This Is How You Lose the Time War

by Max Gladstone, Amal El-Mohtar

Hardcover, 201 pages

English language

Published July 16, 2019 by Simon and Schuster.

ISBN:: 978-1-5344-3100-3

(27 reviews)

Two time-traveling agents from warring futures, working their way through the past, begin to exchange letters—and fall in love in this thrilling and romantic book from award-winning authors Amal El-Mohtar and Max Gladstone.

In the ashes of a dying world, Red finds a letter marked “Burn before reading. Signed, Blue.”

So begins an unlikely correspondence between two rival agents in a war that stretches through the vast reaches of time and space.

Red belongs to the Agency, a post-singularity technotopia. Blue belongs to Garden, a single vast consciousness embedded in all organic matter. Their pasts are bloody and their futures mutually exclusive. They have nothing in common—save that they’re the best, and they’re alone.

Now what began as a battlefield boast grows into a dangerous game, one both Red and Blue are determined to win. Because winning’s what you do in war. Isn’t it?

A tour de force collaboration from …

In the ashes of a dying world, Red finds a letter marked “Burn before reading. Signed, Blue.”

So begins an unlikely correspondence between two rival agents in a war that stretches through the vast reaches of time and space.

Now what began as a battlefield boast grows into a dangerous game, one both Red and Blue are determined to win. Because winning’s what you do in war. Isn’t it?

A tour de force collaboration from two powerhouse writers that spans the whole of time and space.

5 editions

Paul reviewed This is How You Lose the Time War by Max Gladstone

Review of 'This is How You Lose the Time War' on 'Goodreads'

1 star

Just finished reading this book and I have no idea what the plot is. There's a character called Red and another one called Blue, and they like each other but are opposite sides in a war and... that's about it. I'm not even sure what the Time War was or how it's in any way connected to the title. There's nothing wrong with any given line of prose - the authors can clearly write well in that sense - but there's no character development (or characters for that matter, beyond Red/Blue), no story, no anything really.

I'm clearly missing something though as it's won lots of awards and has plenty of five star reviews. If you think you might like it, check out the charity shops in my area shortly as you'll be able to pick up a copy practically brand new for less than the £10 cover price.

Frank Burns reviewed This Is How You Lose the Time War by Max Gladstone

Review of 'This Is How You Lose the Time War' on 'Goodreads'

5 stars

Exquisite. I could wax lyrical about how the authors took the traditional weakness of the collaborative novel and made it a strength. I could go on about how they made me enjoy a time travel story, not something I would normally do. I could rave about the pull of the interactions between the protagonists and how choice it was that this was the main plot engine. Let me just say instead that this is definitely recommended. If you read my reviews, you should read this.