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Original poster

Time travel books

63 replies

MargotMoon · 19/04/2026 06:52

Are there any time travel novels that are well-written with a tight plot, or am I just picking bad ones?

I love the concept of time travel novels but in my experience the writing is really crap and never really fulfils its potential. I’m currently halfway through the Ministry of Time and it feels like the author has lost faith in her conceit and the idea is going nowhere so it’s going to turn into a romance thing, which just feels really boring.

See also: Connie Willis, Jodi Taylor, the Time Travellers Wife…

OP posts:
ReginaChase · 19/04/2026 17:00

The Outcasts of Time - Ian Mortimer.

JuliettaCaeser · 19/04/2026 07:27

Rivers in the Sky is really good. As is How To Stop time - blew my mind. I don’t like Matt Haigs other books but that one is so good. The main character ages 1 year for everyone else’s 30 so he is from the past.

RampantIvy · 19/04/2026 07:26

I agree that the ending of Ministry of Time loses its way at the end. I enjoyed it because I have watched The Terror and knew the back story of Lt Gore.

I can't believe that no-one has mentioned The Time Machine by HG Wells.

BeaAndBen · 19/04/2026 07:26

Solasum · 19/04/2026 07:24

I love the Chronicles of St Marys by Jodi Taylor, though I see you are not keen.

William Corlett The Magician’s House is a nice children’s series, also Berlie Doherty

Edited

The OP's already said she's not a fan.

I came back because I'd remembered the Michael Creighton one, Timeline, but I see @LadyMinerva got there before me.

Solasum · 19/04/2026 07:24

I love the Chronicles of St Marys by Jodi Taylor, though I see you are not keen.

William Corlett The Magician’s House is a nice children’s series, also Berlie Doherty

chocoshopoholic · 19/04/2026 07:22

I loved Ben Elton's Time and Time again

pepayfelix · 19/04/2026 07:20

Charlotte Sometimes was a children’s book that I absolutely loved. Very tightly plotted in my recollection.

It’s not quite time travel but you might like the Bone Clocks by David Mitchell which is a bonkers, brilliant book.

DreamingOfGeneHunt · 19/04/2026 07:20

11.22.63 by Stephen King is very good. Not at all his usual kind of thing.

LadyMinerva · 19/04/2026 07:16

I am obsessed with time travel!

Timeline by Michael Crichton was awesome. Don't go by the movie, the book is so much better.

Also Human and Extinct by Hayley Camille. Outstanding. She's got everything in there. Time travel, evolution, human ethics and a little bit of romance. But the romance is not the main focus.

BeaAndBen · 19/04/2026 07:16

Kindred by Octavia Butler is great - an American black woman in the 20th century getting zapped back to the deep South in the 1800s.

There's Marge Piercy's Woman On The Edge Of Time - a woman in a psychiatric unit finds herself in a future society. It's a feminist classic.

The First 15 Lives Of Harold August by Clare North is a groundhog day do-over type novel, which is time travel of a sort, and it's very good.

Time Riders by Alex Sparrow is YA first of a series with an agency going back in time to fix history when other time travellers bugger it up.

And slightly younger but still great is Tom's Midnight Garden.

Ministry of Time really loses its way by the end.

WhitegreeNcandle · 19/04/2026 07:16

Outlander is an obvious one. Can’t stand the last few but the first couple are ok.

Kindred by Octavia Butler has stuck with me

Not time travel but written so well you feel you’re there - Anne Bauer Medieval woman

Matildatoldsuchdreadfullies · 19/04/2026 07:09

Look at children’s books:

A Traveller in Time, Alison Uttley
King of Shadows, Susan Cooper

ZenNudist · 19/04/2026 06:55

I was going to recommend the Ministry of Time. I thought it was good.

In the case of time travel as a theme for films it often gets confusing. I think it's the same for books.

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