This is How You Lose the Time War

Author: Amal El-Mohtar, Max Gladstone

Genre: Fiction, Sci-Fi

Format: Physical Purchase

Publish Date: July 2019

Read: March 2024

Favorite Quote: I want to meet you in every place I ever loved. Listen to me. I am your echo. I would rather break the world than lose you.

Story Synopsis: In a dystopian future - or past - a Commandant agent finds a letter instructing her to “burn before reading.” What starts as a taunt between rival agents at rival factions, each fighting to secure their ideal outcome turns into a love story that spans time, space, and proximity. With their eternal bond and love threatening to undo the war efforts and one another, they each must determine if it’s easier to have loved and lost or never loved at all.

Why does this book beguile? For a good portion of this book, I had no idea what was happening. Yet, through the letters of these rival agents, a beautiful love story unfolded, and suddenly, everything made sense. Through different timelines, events, cities, and planets, these two brutal and cunning agents find one another and fall in love. The ways they communicate and maintain their romance are quiet, poetic, intense, and shining. This is one of those weird and unusual books, but it's worth keeping and rereading, as I’m sure you’ll find something new each time you explore its pages.

Rating: 5/5

Link*: This is How You Lose the Time War by Amal El-Mohtar and Max Gladstone

If you’re interested in this, read*: The Atlas Series by Olivie Blake