The Accidental Time Machine
by Joe Haldeman
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Book Reviews of The Accidental Time Machine
Book Review: A Story that Stars Strong, but Lasts Only for a Few Chapters
Summary: 1 Stars
I don't think I've ever felt strongly enough about a book to submit a review. This book compelled me to do so.
Joe Haldeman clearly does not know how to finish a story. This is a prime example of a story that was powered by a great concept, and quickly fell apart.
Haldeman spends so much time developing details on parts of the story that completely lose their significance due to the tumultuous chain of events in the book. His view of the future lacks the imagination one would expect from an experienced sci-fi novelist. Some might find it humorous, but I found it to be tragically disconnected.
When I was done with this book, I gave it to my one-year-old so she could have something to tear to shreds. Every torn page was like therapy for me.
Book Review: Had potential but blew it in the last half to third of the book.
Summary: 2 Stars
There are lots of reviews here with plenty of detail. I'll be brief and say that I had high hopes for this book and enjoyed the beginning of it. As it went on, it fell apart. I really was left with the impression that the author didn't know what to do at the end and just copped out and did what was obvious and had been do so often before with time travel. I can't understand why writers find the need to wrap up everything so simply with nice neat and tidy endings. Sometimes things are messy and I'd expect my stories to sometimes end that way. Either way, there were so many more potential outcomes with this that would have been far superior to where it ended up.
Bottom line: Great idea, great beginning, bad ending.
Book Review: A disjointed mash-up of ideas
Summary: 2 Stars
This novel started out as a promising, light-hearted adventure, but when the story really took off, it didn't seem to have anywhere to go. First, we get an awkward exploration of the near-future, which the protagonist escaped on the flimsiest of pretexts. From there, we land in the "meat" of the story, which turns out to be a overly long, shallow, point-and-laugh criticism of religion. To wrap it all up, he throws in a malevolent AI, a confusing deus ex machina, and a "romance" that is really nothing more than lust and curiosity. In the end, it felt like Haldeman had a bunch of unrelated (and rather uninspired) ideas about the future, and invented a vehicle to throw them all together and call it a novel.Book Review: Good reading
Summary: 4 Stars
I've always been fascinated by time travel and love reading about the subject so I decided to try this book. Some science fiction books are written with more technical/scientific terms than I care for, but this book was not that way at all. Matt, the main character, accidentally invents a time machine, and then his adventures begin. He can only travel forward in time, not back, so it makes for interesting dilemmas. Haldeman does a great job of illustrating the paradox of time travel, and the future societies he describes are interesting. Though not the best book I've ever read, this is well written, funny, and entertaining. I'd recommend it for anyone who is a fan of science fiction and time travel.Book Review: Time machine... check. Go into the future... check. Have difficulties... check!
Summary: 4 Stars
J. Haldeman's book, The Accidental Time Machine, has a uniqueness based on its innocence. ABD MIT student Matt Fuller accidentally constructs a time machine. Who knows how or why? What Matt learns is that every time he pushes the "on" button, it disappears, and then reappears in an ever increasing time in the future. Matt learns how to travel with the machine, but the future, or parts of it, are bleak and troublesome. It'll take some time for him to realize that he needs to go far enough INTO the future to find the time when scientists have figured out how to go BACK in time, and send him home.
Will it work?
An entertaining sci-fi story by one of the masters.