid over a hundred years earlier.  But then Verity Kindle, a fellow time traveler, inadvertently brings back something from the past.  Now Ned must jump back to the Victorian era to help Verity put things right--not only to save the project but to prevent altering history itself.  From the Paperback edition.

Becky A

Sarah Escorsa

Updated review here.

Original review:
One of my favourite books ever, I could read it over and over again and never tire of it! It's a "P.G.Wodehouse meets the space-time continuum" sort of book, with great characters (including Cyril the dog and Princess Arjumand the cat, a Victorian maiden, a dignified butler, a not-so-psychic psychic...), an ingenious plot, lots of humour, and of course, the Bishop's Bird Stump! A must-read:)

Ned Henry is a time-travelling historian who specialises in the mid-20th century - currently engaged in researching the bombed-out Coventry Cathedral. He's also made so many drops into the past that he's suffering from a dangerously advanced case of 'time-lag'. Unfortunately for Ned, an emergency dash to Victorian England is required and he's the only available historian. But Ned's time-lag is so bad that he's not sure what the errand is - which is bad news since, if he fails, history could unravel around him ... Winner of the Hugo Award for best novel, 1999 Introduction by Pat Cadigan

· Previous rating: 5 stars *eyerolls at her 2015 Self of Despicable Book Taste and Total Lack of Judgement*
· New rating: 20 million stars. And a half.

➽ And the moral of this rerererererereread is: Connie Willis’ amazingly clever writing + one of the most beautifully constructed tale ever + the top ranking boyfriend in my High Security Harem (aka Cyril the Bulldog) + time travel + restful Victorian times delightfully wacky Victorian escapades + PG Wodehouse + awesome space-time continuum incongruities and self-corrections and stuff + hahahahaha  + the very aptly named Lady Shrapnell + Difficulty Distinguishing Sounds + Agatha Christie and my boyfriend Hercule Poirot + exotic Japanese goldfish (or lack thereof) + high explosive bombs + deliciously eccentric Oxford dons + calamities who look like naiads (and vice-versa) + Slowness in Answering + infirmary nurses and the Spanish Inquisition + the regulations of animals in bed + aged relicts (and not-so-aged ones, too) + Ultra + Maudlin Sentimentality + eating vile, unspeakable Victorian things for breakfast + the Blitz + Couples That Come To A Bad End + naughty bad doggums vs. deawest, dearum, pwecious Juju + cats and cabs and fans, oh my + Dorothy L. Sayers and Lord Peter Wimsey + slightly exasperating, spoiled Victorian brats+ Disorientation + Mrs. Chattisbourne’s ever-giggling flower garden + the Enigma machine + cat-induced suffocation + Napoleon’s hemorrhoids + butler pinching + chaos theory + the bird Luftwaffe + the somewhat hideous bishop’s bird stump (view spoiler)[
  duh
 (hide spoiler)] + I could go on and on but you might as well read the book, it might prove a little bit more time-efficient and stuff =



This is me, disguised as Cyril the Bulldog and being deliriously happy. Just so you know.

➽ And the other moral of this rerererererereread is: I really suck at reviewing this book. QED and stuff.

P.S. The best review you will ever read for this book is here. You are quiet welcome, Comely Decapods Mine.
P.P.S. Penwiper, anyone?



[Pre-non-review nonsense]

Review to come and stuff. Oh, may I leave Cyril the Bulldog with you while I write it? He's really super cool, I promise.



See what I mean? Coolest dog ever. He also happens to be Mostest Awesomest Literary Dog That Ever Was And Ever Will Be (MALDTEWAEWB™), so you better take good care of him while I'm away. But hey, no pressure and stuff. It's not like I'll unleash the murderous crustaceans on you if you suck at baby-sitting him and stuff.



[May 2015]

Surprising as it may be, this is not going to be one of my overly formatted, nonsensical, gif-filled reviews. This will be a long, very boring review that will not do this book justice. Quite a few digressions to be expected, too. There will be no silly fangirling involved either. My love for this book goes beyond that. 

If I had to choose 3 books to take with me to a desert island this would be one of them. I love it more with every reread. Why? Because it's the improbable mix of three of the things I love the most. And as improbable as the mix is, it works. Because Connie Willis is an amazing writer. No, strike that. Simply saying she's an amazing writer doesn't even begin to cover it. There are not enough words to express how much I love her and every book she ever wrote. I could reread each and every one of them over and over again and never get bored (except maybe from All Clear, which was the sad exception to my I'm-Desperately-In-Love-With-Anything-Connie-Willis-Ever-Wrote-Writes-And-Will-Write condition). To get to the point: Connie Willis = Sheer Brilliance ← yes, I lied when I said there would be no fangirling to be had in this review. It might not be silly but it's there.

At this point you might be wondering what that improbable mix of three of the things I love the most I mentioned above is. Then again, probably not. But hey, I started writing this review so I might as well get on with it. And I guess I should issue a warning at this point, because I'm going to talk about my grandmother. Yes, my grandmother. I never get personal in my reviews but this book wouldn't be one of my all-time favourites had it not been for my grandmother. So I want to tell you a few things about her. Because she's the one who introduced me to those Famous Three Things that make me love this book so much. 

My grandmother was French Canadian. She was born in 1910 and stayed in love with the 1930s and 1940s of her youth until her dying day. The movies, the stars, the fashion, she loved it all. When I was growing up she had me watch all the screwball comedies she could get her hands on. She had tons of 1930s & 1940s movies on VHS tapes (yes, I am aware that 90% of GR users probably don't even know what those are. It sucks to be revoltingly young, doesn’t it?) and I would watch them over and over again. And used to wish I'd not been born in the silly 1970s. (The Love Boat and disco vs. George Cukor and Cary Grant? Please someone take me back in time posthaste.) And I wanted to be Katharine Hepburn in The Philadelphia Story when I grew up. So that's Famous Three Things #1: screwball comedies.

Back to my grandmother. She was crazy about British Literature. And when I say crazy I mean CRAZY. She loved the classics but the one thing she just couldn't resist? Humor and wit. The first book she ever made me read? Something Fresh by P.G. Wodehouse. I can't remember how old I was when I first read it but I do remember falling in love with Wodehouse. He's been one of my favorite authors ever since. My grandmother's 1933 copy of Something Fresh sits on my bedside table and whenever I feel down I just open it at random and read a few pages. It works better than all the alcohol in the world. 

Now there was one book that my grandmother suggested I read that I've always had mixed feelings about: Three Men in a Boat by Jerome K. Jerome. Why is this important? Because the subtitle for this much-loved classic is To Say Nothing of the Dog. Yes, this is where Connie Willis got the title for her book. Jerome's story plays a very important part in Willis' book, too. And Willis' book could be considered a homage to Jerome's. I can't recount how many times I've read Three Men in a Boat in a desperate attempt to love it as much as everyone else does. Sometimes I think it's boring as hell, sometimes I think "hey, I think I get it now" but most times I just find it meh. Now that I've just reread To Say Nothing of the Dog I feel like giving Jerome's book another try. Obviously. I wonder how it will go this time. I'm not keeping my hopes up. Anyway, this was Famous Three Things #2: humorous British Lit.

As much as she loved the 1930s and British Lit, my grandmother was a science-fiction buff. Yeah, she was a pretty cool grandma. Her science fiction books? I haven't seen a more extensive collection to this day. And although she didn't actually introduce me to time travel novels, it's my grandmother's love for anything science-fiction that led me to discover that particular subgenre. I was never a fan of space operas and books involving aliens, distant galaxies, androids etc but time travel? I've always LOVED it (digression time: want to read one of the best time travel stories ever written? Read Time and Again. End of digression time). And that's Famous Three Things #3: time travel.

So I'm halfway through this review and I haven't said a thing about the book yet. Sigh. I told you this would be long and boring. 

Let's do a little recap here. We have screwball comedies + humorous British Lit + time travel. And where does that take us? To Connie Willis of course. Because To Say Nothing of the Dog is the perfect mix of all these things. And more. So much more: it's P.G. Wodehouse meets the space time continuum meets comedic romp meets Agatha Christie meets the Victorian era meets Alternate History meets Dorothy L. Sayers meets fantasy of manners meets Everything I've Ever Loved. It's hilarious (well my kind of hilarious anyway), it's clever, it's witty, it's interesting, it's fun, it's thought-provoking and DAMN I still haven't said a word about the story. And I won't either. Just know that this book is about time travel and Victorian society. About chaos theory and bulldogs. About The Battle of Waterloo and hemorrhoids. About the butterfly effect and butlers who read Darwin. About crisis points and the drowning of extinct cats. About the Enigma machine and jumble sales. About penwipers and the least likely suspect. About Ultra and spiritualism. About time-lag and chaperones. About meddling with history and loose lips. About self-corrections and Coventry Cathedral. About space time continuum incongruities and Oxford dons. And ultimately it's about the Bishop's bird stump. But is it really? Maybe not. Everything is relative here. So you'll just have to read the book to find out. If you still feel like reading this book after being put through my review that is. I'm pretty sure the number of people who had this book on their to-read list just plummeted. So just forget you ever read this review and trust me when I say: this book. Read it.

Sadly enough my grandmother passed away before To Say Nothing of the Dog was published. Had she had the chance to read it I'm pretty sure she would have LOVED it as much as I do.

Updated review here.

Original review:
I’ve just finished reading TSNOTD for the umpteenth time and could start all over again right away! This is definitely one of my favourite books ever:) Take time travel and the space-time continuum, add some Victorian screwball comedy, throw in a bit of P.G. Wodehouse here and some Agatha Christie there, cast a cat and a dog as two of the main characters, mix well and you get this one of a kind story only Willis could come up with. Reading doesn't get much better than this!

Risa C

I've always maintained that time travel is my favorite science fiction fantasy trope, because of its near-limitless potential for heartbreak and emotional devastation, but not until I read "To Say Nothing of the Dog" did I ever fully appreciate its inherent capacity for madcap hijinks and logic-bending shenanigans.

This an extremely clever and tightly written story, with a wondrously monstrous MacGuffin (and who doesn't love a good MacGuffin), delightful, scene-stealing animal companions, characters that leap out of the page and into your heart (apart from certain family members), and more than enough head-twisting time travel mysteries to keep you baited, hooked, and reeled merrily away on this crazy ride. Connie Willis blends so many genres together so seamlessly and writes with such timeless wit and humor that I feel there is something here for everyone and that this book, now more than two decades old, won't be eroded by the ravages of time, though it isn't a hideous thing, unlike the bishop's bird stump, St. Pancras Station, or the Albert Memorial. Instead, it's a lovely book that'll surely pick back up again in the future, if only to try and travel back to the time I first read it.

Casie Blevins

I giggled my way through this novel. I just love this author and can't wait to read more of her stuff.

To Say Nothing of the Dog

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