Blackout by Connie Willis

Title: Blackout
Author: Connie Willis
Genre: Time Travel Historical Fiction
Rating: 4/5 stars

I can't ever bring myself to give Connie Willis's books 5 stars mostly because of the "looong walk for a short drink of water" feeling. but they are fairly entertaining and immersive. I love historical fiction/time travel books, so I've been listening to hers lately on Audible. I have already read/listened to Doomsday Book and To Say Nothing of the Dog. Doomsday book was terribly depressing of course, and I am surprised I actually picked up the next one after reading it, but I found it worth it overall for the historical fiction value. I never really understood how horrible and tragic the Black Death was - I mean, I understood intellectually but not really emotionally. To Say Nothing of the Dog was COMPLTELY different, and I was entertained by it so much more. It was flat out delightful in comparison.
This book lands somewhere in between. There is the ever present "how do I get to my drop/my drop won't open?" theme. The "Mr. Dunworthy said/Mr. Dunworthy is coming to get me" theme, and overall hardship at every turn to accomplish even the simplest of things. The book starts out almost unbearably slow, as the others did. I'll admit I almost gave up. It felt at first like there were WAY too many perspectives to keep track of. There are five or six I guess, but only three really ended up going anywhere and finally converging. The last 20% of the book finally got interesting as things started to connect. Before then, it jumped around a lot and seemed overwhelming and confusing at times.
One thing that's missing from this book in comparison to Doomsday Book is that we don't get to know what's happening in Oxford. In Doomsday Book, we knew there is a pandemic going on that makes it impossible for them to keep Kivrin's drop open, which doesn't end up mattering anyway since she doesn't even know where it is, and everyone is dying around her. But in this book, there appears to be something majorly catastrophic going on, as none of the drops are opening and no retrieval teams are coming. The most engaging part about this book is the desire to know what the heck is happening in Oxford! The characters themselves aren't particularly interesting, though I do sympathize with them as much as I need to.
The narrator for the Audible book is actually pretty good, though at first I had to listen at .9 speed. She reads really fast. But I got used to it eventually and started looking forward to hearing her voice.



I did download the next book right away. This is one of the most painful cliffhangers I have had to experience recently.