(1 / 5)
Time Quintet #1
This is going to be a hard review to write, and I know a lot of people are going to disagree with me, but I just did not like it. It took me sooooo long to get through, and I just flat out did not want to read it after a time. This book is praised as a ground-breaking fantasy novel, but the plot was so disconnected that I just couldn’t engage with the story. The fantasy elements are not purposeful, but instead seem to be thrown in to make the world flavorful without adding any substance. We skipped and hopped our way through the universe, and I don’t feel like I really got to explore anything.
And the characters just felt so flat. Meg started out strong and independent, but by the end just became a whiny kid. Charles Wallace was interesting at first, but even his “genius” became boring and redundant after a time. I’m still not totally sure why Calvin even had to come along. And Mrs. Who, Mrs. Which, and Mrs. Whasit just seemed to serve as an element of “strangeness” without actually being necessary to the plot (except as a means to an end).
I know a lot of people won’t agree with me on this one, but it just wasn’t my cup of tea. Maybe things would have been different had I been younger. Maybe then I wouldn’t care about the cool science concepts of the beginning that are basically abandoned for boring fantasy thereafter. And maybe things would have been different if I didn’t have all the great fantasy novels to read that I do now. Maybe…