Time travel sci-fi? Spy thriller? Or romance? I'm not sure what genre this book fits in, but it was certainly original and fun.

The main character (whose name is never mentioned) works at a UK government ministry and is assigned a new role of a 'bridge' to look after a time traveler - Graham Gore, a navy officer who died in 1847. Graham must be one of the most charming literary characters I've come across, and his adaptation to the 21st century was often hilarious.

The bridge and Graham are put in a house together and yes, they fall in love!

There's lots going on in the book and a twist is revealed towards the end I did not see coming at all.

Many thanks to the publisher and Netgalley for my review copy in exchange for an honest review.

I absolutely loved this new novel by Kaliane Bradley. Full of uniques ideas and great characterisation I found it very funny in parts, yet poignant in others. Great writing style.

A thoroughly enjoyable debut novel which is a fast read with a lot going on for a relatively short book.
Near future spy thriller, speculative time travel, a slow burn romance, historical fiction details of Franklins doomed expedition on the ships Erebus and Terror, themes of climate, colonialism, race and belonging. If anything there are too many big themes to fully flesh them out but it does mean we get a fast paced fun, emotional, mysterious and at times, humorous, story.

Narrated by a young British-Cambodian woman working as a translater who is offered a job as a 'bridge' at the Ministry of Time.
Five people from the past have been rescued from their own lives and brought to this 'present' time. It's the job of the bridges to help these 'expats' acclimatise to modern life while keeping them safe and keeping the project secret.

Our narrator is paired up with Commander Graham Gore, plucked out of the 1840s before he dies an icy death on Franklin's expedition.
It's the relationship of Gore and his bridge that is the heart of this novel with the other expats and ministry workers reduced to side characters. These include a soldier from the Great War and a woman from the 1600s who has a lot of fun learning about modern life, especially when she realises being queer is not to be hidden away as in her own time.

There are spy shenanigans with unexpected dangers when someone starts targeting the expats. Is there a mole? Are there people from other times involved? And what exactly is the project trying to achieve?

By the end of the novel there's love, heartache, death and sadness and many answers but not answers to everything. There's definitely scope for a follow up novel but it works perfectly well as a standalone. A terrific debut.

What an incredible book. I expected this to be a quiet, calm read, but it was anything but. I loved every second and I can't wait to read more of Kaliane Bradley's work. The idea of picking a character out of a history footnote and building him into a character that is so full and complex is such an amazing skill to have, and it makes me want more of these sorts of books. I found myself immediately looking up more about Graham Gore and the Erebus, as my own knowledge about the expedition was tiny. Mixing in time travel was a fun element and I feel it was done beautifully.

I agree that parts of the book were slow, but I felt that Kaliane used this opportunity to build characters and relationships and I really enjoyed the lulls in the tension. It also made me anxious to seek out the next bit of foreshadowing and try to grasp what was going on. The writing may not be for everyone, but personally I loved the flowery metaphors and similes ("bobbing around one another like clots in a lava lamp"; "emotion in her face spiralled away, water down a plughole"). It was fun to see new descriptions and they gave a great visual effect.

The characters were lovely to meet and follow. While the romance wasn't what I expected, I found myself searching for each look and word and praying that things would go further. They were all beautifully fleshed out.

Overall, I loved this, and feel physically drained after finishing it (a sign of a great book for me). Thanks to Netgalley and the publishers for sending me an e-ARC in exchange for an honest review.

A very interesting concept of futuristic dystopia, where all the ills of modern society have brought about destruction,and changing history through a portal, to bring people back from different eras is somehow going to change things. It is a pretty incomprehensible idea, and confusingly there is a lot of violent opposition and mixing up of the past and the future. Add to this a love story, and racial tensions from a Cambodian family’s past and present.
It is difficult to place this, on the one hand it is a comment on modern issues, it tells the story of the famous failed Artic expedition, and even plucks a real person from that to take the story forward. I found the writing to be full of language which seemed to be deliberately exclusive, also there were irritating weather analogies throughout e.g. “air like sifted flour” which I found very tedious.

I was so intrigued by the title of this book purely because I love anything to do with time travel. If I could go back in time or even forward and have conversations with people from 100 years ago, I would absolutely love it. How interesting would that be? You would be able to see how far mankind has come and how far we have left to go which is portrayed here clearly in the ministry of time. The expats brought from the past from different eras show clearly the rapid progression of the world in the book with things such as technology, climate and population but how much still hasn't changed from racism to inequality amongst the sexes and gender attitudes. So from that point of view, I enjoyed the book. I just felt i was a little bored at times and was trying to fast forward to find exciting bits. The idea of the book is good And there's a very clever twist that I did not see coming at the end. I took alot from the themes we see through this book and was able to reflect on them but would have liked to be more enthralled by the actual plot.

I love time-travel fiction ,so I was looking forward to this one by Kaliane Bradley and while I did enjoy Ministry of Time , it wasn’t quite what I was expecting. The book has a different take on time travel- what would happen if time travel was another department of the British Civil service and the establishment. And yet, there are a lot of forms!
The first-person narrator is a civil servant who is of mixed Cambodian and British descent is recruited to be part of the Ministry of Time, a department to help a time traveller( or kidnappee) assimilate into modern society. The narrator becomes the bridge to Graham Gore ( a real-life explorer) from 1845 and the gentle , development of the relationship between them and the other time travellers form the core of this lovely book.
The book also touches upon the difficulties of being different and trying to fit in whether as a minority, gender, sexuality or because you happen to be from the past.
The book slowly builds to an action filled finale with some twists and reveals along the way- but these are gently threaded through the narrative.

Always a fan of a good time travel yarn, and this is a good one- exciting, immersive and humorous to boot. I love the idea of historical figures being brought into the 21st century and seeing how they manage, but I am still at a slight loss to understand exactly why the government decides to do this (I might have missed something). Thoroughly invested in the relationship between the nameless protagonist and the wonderful Gore. Feel like a follow up might see the author really get into her stride with this- looking forward to it!

I like a good time travel story. This was a bit of a ‘genre-jumping’ tale- time travel, romance, a bit of a spy thriller vibe, wryly comedic for much of the story, and a touch dystopian.
The pace was at times a bit slow, and it seemed to me that the narrator (author) popped in quite a few comments that were non-sequiturs or just oddly phrased and I wasn’t sure what they were supposed to mean.
But I really enjoyed the story. The author does a very good job of taking characters from quite different eras, bringing them to life and making them believable.
It’s well-written and well thought out, with good background research, and a couple of clever twists.
As with all good time travel tales, the plot gets nicely convoluted towards the end, where it also picks up pace. My advice would be: don’t try too hard to work out the ‘chicken and egg’ ramifications of time travel - it just makes the brain overheat!
Thanks to NetGalley for an ARC of this book.

Very entertaining! Kaliane Bradley’s debut novel centres around an unnamed protagonist. She is a civil servant … but with a very unusual brief. She works for The Ministry of Time as a ‘bridge’ (ie a handler) for one of five expats. These expats have been plucked from their original timelines (in this instance 1847) just prior to their point of death … and so that history is not changed. The work of the bridge is to live with the expat for a year and monitor them as they acclimatise both physically and emotionally to their new environment.

Forty-seven, or Graham Gore - as he is also known as, initially adjusts well to 21st century life with the help of his bridge. He learns to cook, loves a drink and really enjoys riding his motorcycle. As the novel progresses, bridge and expat become more acquainted with each other and the inevitable happens.

Bradley’s novel features a combination of time travel, sci-fi, romance and your classic thriller-type conclusion as the expats come under threat from more expats from the future. This is a great bit of escapism, as well as a wise exploration of the human heart. I strongly recommend this book.

This was a refreshingly original read set in the not too distant future, The government have 'discovered' how to travel through time. As a test of its safety they have brought five people from the past, who would have died, into the future. Our narrator, a civil servant, is employed to work as a Bridge for Gore, an arctic explorer. Her role is to help him to come to terms with the 'hereness' and 'thereness' of his past and present experiences. Not only is this a love story, it is also underpinned by some thought-provoking ideas linked to climate change and the ends to which governments will go to protect their resources.

A hugely enjoyable time travel romance, which examines the reliability of memory, time and power. The The Ministry of Time is an impressive debut novel by Kaliane Bradley. I did get a little confused sometimes by the sci fi/time travel narrative, but overall, loved it.

A by-the-book millenial civil servant gets put in charge of stewarding a victorian polar explorer plucked from history into the twenty-first century. Time-travel and the British government, what could go wrong?
What struck me first about this debut novel was its confidence. Behind this bizarre romance premise was a challenging and clever postcolonial look at time travel and love under imperialist structures; one I feel like I need to go back and read all over again. This has been billed as a romance and yes, the relationship between the unnamed protagonist and Graham Gore sits front and centre but despite finding myself deeply compelled by the romance here, Bradley never let it sit completely easy. The narrator was deeply interesting, though often frustrating and hard to like, as well as deeply self-critical and contradictory and the story never quite managed to completely reconcile the fact that she fell for a charismatic and likeable former(ish) agent of British colonial expansion and empire, who she nonetheless had a significant degree of power over as his keeper and educator, though I think in many ways that was the point. She was bitter and reactionary, and a bit of a coward, but she felt incredibly real, despite the fantastical premise. I think her consistent naivety began to be a little grating towards the end of the novel, especially as I began to lose track of the increasingly convoluted plot and themes, however I absolutely could not put this book down and if the ending was hinting to a series, I am very on board for round two.
A moment also, before I finish, for Maggie and Arthur. I loved them and I miss them and they were often the absolute highlight of the book as everything went down.
Thank you to netgalley and the publisher for a proof copy of this book

Wow, I don't know what I was expecting when I requested a review copy of this book, but this was certainly quite the journey...

In some alternate version of present day(ish) Britain, our unnamed protagonist gets a secret ministry job as a "bridge" for a person who has been rescued from time. Specifically commander Graham Gore who is rescued from a polar expedition in 1847. Her job, amongst other things, is to monitor Commander Gore (or "47" as he becomes known amongst his cohort of time refugees) for any distress time travel may have caused his physical or mental self, and acclimatise him to modern day.

But soon it becomes clear that the time travellers and their bridges are under threat from something or someone more sinister and immediate than the side effects of travelling through time.

I love time travel stories, though they often unravel and become hard to follow. To some extent that is also the case here, but I found it logically consistent enough within itself that the whole mind bendy aspect of time travel didn't bother me. And I cared about Graham, Arthur and Maggie, and was interested and invested in finding out what happened to them and how they would adjust to modern life.

The writing is gorgeous, and there were several passages that hurt me with their beauty, though there were also similes I couldn't quite get on board with.

I probably would have rated this 5 stars if it wasn't for the fact that I couldn't quite get on board with the romance. It gave me the ick, somehow. Something about the time refugees being in a vulnerable position and their bridges being in a position of power, and the way Graham was described through most of the book I didn't really read him as a sexual being. I feel like I would have needed to see more romantic interest from his POV earlier on. That said, I was still invested and I was still touched by the ending.

It's a clever, funny, sad, beautiful and thought-provoking book, that I would absolutely recommend.

Part Time-Travel Sci-Fi, Romance, Spy-Thriller set in London in the 2020s, but actually reads like a slice-of-life literary fiction novel most of the time.

The MC is of mixed heritage, her mother is a refugee from Cambodia and her father is British. She’s been working as a translator for some time when she is recruited by the Ministry of Time. She’s going to be the person who explains how the 21st century works for a temporal expat. The two of them are going to be housemates for at least a year.

The expat is one of a group of five temporal refugees, who were extracted shortly before they might have died. Commander Graham Gore is a real life figure from history. He was on the "Terror", one of the ships of Franklin’s expedition to find the North Passage. The fictional Gore of this novel is extracted from a small observation shed in the Arctic in 1847 and now has to find his land-legs in a Britain that is very different from his time. The bridge is supposed to help him.

I liked the premise the book offered, but had my problems with the fanfiction-like writing style, the pacing and its convoluted plot. Very prosaic passages clashed with banter, dialogue and, later on in the book, action sequences. The first two thirds of the book seem slow, compared to the last third when the spy-thriller part of the story kicks in.

The story is narrated in first person POV by the unnamed female MC, except for the beginnings of each chapter, which are third person POV accounts of the expat’s Arctic journey. If this was an account written by the unnamed Ministry employee, why were there passages about Gore and his days in the Arctic at the beginning of each chapter? Where did they come from and how did they make it into this report?
Some of the elements of the story worked better for me than others and all in all it only made sense when I reminded myself that the story is supposed to be the account of the Ministry employee and not a novel. That’s why her rather detached inner monologue about her feelings made sense to me, as well as the above mentioned fanfiction style writing that seemed to be all over the place.

Why the five people were extracted from the past and for what purpose is never fully explained. It was interesting to have five characters from the 17th to 19th century trying to find their way around the 2020s, but this aspect of the novel fell short. I think this book wanted to incorporate too many topics at once (climate change, refugees, racisms, misogynism, homophobia,… to name only a few) and be a romantic story and spy-thriller at the same time.

ARC provided by the publishers via NetGalley.

It's always tricky reviewing such an anticipated book, and one that has received such glowing reviews already. It can be difficult to live up to the hype, and whilst there was a lot to like in Ministry of Time, it fell a touch flat for me, in part because of this. Bradley is a skilled writer, and there’s a lot of excellent prose here. My main issue was towards the last 3/4ths of the book when it takes a slightly more ‘genre-y’ turn and failed to quite stick the landing. There are so many things explored in this novel - slow burn romance, time travel, post-colonialism, otherness and race, displacement - that work so well when combined early on, that when the plot sort of devolves into a more action based ‘typical’ time travel story, I felt we lost the richness that had come before, which led to a slightly muddled, slightly rushed and slightly disappointing ending. I honestly would have been happy to just read a romance that explores all of the themes outlined above, as these were the parts where Bradley’s skills shone. Seeing the ‘expats’ adjust to the 21st century could have filled the whole book alone, as this was such a fresh take on the time travel genre - we didn't need to devolve into cliche. Some of the logic about the 'future' also just didn't quite chime for me - the timescale felt off. The secondary characters felt richly drawn (and I loved Margaret and Arthur in particular), to the degree that I felt I couldn’t quite say the same about the narrator - she’s withholding from us in the text, but we also largely see her in relation to other people. Perhaps this was intentional, but I’d have loved to have delved a little deeper into her psyche at times, as she was compelling, but distant. There were a few jarring moments and/or references for me as someone of the same age and clearly the same level of online-ness as the author (as well as having read an interview with Bradley that stated the books very embryonic origins in ‘The Terror’ fandom, which is also referenced in the acknowledgements at the end) - that I couldn’t quite shake off. I also felt the framing device of the story felt introduced a tad too late, personally, which also made it fall a touch flat. Overall this was a strong debut that didn’t quite match up to my, admittedly high, expectations, but Bradley is clearly an incredibly talented writer, and I look forward to following her career with interest.

Oh yes. This is a very good book. I mean, it’s got time travel so I’m already partially sold but still.

The time travel itself consists of “doors” opening to bring through various people from the past just before their death, including polar explorer Graham Gore and it his “bridge” who the novel follows as she tries to help him settle and navigate in the modern world. There are elements of a once fiction, spy thriller and romance in this book and is just so well written. The characters are wonderfully drawn and I loved reading about their interactions in the future.

Highly recommended.

The author clearly has talent, and this book will find a big audience I'm sure, but it didn't work for me, for a number of reasons.

The humour, which is very present, was more miss than hit for me. There were times in the book where I was reminded of slightly naff BBC sitcoms, as our motley crew of time travellers try to adapt to modern-day England. Humour is very subjective though, and of course lots of other readers will find this aspect a strength.

The romance didn't really work for me. It arrives fairly late on in proceedings and then feels rather rushed.

As for the plot and time-travel elements, which is what I was here for, well this also felt like a late arrival. It was almost as if the first 2/3 of the book was a hilarious "fish out of water" comedy, and then the final third was an action-packed, twisty, sci-fi, spy thriller. I'm usually an absolute dolt when it comes to spotting twists, but I have to say even I could see the "reveals" from some way off. But the end manages to be both predictable and slightly incomprehensible. I may have glazed over a bit in the final sections, but I'm not entirely sure what happened and what the overall lesson was.

I think the author has a very strong "everywoman" voice, in that her main character felt relatable and fun. The book was at it's strongest for me when told in a simple fashion; there were a few passages that seemed levered in to be more "literary", and at times felt oddly-worded or obtuse.

Anyway, not one for me, but as other reviewers have noted, those who enjoy light-hearted, comic, "romantasy" style novels may well love it.

One of my favourite genres is time travel and although this involves people being extracted from the past to the present day we are never really involved in that aspect of it.

The protagonist, a civil servant, becomes a 'bridge' for one of these 'expats' a Graham Gore. A fictionalised version of someone who actually existed. The bridge, we never discover her name, is there to assist the ex=pat in acclimatising to 21st century life. The blurb states that it is comedic yet it never made me laugh. Perhaps my sense of humour has failed.

The book covers a year in which their lives as a 19th century man comes to terms with woman power, climate change, technology and the knowledge of what happened to his contempories.

In part, the book is about the decisions we make and how those decisions take us down different paths. There is a mix up of different dimentions to that effect.

I do not think I will read this again. The plot twists now being known, The BBC has aquired the rights to adapt this book and it will be interesting to see how they go about that.

I think my biggest let down was that none of the characters came to life for me. A shame as the premise was good and different.

3 stars as at one point I did wonder whether I could finish, I am glad I did.


Thank you to NetGalley and the publishers for the ARC.

It was a delight to read something so inventive and different, that was at the same time historical and precisely modern, witty and thought-provoking.