The Time Between Space

Bitlibro

Lingvo: English

Eldonita de Ringwood Publishing.

ASIN:: B0C57TQZ26

(1 recenzo)

The story follows the protagonist (Emma) during her childhood and adult years in Edinburgh and East Lothian. The secret that only Emma knows is that her mother’s death was no accident. Her knowledge of her mother's conscious decision to die by suicide precipitates a suicide attempt and leads to her estrangement from her father. Emma stumbles through university and finds work as a journalist in Edinburgh, although she once more starts to become mentally unstable and, following the death of her father, she ends up attempting suicide again. It’s while she’s in a mental institution that her psychiatrist suggests she write a memoir of her life, to help her make sense of everything that’s happened to her, and The Time Between Space is the story she writes.

(Previously published in a slightly different version as The Space Between Time)

1 eldono

Stephanie Jane recenzis The Time Between Space de Charlie Laidlaw

A thoroughly engrossing read

5 steloj

This story follows the apparently charmed life of Emma Rossini as she grows up in a seemingly picture perfect family which is soon revealed to us readers to be anything but. The sporadic astrophysical diversions added an unusual aspect to The Time Between Space and, as Emma's story progresses, I understood enough to appreciate how the scientific theories reflected aspects of her's life - or vice versa, perhaps! Less hard-science concepts such as her Grandfather's ideas on Spherical Bastards are also rather profound and it was interesting who was - and wasn't - included within this definition.

Laidlaw's humour is pitched just at the right level to keep The Space Between Time from becoming a depressing drama. The novel does explore heavy themes of mental illness, family relationships, and ideas of personal responsibility - with a trigger warning for attempted suicide. However Laidlaw's eye for the absurd and his dry …

This story follows the apparently charmed life of Emma Rossini as she grows up in a seemingly picture perfect family which is soon revealed to us readers to be anything but. The sporadic astrophysical diversions added an unusual aspect to The Time Between Space and, as Emma's story progresses, I understood enough to appreciate how the scientific theories reflected aspects of her's life - or vice versa, perhaps! Less hard-science concepts such as her Grandfather's ideas on Spherical Bastards are also rather profound and it was interesting who was - and wasn't - included within this definition.

Laidlaw's humour is pitched just at the right level to keep The Space Between Time from becoming a depressing drama. The novel does explore heavy themes of mental illness, family relationships, and ideas of personal responsibility - with a trigger warning for attempted suicide. However Laidlaw's eye for the absurd and his dry turn of phrase really appealed to me. Each of the characters are fully-rounded nuanced people and I appreciated Laidlaw's strong portrayals of the central female characters. Seeing everyone slightly differently as Emma grows from child to teenager to adult, and her perceptions change with her increased understanding of what had passed, gives a great depth to the story. This is cleverly done and felt very real throughout the novel. I now want to visit several of the stunning locations too, especially that North Berwick coastline which sounds bleakly wonderful.

I think The Space Between Time would be a great book club choice inspiring lots of animated discussions of the ideas it raises! I felt that it has important things to say about the way we see ourselves and the assumptions we often make about other people without any sense of their internal lives. It is also simply a great story and an engrossing read which I hope will have a wide appeal.

Temoj

Psychological fiction