Sometimes, at the bookstore, a customer looking for a recommendation will ask me what I've read and loved recently. It’s a hard question to answer, not because I haven't read and loved something recently, but because, as a bookseller, I want to make sure my answer is likely to be something the customer will love, too.
That's why I like to ask questions: What have you read and loved recently? Do you prefer historical or contemporary fiction? Are you looking for strong characters or a plot that keeps you hooked? I try to read widely, but it's rare to find a book and feel that no matter who they are or what they're interested in, any customer will enjoy it. But I recently did. The next time I hear, "I need a book recommendation, what have you loved recently?" I will say The Ministry of Time by Kaliane Bradley—with no follow-up questions. Because their answers won't matter. Historical or contemporary fiction? It's both. Characters or plot? Doesn't matter, both are utterly compelling. Something fun or something that makes you think? You don't have to choose! It is so rare to find a book and think it nearly universally appealing. It's a bookselling unicorn.
The Ministry of Time, as you might expect from my exultation, has a lot going on. I can reasonably define it as workplace dramedy, spy thriller, speculative sci-fi, and social commentary. Also, it's got romance. It takes place in a near future, not dissimilar to our own, where England has quietly figured out time travel, but it's a nascent science that needs to be tested.
How are the body and mind affected when a person is yanked from their timeline and dragged into another? Our narrator is a civil servant hired to help answer that question. She has been assigned to "1847," a member of Sir John Franklin's doomed 1845 Arctic expedition, recently rescued from the brink of starvation and from his timeline. As far as history is concerned, this man is dead. To our nameless narrator, he is very much alive. And quite charming. She must live with, monitor, and assist this "expat" as he comes to grips with the modern world and its multitude of miracles and misfortunes: germs, Spotify, plumbing, Sesame Street, climate change. This alone makes for a comic and compelling read.
But, of course, there is more at stake. It is a truth universally acknowledged that a government agency in possession of a scientific discovery is going to weaponize it. And so our narrator is plunged into a morass of secrecy, bureaucracy, and paranoia. There is a threat, a mole, and a twist I really don't think you'll see coming. Normally what I'd say next is that this book is pure fun, but it has more depth than its spy-thriller/romance/spec-fic premise implies. Bradley is grappling with big questions of exploitation, marginalization, imperialism, identity, and progress. And I found her sentences so compelling, I read with a pen in hand, furiously marking up my copy. If you want a book that is brilliant and entertaining in equal measure, I can recommend no better.
Emma Kaas co-owns the Norwich Bookstore with her husband, Sam. When not at the bookstore you’ll most likely find her reading books, baking bread, tinkering with spreadsheets, or pulling tarot cards.