All Our Yesterdays (All Our Yesterdays #1)by Cristin Terrill
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Synopsis:
Em is locked in a bare, cold cell with no comforts. Finn is in the cell next door. The Doctor is keeping them there until they tell him what he wants to know. Trouble is, what he wants to know hasn't happened yet.
Em and Finn have a shared past, but no future unless they can find a way out. The present is torture - being kept apart, overhearing each other's anguish as the Doctor relentlessly seeks answers. There's no way back from here, to what they used to be, the world they used to know. Then Em finds a note in her cell which changes everything. It's from her future self and contains some simple but very clear instructions. Em must travel back in time to avert a tragedy that's about to unfold. Worse, she has to pursue and kill the boy she loves to change the future.
Well, well, well, it does occur to me that I’m living in a high-ratings fantasy world lately.
Basically I have two options here :
– Either I become easier and easier to satisfy
– Or, thanks to my wonderful GR friends and hours spent to go through a ridiculous amount of reviews, I’m lucky enough to grab books which perfectly suit my tastes. ← Of course I’m gonna go with that answer, what do you think?
“James leans against the wall, letting it takes his weight. “You two agree on this?”
” I know, it’s weird,” Finn says. “I feel dirty.”
Let’s talk about the plot without talking about the plot (yes, I can do this)
All Our Yesterday brings us in a shattered world where time travel is not only a reality, but also a terribly frightening weapon when hold by delusional and powerful hands. I must admit that while I often love time-travel stories, I usually find myself wondering about the possibility of it – I mean, of course I know I’m reading a science-fiction book, hey, I’m not a fool but I need to be able to rely on some believable explanations or I’m not buying it.
So, here? I have to congratulate Cristin Terrill because I find myself drinking and believing the explanations The Doctor gives us – The Doctor aka The Evil, and no, I won’t say anything else about him, except he’s the creator and user of the time machine, Cassandra (am I the only one to see a messed-up joke in that name? Cassandre? Reaaally?)
Verdict : I finished that book with the almost absolute certainty it could be possible to create such a dreading machine – and what a scaring possibility, I’m telling you!
Why did I love those characters ?
That’s pretty simple actually : they’re so realistic I could almost grasp them. Throughout the story we become witnesses of their evolution and I was very passionate about that experience : Call me cynical, but I never thought there were bad guys and good guys out there – Actually I think sometimes people drive on a thin ice without knowing it, and as we say in French, l’enfer est pavé de bonnes intentions, understand : even if we think we’re doing the right thing, unexpected really bad things can arise from our so-called good actions. We’re in real life here, and from a sci-fi novel, I say bravo. Either Em or Finn grew fiercer and fiercer, all the events and suffering they have to go through making their final resolution completely believable and understandable.
“I glance at Finn to see if he’s starting to sweat and shake the way I am, but he seems unaffected. He’s probably been working out in his cell, the vain little bastard.”
How can we recognize a good characterization?
Huuuum, Let’s see :
☛ Option 1
Character A is character A at the beginning of the story.
Character A is put in the middle of a war-a wild and frightening world-whatever.
Character A never changes and stays Character A in the end of the story.
Character A is a f*cking robot. He bores me to no end.
☛ Option 2
Character A is character A at the beginning of the story.
Character A is put in the middle of a war-a wild and frightening world-whatever.
Character A evolves through the story and becomes Character A’.
Character A’ is believable. I love Character A’.
As you can guess, in my opinion All Our Yesterday belongs to the second option. Plus, icing on the cake, I loved Finn‘s character from the beginning to the end, from the sarcastic and loyal best-friend to the adorable and fierce cell-mate.
Saving the world is not easy, but if I had to choose, he’d seem a really great option. Trust me.
To sum-up, what do we have here?
Convinced?
