Synopsis:
In Bee Ridgway’s wonderfully imaginative debut novel, a man and a woman travel through time in a quest to bring down a secret society that controls the past and, thus, the future.
“You are now a member of the Guild. There is no return.” Two hundred years after he was about to die on a Napoleonic battlefield, Nick Falcott, soldier and aristocrat, wakes up in a hospital bed in modern London. The Guild, an entity that controls time travel, showers him with life’s advantages. But Nick yearns for home and for one brown-eyed girl, lost now down the centuries. Then the Guild asks him to break its own rule. It needs Nick to go back to 1815 to fight the Guild’s enemies and to find something called the Talisman.
In 1815, Julia Percy mourns the death of her beloved grandfather, an earl who could play with time. On his deathbed he whispers in her ear: “Pretend!” Pretend what? When Nick returns home as if from the dead, older than he should be and battle scarred, Julia begins to suspect that her very life depends upon the secrets Grandfather never told her. Soon enough Julia and Nick are caught up in an adventure that stretches up and down the river of time. As their knowledge of the Guild and their feelings for each other grow, the fate of the future itself is hanging in the balance.
Sometimes I read books about time travel that are not Outlander. One book I read was so horrible I was complaining every five minutes to Tqwana, but this book holds it’s own in terms of time travel historical romance. However this review is so vague it makes me want to re-read it just to remember what’s going on. All I really know is that I liked it –that’s enough right? Recommended for fans of sci-fi, romance, Outlander, and historical fiction.
This review originally appeared on Goodreads.
The River of No Return by Bee Ridgway
My rating: 4 of 5 stars
I usually gauge my interest in a book by how many “gasp” moments I have. By the end of this book I was gasping almost every chapter. I tend to ignore foreshadowing or the like (although Julia’s parental heritage I knew would come into play) but here, I was genuinely shocked to find out how important Julia was to the Guild/Ofan story.
Through most of the reading I was frustrated that Nick and Julia were not telling each other about what they knew. I wish that they were more upfront with one another. By the time we get to this point in the book, it’s the end. (Setting up for sequel, obviously.)
I liked the writing, very crisp and flowery (if it is possible to be both). I was always drawn in to the scenes of Nick and Julia together, they were very romantic and passionate.
I did not like the pacing. Mid-book we have not gotten anywhere with the plot and we’re stewing in mystery. It was frustrating, but more than that, it was not necessary. I felt that we could have glossed over the adjustment back to 1815.
But thank you to the people who recommended this book to me. How did you know I loved time travel historical romances so much??
