Journal Entry 1 by Molyneux from Oxford, Oxfordshire United Kingdom on Wednesday, August 03, 2005

Amazon.co.uk Review
In London at the turn of the 20th century, H. G. Wells's time machine mysteriously appears--empty--in a squatter's flat. From where did it come, and for what purpose was it sent? The answers to these questions--though not to an even greater mystery connected with the machine's appearance--are contained in a letter written by Wells on May 2, 1946, which falls into the hands of one David Lambert on the eve of the millennium. Lambert, an industrial archeologist, reads the letter foretelling the arrival of the machine and, half convinced the whole thing is a hoax, goes to the address Wells provides, where, at the appointed hour, the time machine materializes. Thus begins Ronald Wright's fine and fantastical novel A Scientific Romance.

Romance can refer to an affair of the heart; it can also describe a heroic tale of extraordinary events. In A Scientific Romance, Wright plays on both possible meanings as he weaves a tragic story of betrayal and lost love into a larger narrative of time travel. Lambert, having lost the woman he loved, is reckless enough to test Wells's machine himself, catapulting 500 years into the future, where he finds London--indeed, all of England--a deserted, semitropical landscape. As David explores the future, he also sifts through his own past, creating in this Möbius strip of time and relationship a chilling cautionary tale about the limits of science and human ambition.
 

Journal Entry 2 by Molyneux at The Clarence, Whitehall (OBCZ) in City of Westminster, Greater London United Kingdom on Monday, August 08, 2005

Released 6 yrs ago (8/8/2005 UTC) at The Clarence, Whitehall (OBCZ) in City of Westminster, Greater London United Kingdom

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Taking along to the BookCrossing evening meet Tuesday 9 August 

Journal Entry 3 by minx2012 on Wednesday, August 10, 2005

Were it not the case before the Discovery mission, I am now officially the office's science nerd.
I happily burble away in meetings about news stories that no one else looks at because of the very long words and doubts over how much our audience wants to know about the mating habits of frogs in Norfolk, and even occasionally manage to pass on enough of my enthusiasm to someone else in the team that we end up covering the story.
So even though it's fiction, I couldn't let this escape my clutches at Tuesday's meet-up. 

Journal Entry 4 by minx2012 on Monday, October 03, 2005

By turns depressing, infuriating and morbid, occasionally darkly humorous, but always intriguing.

Anyone who has just lost the love of his life is bound to be a little miserable, but David Lambert is coming to the conclusion that the death of the woman he and his best friend both loved is his fault - and that he is also to blame for the downturn in both men's fortunes. Cheery reflections are not going to be the order of the day!

But Lambert is determined to go out with a bang.
Realising that he too has the condition which probably killed Anita, he has nothing to lose by investigating the Time Machine supposedly built by a former lover of HG Wells.
In the future, Graham provides a much-needed touch of lightness, but the description of the post-modern Britain is compelling enough to keep you reading even when you're wondering just how much more bleakness you can stand.
What happens to cause the fall of the modern world is never really explained, archaeologist Lambert leaving us to fit together the clues he finds for us, much as he always had to do. As a warning to society I don't think it works quite as well as Brave New World, but as tributes to HG Wells' The Time Machine go, it's hard to beat. 

Journal Entry 5 by minx2012 on Monday, October 03, 2005

A certain Urban[e]Spaceman expressed an interest in this when we met up last week, so I'll be passing it on to him next. 

Journal Entry 6 by UrbanSpaceman from Kingston upon Thames, Greater London United Kingdom on Sunday, October 09, 2005

Had this from the Minx on our releaseing trip to the Science Museum on Friday last. Thanks! 

Journal Entry 7 by UrbanSpaceman from Kingston upon Thames, Greater London United Kingdom on Thursday, January 12, 2006

As will be clear from the the earlier reviews, this book takes as its starting assumption the fact that the time machine of HG Wells eponymous novel was real.

The title of the book has two meanings that I can detect. Firstly, it is a very Wellsian title, using an older meaning of the word romance "a fictitious tale of heroes and extraordinary or mysterious events, usually set in a distant time or place". Whether David Lambert is hero or merely protagonist is perhaps arguable (personally I would say the former). Certainly, though, a large amount of this story is set in a place that is both temporally and pyschogeographically distant - 500 years in the future after an only partially-explained apocalypse has cast down civilisation.

The second meaning of the title stems from the more modern meaning of the word romance, since at the real heart of the story is the three-cornered love affair between Lambert, Bird and Anita and the after-effects of Anita's death from a variant of BSE which David discovers that he also has.

Lambert is, to me at least, an interesting hero. Orphaned at a young age he has become a literary academic loner who has never really put down roots. His career as an archaeologist and historian means that he is more focussed on the past than the present or future, but provides him both with some of the practical skills to survive in the future wilderness and to interpret what he find remaining from the past. He is not a rugged hero, but he does show keen self-awareness.

Wright has fused all these various elements into a strong novel which, although marketed as 'Fiction', is certainly admissable as science-fiction as well - some of the scenes were reminiscent of JG Ballard's The Drowned World. Overall a well-conceived and very well written story which I greatly enjoyed. 

Journal Entry 8 by UrbanSpaceman at Joy Indian Restaurant, Brighton Road in Surbiton, Greater London United Kingdom on Sunday, January 22, 2006

Released 6 yrs ago (1/22/2006 UTC) at Joy Indian Restaurant, Brighton Road in Surbiton, Greater London United Kingdom

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On coffee table in waiting area just inside front door. 

Journal Entry 9 by aknighty from Wallington, Surrey United Kingdom on Wednesday, January 17, 2007

I won't lie, if I didn't hava a LOT of time to kill in the restaurant where I found this book, I'd never have got past the first few pages. Am I happy I did? I don't know. I alternately didn't think that much of it, and then thought actually, it was quite good. Over and over. I must have enjoyed it, as I read the thing within 24 hours of getting it and in two sittings, which is unlike me. Ultimately I think it was written for a more academic mind than my own, but ignoring the long words worked a treat. Bit of a downer overall, but enjoyable nonetheless. Signed by the author, too. Bonus!