I read this book on a whim, never for a moment thinking I was going to enjoy it - I was wrong. Cracking, fast paced sci-fi from Lawrence, that turned this sceptic into a fan!

These books were really not for me unfortunately, I found them tedious and a bit boring!

I think Lawrence had enough content to write these as full length but as the basic short story, he needed to develop his characters more than he had chance to in this book.

Firstly, Limited Wish, was not as show stopping as One Word Kill. It still had all the amazing elements of One Word Kill but it didn’t hit quite as hard as book 1!

Limited Wish had the same amazing combo of humour, unexpected twists & turns and amazing sci-fi elements of book 1. I also still really enjoy this series’s take on time travel even though it drifted a little bit into the normal take on time travel in this one.

Book 2 was still extremely unpredictable and kept me on the edge of my seat. Though in this one the twists were a little less hard hitting as it book 1 which left me wanting more. I hope book 3, Dispel Illusion, will be able to fill that gap!

Overall for a 200 page book this is still very hard hitting, in depth and unpredictable and I highly recommend giving it a go! I will be picking up Dispel Illusion as soon as I finish writing this review!

The plot was exciting and kept me hooked but the writing and characterisation left a lot to be desired. The author felt the need to mention Simon's weight every time he was in a scene and the love interests didn't seem to have any agency in who they ended up with by the end.

Quick easy read, this is my first book by him. Wasn't completely impressed. It is the 3rd installment of a series so that might be why but I did feel it lacking in some areas.

After reading and loving One Word Kill, I could wait to jump into Limited Wish and see whether Demus’ plan actually works. Limited Wish starts with some jumping timelines, we open in June where Nick is working with a Professor at Cambridge University despite only being just 16, but we also know that between February and now, he has lost his friendship with Elton and broken up with Mia who he worked so hard to save in the first book. We then jump back to February where we learn Nick wanted to get into university early so, he could start working on inventing the headbands Demus gave him and prove time travel was real and possible. He manages to do this by crashing one of Professor Halligan’s lectures in order to talk to him, but he soon realises that his new research is incorrect and corrects it for him. At that point the Professor demanded that Nick be allowed to work with him or he would resign so Cambridge allowed it but being on the youngest people there Nick is having a hard time fitting in as we see in the opening chapter where he is rescued by 17 year old Helen for some third year students. Nick gets the same déjà vu feeling with Helen as he did with Demus when they first meet so I have a feeling she is going to be important to this book. So far, the opening of Limited Wish was great, and I can’t wait to see where Nick goes in this instalment.

As we approach the ¼ mark in the novel, Nick dries off his clothes in Helen’s accommodation and he begins talking to her about everything that has gone on with Demus even though he didn’t realise he was doing it when he suddenly remembers why Helen looks so familiar. It turns out in February, Nick saves Helen from being chased down by echoes of herself and something else that he doesn’t quite understand, while Helen sees this as a bit mad, it also happens with John on their way home and other strange things have also been happening to Nick but now there is no Demus to explain them. When he brings this up at their next D&D game, now minus Elton, everyone including Simon is very concerned for Nick and it seems like Nick has turned himself into a statistically outlier meaning there could be many more unpleasant and dangerous thing in store for Nick as time goes on. While the first book didn’t feature the dual timelines, I am rather enjoying it as it will take a bit longer for the puzzle to come together as the clues as scattered over two distinct time periods. Nick is beginning to notice more of these impossible events happening to him but every time he is saved my time fragmenting and showing him the way out. He also begins to notice that these events are more violent in nature whenever Helen is around. We get our first clue that she is just like Demus, in the fact she comes from the future by the band t-shirt others see her wearing referencing The Red-Hot Chilli Peppers and Lady Gaga which weren’t around in 1986.

As we cross the ¼ mark in the novel, Nick is trying to pin Hellen down to try and figure out what the hell is happening when they are together and what the link is between them but she always manages to evade him by simply disappearing whenever he tries to chase her down. The next he is at Simon’s for D&D, they have a new player in the form of Sam, Mia’s new boyfriend which upsets Nick, but he doesn’t say anything. The echoes and strange things haven’t stopped happening and even Simon who has no interest in the outside world warns Nick that someone is protecting their investment and that investment is him and he should watch himself and follow the money since his project has an unknown financial backer. Nick gets even more concerned when he realises, he is begin followed but it turns out to be Demus, not the one from the first novel, but a different Demus who believes a paradox is in effect since he is missing memories that Nick has especially surrounding Helen. This means that this Demus and Nick aren’t the same person and the future Nick worked so hard to protect in the first book might be in trouble now unless they resolve the paradox. I am almost sure that Helen is the paradox since she is clearly from the future and somehow is disrupting the timeline that Nick wants to protect.

As we approach the halfway mark in the novel, I was enthralled by the characters and where the story was going. I also have the mention that the science presented in this novel isn’t hard to understand at all and is extremely fascinating and I hope that Mark Lawrence write more science fiction in the future since he seems to be really good at it although I will withhold my final judgement until I have completed the trilogy. Demus was right to tell Nick to listen to Simon’s advice since night when he returns home, he realises that the mysterious girl was in his home and left him a book on mathematics written by none other than Lewis Carroll in 1888. However, Nick can’t touch the book without receiving a massive shock, but he decides to take it to university the next day. On the train there he meets an unsavoury character called Charles Rust who seems to be working on the behalf of Miles Guilder the man backing their research. Rust explains that his job is one part to protect Nick and the other part to intimidate him and I am getting some really bad vibes off this guy as he proves he can get to Nick and anyone Nick cares about with ease. However, Nick has bigger things to worry about as one of the university boys runs him through with a sword and while it should have been a deadly blow it almost magically became a small cut but Nick is also told at the same time that his cancer has returned. This solidifies the message that the current Demus and Nick aren’t same person and that they have definitely gone off course since the original Demus lived to be 40 whereas Nick might not even make 17 now.

As we cross into the second half of the novel, Nick is in the hospital when he is rescued by the mysterious Eva who has been asking after him. It turns out that Eva is Nick’s daughter from another alternate timeline to Demus’ meaning that Nick himself is the paradox causing all these strange events. From what he can gather from Eva and Demus, it all centres around the May Ball, in one timeline he leaves the ball with Mia, lives 25 years until her accident where he comes back in time like the original Demus from book one. In another timeline, he leaves the ball with Helen, has Eva at 19 and dies from his cancer two years later. What they have to do now is create a time hammer and activate it at the precise moment the paradox occurs which is the evening of the ball but Nick also has to get Mia, Helen and his other friends to attend for it to work. Nick is also going to have to make the choice between the timelines at some point, but I am not sure which one he would rather choose right now. In addition to all this, he has Charles Rust, Ian’s older brother sniffing around and while Charles isn’t as crazy as his younger brother it definitely runs in the family and he wants to know what happened the night his brother was killed but Nick can’t tell him even if he wanted to because he erased those memories.

As we approach the ¾ mark in the novel, Nick knows what has to be done to repair the paradox, but it seems like absolutely nothing is going in their favour, although the universe has temporarily stopped trying to kill Nick. While he knows he has to go to the ball, Nick doesn’t feel well enough to do it but Demus and Eva break him out of the hospital again only for them to be jumped by Charles Rust, who has figured out that Nick is time travelling and the dead Demus and the current one are version of him and he is out to get revenge for the death of his brother. They manage to escape but it has thrown a spanner in the works since he needs to be dealt with in the current Nick’s timeline to prevent any problems after they unleash the time hammer. It turns out the best solution there is for Demus and Eva to jump back in time, Demus to his original point in January and re-live that timeline while Eva will jump further back to the 70’s and deal with the Rust problem. I did like that Elton made a reappearance in this novel, but still doesn’t really interact with Nick because of his ability to attract death and destruction but he still cares about his friend which is nice to see. At this point in the novel, the plot did seem really similar to that of the first book but I am hoping that the resolution will be different and provide a great opening for the last book in this series, Dispel Illusion which I will probably be reading right after I finish Limited Wish. I also really liked how the titles of the first two books somehow linked back to D&D which is something all the characters love and it makes up a huge part of the books. You don’t have to know anything about D&D in order to read these books as most of it is explained and you pick the rest up fairly easily and honestly it sounds rather fun.

As we cross into the final section of the novel, we get to see the pieces come together as Eva and Demus race to untangle their timelines while our current Nick watches from the side-lines. Their plan is interrupted as Charles Rust land a fatal blow to Demus, but he manages to complete his side of the arrangement allowing Eva to travel back through the cracks in time to where she needs to be. However, along the way she makes a small yet important change which has some amazing consequences. Ultimately Nick still has to make a choice between the two timelines, between Mia and Helen and the two lives he could lead. Despite not knowing that much about Demus’ life, his future life he chooses Mia which I had been hoping for although the introduction of Eva did make me question this. The ending of Limited Wish was great and leaves a nice opening for Dispel Illusion, I think the final book is going to focus on Mia’s future accident and where or not Demus’ efforts actually saved her but I am eager to see whether my theory is correct.

i generally enjoy mark lawrence, his characters and his writing. i devoured his Book of the Ancestor trilogy, and have loved many of his other works as well.

this is no different from what i've read from him and already loved, although it has a very interesting and different urban fantasy setting. it's a short and fast story about nick hayes, fifteen year old cancer patient, math nerd and D&D aficionado, and the trials he and his group of friends have to go through in order to fulfill a request made by a very weird yet very familiar man who claims he is a time traveler. i love it because it's the perfect kind of escapism fiction i find myself craving these days; sweet characters, an adventure to go through and an atmosphere that gets me to turn the pages as rapidly as i can.

A worthy follow-up to One Word Kill!

Limited Wish is the second installment in the three-part Impossible Times series, and it was just as entertaining as the first. With this one, however, Mark Lawrence seemed to swop out some of the adventure elements of the first book for more technical details on the intricacies of time travel, so where One Word Kill was a general rip-roaring good time, this one felt a tad more serious - in a good way! The buildup to the final, critical moment was also really well done, making for a satisfying read overall.

Woohoo for book 3!

Limited Wish, second book in the Impossible Times trilogy, follows again Nick, this time a student at Cambridge determined to be just that - a regular student. When he sees a familiar looking girl, he discovers creases in the fabric of time, that paradoxes are arising, and he’s running out of time to save not only his future but the world.

Limited Wish follows closely behind One Word Kill, and the events that took place. Nick is still struggling with his sickness, and having met his future self and the effects that has on him and his friends. It’s still heavy on the math and DnD, but this time with more of a focus on time paradox, as well as a new member of their DnD group. It’s a similarly fast paced story, moving quickly through the events after Nick sees the familiar girl.

The writing is also fast paced, pulling you along with Nick. There are some rather dense moments when focusing on explaining the math and science behind the time travel and paradox, but it doesn’t feel like it bogs the story down. Occasionally it is a bit overbearing for how long these sections go on, but it doesn’t detract from the story and is important.

My biggest complaint with this one is the side characters really don’t feel as though they grow, or have any development. While Limited Wish doesn’t focus on them, it would have been nice to see some change with Nick’s friends, showing that they’re growing up as he is. Instead, they feel a bit one dimensional, and you feel rather indifferent to their purpose in the book.

All in all though, a good sequel to One Word Kill, and especially a fun series for those that love mind bending time travel stories.

Great follow up to One Word Kill with the continuing story of Nick Hayes. Time travel is a difficult sci-fi concept to get right, but here it works well with a fast paced plot and emotional moments.

I preferred this sequel to One Word Kill, the first in the trilogy, and really enjoyed the direction it took the characters in. And of course there was plenty of time travel goodness and Dungeons & Dragons campaigns to be had.

I enjoyed Limited Wish even less than One Word Kill. This book might suffer from the middle book syndrome (which isn’t something I can verify, as I don’t plan on finishing the series). Despite this book being as short as it was, I felt that it dragged on in some parts. There were just many things about Limited Wish that bothered me.

I found the overall story less engaging and enjoyable. The action was still there and I did fly through this book, which is always nice. The D&D stuff started to annoy me, it felt like such a chore to read about it. Another aspect of this that bothered me is Nick. He annoyed me so much throughout the whole book. I can’t go into detail as to why, because that would definitely contain spoilers. The other characters weren’t developed from the first book, which was rather disappointing. I feel that the point of this series is the plot and not the characters.

The thing that bothered me most about Limited Wish is the love triangle. That is a trope that I hate and the way it was used in this story bothered me so freaking much. I honestly didn’t expect this kind of love story from this book. I feel like this review makes it seem like I hated this book. That is not the case. I was still interested in the story, but many other aspects of the book hindered my enjoyment of it.

Overall, Limited Wish was a disappointing book for me. Things I hoped would improve from the first book didn’t and some other things happened that really bothered me. I’m not sure if I would recommend this book.

I absolutely love this book! Mark Lawrence has a wonderful imagination, I didn't think Book 1 could be topped but it was! The Impossible Times series has become on of my all time favourites!

I can only reiterate that I love symbolic titles and titles that appear verbatim in the text.

I feel this suffers from typical second-book-syndrome that so many trilogies have. I was missing the excitement and suspense and nothing new came to be. The D&D sessions are still happening and kind of mirror real life, Demus plays a role again and the time travels shows its flaws - but that's nothing we haven't seen in the first book. I don't feel we have enough development to suffice for a whole book.

I felt the choice Nick has to do make in the end felt quite shallow since we spent so few pages on either of the relationships. It was a critique I had in the first part but I feel it is more pronounced now.

I was very fortunate to receive this book from the author for an honest review. While I thought the depiction of mental health and the struggles from that were very real and honestly triggering, the rest of the book faltered from a pacing issue. I feel that dungeons and dragons could be more interesting in a tale (see the show Stranger Things), but in this book, I found myself really bored. Things finally started getting more interesting in the last 50 pages, enough that I picked up the second book to see what happened.

The second book in this trilogy is largely a retelling of the first book. Nick sees some mysterious people, who turn out to be from the future, there is a lot of talk about time travel and parallel universes and there is a heist sequence at the end.

This book was a lot heavier on the pseudo-science and that got a little tiring and head-scratchy at times, with all the talk of paradoxes and whatnot.

This was an enjoyable read, but as with anything time travel related too much creativity and inventiveness can only lead to stretches in plausibility and lengthy justifications for the "science".

A brilliant continuation from One Word Kill, Limited Wish picks up a little while into the future where our hero is delving into the realms of time travel probability and the universe is trying to kill him for it; A surge of action and excitement, I love how each book's title captures the mood and outlook for each individual book. I can't wait to see how the story wraps up in Dispel Illusion!

This second installment is brilliant and gripping as the first one - after all, Mark Lawrence is a warranty- Maybe it is a bit too convulted for my tastes, but I loved how it messed with my mind nonetless.

This story had two, then three strikes against it (set in the eighties, which was a decades I loathed), its protag has cancer, and I loathe cancer stories, and there is a love triangle, another pet hate.

On the other hand, it was written by Mark Lawrence, and so I dove in, and what a wild ride. Really, this needs to be a film. Lawrence lets his imagination go while managing to make math sexy, throwing twists, turns and coincidences at the reader faster than a roller coaster that lost its brakes. While the basic time travel paradox isn't necessarily convincing (how many of them are?) the pure story telling power cannot be beat.

So, I have a little confession to make before we start… I am not a fan of time travel. But I am a big fan of Mark Lawrence. Do you see my problem here? On one hand, this series is not for me, because of time travel, on the other hand… how can I resist? so I had to try and see for myself how this series was.
The first book was ok. Obviously, if you are more into time travel the first book was quite interesting. And if you are a fan of D&D or if you are going through a nostalgia fase for the 80’s well, even better. But I am not a fan of D&D (hear me out, I love the idea but it just too social for me, it requires too many social skills, because it involves a group of people, and groups aren’t my thing) and I am not having a bout of nostalgia (even if I am in the right age for it), so the three main points of this series aren’t really doing something for me.

But the first book wasn’t bad, just not really my thing and I have decided to try and see how the second was. And I was very lucky because I enjoyed myself more during this second installment. I don’t know what was better, for me, but I found myself more drawn into the story and I didn’t have a hard time empathizing with the characters, either.
All in all is a fast-paced story with a great part about timetravels and paradox (this was surprising, but that part was quite enjoyable to me!) and I fell in love with their campaign in D&D (is that the right name, I know the Italian word, but I am not so sure about the English one, so if it’s not the right one please forgive me!).
And I liked all the characters more, too. Eve was my favorite, but all the others were quite good (in the first book I had some difficulties to really like them, I wasn’t really invested in them and in the story) and I found myself more at ease with them.

All things considered, I am a big fan of Lawrence when he writes fantasy, not so huge when he tries something new (sorry!), but I think it’s a good thing that he’s experimenting and I would read the final chapter, too.