Invictus Book Review
I am not a huge science fiction reader. While I do enjoy comics and DC or Marvel entertainment from movies to tv shows, i do not usually read many fantasy or sci-fi books. I tend to lean more towards contemporary or historical fiction, rather than those kinds of genres. This is nothing against them, I just usually like to read more realistic fiction books instead.
This book, Invictus, though may have been the book to break me out of my habit of wanting to read mostly contemporaries.
That is because this book was fantastic.
Invictus (written by Ryan Graudin, the author of Wolf by Wolf) is the story of a boy named Fairway McCarthy who was born "outside of time." Every since he was young Fairway has wanted to be a time traveler for the Corps of Central Time Travelers. After being unable to pass the exam, a shady business deal is made to Fairway to allow him to travel through time with his own team and possibly search for his long lost mother. This deal though also involves stealing artifacts through time for his potentially dangerous benefactor. After going on a mission to the Titanic, things start to get even more dangerous and strange when a mysterious time traveler named Elliot shows up offering to assist her services. It is now up to Fairway, Elliot, Fairway's best friend Gram, Fairway's cousin Imogen, and his crush/friend Priya to use their skills to get the artifacts they need, as well as figure out what this mysterious Fade is, why it's following them, and how they can stop it from ruining not only their current lives, but past & future too.
To say this book is one great adventure would be an understatement. Invictus has a very similar feel to the CW/DCTV show, Legends of Tomorrow. By that I mean it is a fun and enjoyable story about a bunch of time traveling misfits who have to fix the past to help their own and many other's futures. I really like the idea of a team of time travelers and have always found an interest in time traveling. If you're a fan of a series like Doctor Who or Back To The Future, you will definitely have fun with this novel.
The characters in this book are all a diverse crew of characters, all whom are unique and have something about them that makes them a valuable member of the time traveling team and character in the story. I love this diverse cast of characters who all bring something great to Invictus, both the book and the ship. From Imogen's ever changing hair color to Gram's ever continuing game of Tetris. To the struggles that Elliot feels with secret keeping to the relationships between multiple characters in this story. Like many friend groups, this book shows the relationship they all have a whole, but also more intimate relationships made with each other. From the friendship between Imogen and Elliot to Fairway and Priya's romance, and more. The character's and their unique backgrounds, likes, dislikes, and relationships with each other is what gives this book so much heart and likability. Something that is ideal for any great story.
Something I really liked about this story is that author points out things when it comes to time traveling that are usually questionable things concerning time traveling. For instance, there are certain rules about going back to places and not interacting with particular people in history due to possibly changing history or about going to the future. Another aspect of this book that I feel Graudin excelled at was the consequences of the story. For instance, in some time traveling media there may not be outright references to cultural normalcies of that exact era of history. Something that I see in movies, books, and shows when time traveling occurs, is the tendencies to ignore or skim over the ways that people treated women or people of color during that time. There have been stories told or shown in which people go back in time to the colonial era or the days of the old west, yet certain things like racism or sexism or any other discrimination or prejudices are not addressed. Invictus though does acknowledge certain time periods or discriminations that the crew members may be affected by due to their race or gender. Gram is a young black male so the story does take the time to recognize and make some statements about how Gram has felt hesitant traveling to certain times & places before the Civil Rights Movement and how that has affected him. Though it is not a huge part of the story, I was glad that Graudin did take the time to point that out and remind readers that time traveling is not all fun & games and without any worries, besides The Fade and overlying evils that every member must worry about.
Warning some spoilers ahead for book, I will makes these spoiler parts in italics and when you stop seeing the italics it is safe to read if you are avoiding spoilers.
The consequences I really admired with this story has to do with the ending. In the end there is somewhat of a do over where the characters get to help change Fairway's fate and stop the Fade. To do this the characters end up creating a life where Fairway's mother never disappeared and Fairway was not born "out of time." Not only do we see the impacts of this change, but it is something permanent that the characters have to come to terms with before this mission. The story has a somewhat happy ending, even though some relationships have changes with the characters, some moments in their personal histories have been altered, and more. I really liked this bitter sweet ending. The fact that it did have a major impact, both good and bad depending on how the reader sees it, was a perfect decision made by the author. I have seen so many time travel stories use time travel to fix all their problems and have everything be perfect in the end. Everything they wanted changed was changed and everything else is intact and not altered in any way. With this ending, Graudin shows the dire consequences of changing fates of history and how even impacts we do not think will be that big can affect so many lives and in more ways than one. I think other writers of any kind of time traveling story (whether it be a book or movie or show) should take note of Graudin's decisions, because her bittersweet conclusion is one of my favorite things about this book.
Overall, I really enjoyed this story. It has somewhat of a unique premise, a great cast, and a fantastic ending. I loved that so many loose ends were tied up and that the story felt next to perfect from beginning to end. The only issue I had with it, making it a 4 star instead of 5, is I felt at times that the story was dragging on for longer than it needed to be or focusing too much time on a certain storyline when I wanted to get back to another. While I found everything great by the end, for those reasons I have to give this book 4 instead of 5 stars. However, I have to say that this book is still highly recommended by me and I think that whether you are a science fiction or time travel fanatic or not, you'll find great joy and entertainment from Ryan Graduin's Invictus.
**** out of *****
4 out of 5 stars
I received this ARC for free from Little Brow Children's Publishing and I would like to take the time to thank the publisher and Ryan Graudin for making this book possible.
