Lost in Time
Ratings25
Average rating3.9
15
Ratings25
Average rating3.9
When his daughter is falsely accused of murder, a scientist must travel 200 million years into the past to save her. But there are secrets waiting there. And more than her life is at stake.
From the worldwide bestselling author of Departure and Winter World comes a standalone novel with a twist you’ll never see coming.
Control the Past.
Save the Future.
One morning, Dr. Sam Anderson wakes up to discover that the woman he loves has been murdered.
For Sam, the horror is only beginning.
He and his daughter are accused of the crime.
The evidence is ironclad. They will be convicted.
And so, Sam does what he must: he confesses to the crime.
But in the future, murderers aren’t sent to prison.
They’re sent to the past.
Two hundred million years into the past—to the age of the dinosaurs—to live out their lives alone, in exile from the human race.
Sam accepts his fate.
But his daughter doesn’t.
Adeline Anderson has already lost her mother to a deadly and unfair disease. She can’t bear to lose her father.
She sets out on a quest to prove him innocent. And get him back. People around her insist that both are impossible tasks.
But Adeline doesn’t give up. She only works harder.
She soon learns that impossible tasks are her specialty. And that she is made of tougher stuff that she ever imagined.
As she peels back the layers of the mystery that ripped her father from this world, Adeline finds more questions than answers. Everyone around her is hiding a secret. But which ones are connected to the murder that exiled her father? That mystery stretches across the past, present, and future–and leads to a revelation that will change everything.
Reviews with the most likes.
Interesting Concepts Yet Disjointed Storytelling. This is one of those books where there is nothing objectively wrong with it, and yet it also feels a bit disjointed. Separated into several parts, it could likely have been better separated into a trilogy, with the events of Parts 1 and 2 in one book, 3 and 4 in a second book, and 5 in a final book. Then you could expand each section out beyond what was presented in even these 400 pages (since you'd arguably need at least another couple hundred or so for a third book) and really make the effort to take a good tale into the stratosphere of being among the best in scifi. Overall the specific application of time travel here was one I hadn't seen in any form since the early 2000s era Jet Li movie The One, and even here the specific direction Riddle applies is unique in my experience and intriguing overall. Ultimately this is a good tale and well told, it just seemed like it could have been better with a different editing approach. Very much recommended.
Fantastic and fast paced, emotional rollercoaster.
This is my first A G Riddle read and I will definitely be reading more.
Thank you NetGalley for the ARC in exchange for an honest review.
The story centres around a group of people who, with their own reasons, stumble onto building a time machine. The plot is on full of murder mystery, a whodunnit situation that leaves you disagreeing with yourself on what the hell has happened.
The story flows very well, I only started this last night and have now finished it in two sittings. If there was ever a unputdownable book, this is it.
The characters, as I've mentioned, all have their reasons to want to change their lives. Also, each one has a motive to want to murder the victim. Every time I thought I knew who done it, I was switched and left unsure. Each character felt real and were making decisions you'd expect of them.
There is a lot of time travel in this book and it sometimes went over my head, which isn't hard! There's a few scenes I would love to mention but it's much better if you experience this yourself.
4/5 stars. Great story and one I didn't want to end. I look forward to delving into the Riddle world.
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I think with time travel stories, there's only so many different twists people can come up with and it's evident in Lost in Time, because the main twist has already been done before and if you know enough time travel stories, can probably figure it out. However, the lynchpin of the conclusion, the final “twist,” I think I've seen done in time travel stories, but not the way it's done here, and gives it a very satisfying ending. Given that, I think this book is a worthwhile addition to the time travel genre. And personally just because I love time travel stories, this book was very entertaining to me and I was very invested in seeing how it all wrapped up.
My only gripe with the book is that the marketing is pretty misleading and the actual book is very different than what I expected. You're lead to believe that the time traveling to the past is very important, and that dinosaurs and everything would be a large part of the book but they really aren't. In fact you're also led to believe that Sam is the main character of the book but he really isn't. There's a line in the book's description that says "But he can't give up, because he has to save his family who are 200 million years in the future" which makes you think he would do something to save his family somehow. But in fact it's him who gets saved by Adeline, the true main character of the book. Sam doesn't really contribute to the plot at all so his time in the past is largely irrelevant. Everything about the marketing makes you think it's super important, that Sam contributes significantly, but it's Adeline the story revolves around and the present timeline that's relevant. I am not sure if this was done on purpose to hide the twist, but it was just strange having this disconnect between the description of the book and the reality.
