Great prose and character development and a, to me anyway, believable romance made this a novel to remember (as long as I don't study that plot too closely).

I wanted to love this book. I wanted to love it so badly, and yet I did not. I love time related books with a love story looped in but this one just did not do it for me. It started off strong but I didn't love the flashbacks to his expedition and I felt that the author told me rather than showed how the FMC fell for/loved the MMC and it came out of nowhere. It was just a near-miss and the whole thing was sort of strange. But, if you like time travel, history, sociology, romance, suspense etc give it a try as it may be the book for you! There were a few side characters that I enjoyed getting to know and I was glad I saw one of the major surprise twists coming in advance haha. I fear that I had been wanting to read this for so long and saw some good reviews (President Obama) that maybe it was overhyped since I've read alot of books in this subgenre. Thank you to NetGalley and Simon & Schuster for allowing me to read an ARC and apologies that health issues made it take this long!

What a wonderful read! Mixing humor, romance and the traditional sci-fi theme of time travel into a mystery novel,
Bradley kept me interested from start to finish.

A young woman, an ordinary civil servant, is one of several people hired by a new British ministry to help - to act as "bridges" --
to a handful of persons pulled from various eras in England's past to adjust to the new world of the present. Why pull individuals from earlier eras? Why were the bridges chosen? What is the Ministry's plan? That's part of the mystery that slowly unfolds. But before the reader gets there
we are treated to an imaginative, creative and humorous description of how those plucked from the past, with different speech patterns, unfamiliarity with technological advances or what is history to us, might try to adjust.

I love a good time travel yarn and even though this one wasn’t for me, I can totally understand the compelling appeal! My heartfelt gratitude to NetGalley, Avid and Simon & Schuster for providing an eARC in exchange for my honest opinion!

This was a fun read! Time travel is always tricky to write and I appreciated some of the cultural shocks that someone from the past would encounter. Thanks for the opportunity to read this ARC!

I was experiencing a silly time travel. Ogle but was pleasantly surprised by the depth of this. A spy thriller on the surface but the first person point of view brings up a lot of discussion of family history and trauma and how we relate to other people. Some of the time travel elements didn’t quite work for me in the end but really helped enjoyed it nevertheless.

This was a great book! Unique and has real staying power. I thoroughly enjoyed it. Thank you NetGalley and Avid Reader Press for this ARC!

I finished the book, but I wasn't totally pulled into the narrative behind the main character's experience. The ending felt abrupt and slightly unfulfilling.

The description of this book's plot was so intriguing! Unfortunately, the actual story left me a bit disappointed. It seemed the author was trying to do too many things at once, with multiple competing genres. I also found some of the word choices distracting since they didn't seem to flow naturally. The British humor and interesting world-building were my favorite parts, but ultimately I found it hard to get to the finish of this one.

I found this book to be wholly enjoyable and had a very quirky premise. The main character and Gores relationship evolved naturally and had many funny moments that I was sharing with my friends as I read it. I found the mystery at the end by complete surprise and I’m glad because sometimes I can tell the ending early on but not for this one. I’d recommend it to any sci-fi lover out there, such as those who enjoyed This is How You Lose A Time War.

Genre: Sci-Fi

Format: Audio

3.5🌟 - it was fine!

I really expected to be obsessed with this one, but it made me feel nothing 🫠. I think objectively the writing is good, but something about this was not for me!

3.75 stars

I really enjoyed this! I liked the idea of a government agency testing the bounds of time travel and the logic behind who they chose for test subjects. It makes sense and isn't something you see much of in time travel books. Those early days of figuring things out were probably very messy (as we see).

I loved the narrative voice! It's very unique and a compelling way to tell the story. It's first person past tense; our narrator knows what happens from the very beginning. I love that she isn't named. And I thought the challenging balance of governmental complicity and duty to resistance was well executed. It turned this story into more of a social commentary than just a thrilling time travel novel and I deeply appreciated that.

The characters are darling! Arthur and Graham and Maggie and the narrator were beautifully realized and individualized. I can't imagine the work that went into them to make each of them feel specific to their periods. I wanted to be friends with their group and just tuck them safely away.

Everything started to fall apart for me in the last 20%. It started to feel like a different story and I think that's partly due to the limits of the narration. The narrator knows what happens but is walking us through it as if for the first time. So there's not enough foreshadowing to make the last chunk feel cohesive. It gets chaotic and messy.

I'd still recommend this because I did truly enjoy it!

<i>Many thanks to NetGalley, Avid/Simon & Schuster, and the author for providing a copy in exchange for an honest review.</i>

Unfortunately this book was not for my. I tried and made it to almost halfway through the book. But I just wasn't invested in the characters and the story was slow paced for me. I did really like the concept of the story though.

This was a delightful read. This is a book about the apocalypse written with levity. What if we shared a flat with a time traveling arctic explorer? And what if that is what was needed in order to save civilization? This story brings up so many questions I had never thought to consider and will spend a long time pondering them.

The Ministry of Time was a unique read that started a little slowly for me. I would have enjoyed learning more after the ending, but overall this was a great book that I may read again to catch things I missed. The author, Kaliane Bradley, writes the most beautiful descriptions. I look forward to reading more.

I was unfortunately unable to finish this book in time due to a serious health issue, but I was incredibly, incredibly sad that I wasn’t able to do so. Because I liked the first several chapters so much — the quirky premise, the time travel/magical realism, the banter between the characters, and the moral questions the book posed from the beginning, I actually purchased a copy so that I could finish reading it on my own time. Absolutely delightful, thought-provoking, and gut-wrenching all at the same time. Bardley’s book is simply a masterpiece and I very much hope to see her more in the future!

2.5 stars

I loved the premise of this one but not the implementation- it just was too slow. It could have been edited down a fair amount.

The Ministry of Time is an incredibly fun combination of science fiction, historical fiction, and romance. The characters, though difficult to understand at times are intriguing and the plot includes just enough variety to keep a reader hooked til the end.

I think this is actually more of a 2.5, but I’m rounding up because I loved the backstory of why the book was written (the author’s unhinged obsession with a daguerreotype of a long-dead, very handsome Arctic explorer) and really, really loved the first third or so where Commander Gore and his fellow expats are exposed to modern life. Muppets! Scooters! Spotify! So funny and smart - I had the highest hopes for where this was going…

But then it lost me. The main character was annoying. The love story felt forced and weird. The spy/traitor business was very confusing. The big twisty surprise about one of the characters was very lame. It just kind of went off the rails trying to be too many things and lost all of the fun of the first part.

Also: I listened to some sections of this as an audiobook and have to say the narrator was not my favorite - the girl voice parts were mumbled and hard to understand and the boy voice parts sounded like when me and my friends imitate our husbands saying something dumb. You have a competent male narrator already booked - use him for the boy voices! I am very happy I didn’t listen to any of the sex scenes on audio bc that would have been horrific.

This was Truman Show meets Back To the Future. There was an unexpected connection I wasn't expecting between the main characters, which brought a depth to the story.

I like how it touches on the themes of finding oneself and immigration.