Authors: A group of authors (links below)
The Time Traveler’s Passport is a series of novella/long stories (about 50 pages each) recommended by the New York Times and published by Amazon. The series is available on Kindle Unlimited, and it was released this month. Needless to say, I grabbed it immediately, and I read all the stories in just two days because they are so good, I could not let them go. I could not praise this short story series enough.
The series collects six stories about time travel and dystopia. The author line-up is strong because they are all talented and known writers in SF. Each story uses time travel in different ways (tourism, dystopia, corporate exploitation, immortals, etc.), and due to its story form, one can read each story in one sitting (or all six in two evenings, like me). It was also very interesting to compare stories and how different authors examine time travel. The stories are not connected, though, so characters are entirely different, which was also an appeal. There is something in this series for everyone. The six stories are summarised below.
3 Days, 9 Months, 27 Years by John Scalzi
A time-travel technician works for a luxury time-travel tourism agency and sends clients into the past. Travelers have three fixed windows to return: after 3 days, after 9 months, or after 27 years in the past. The story has a good concept of time travel as a commercialised activity, which is a fresh angle. The author uses time travel in a pragmatic but also morally loaded way and thus also tackles past interventions as a concept.
Making Space by R.F. Kuang
The premise of this story is that a child was discovered by a woman in the woods. Time travel is suspected because of the title of the series, but it is not immediately visible. The story of time travel thus develops gradually, and we also explore topics of parenthood, childlessness, responsibility, and environmental degradation. The latter is the reason for a child to be sent back to the past, to fix things and ‘make space’. This story is more of a literary attempt to describe time travel rather than a traditional SF story because the focus is on family. I thought that was very interesting and compelling due to the centrality of characters embedded in a time travel narrative rather than time travel being a topic in itself, like in the first story.
For a Limited Time Only by Peng Shepherd
A salesman at the company uses small jumps through time for product placement and marketing activities, but ends up finding his personal life and timeline have changed. I was slightly confused with this story because of multiple jumps and shifting ages of his family members, which were arguably difficult to depict in a story. But, eventually, one figures it out, and it gets interesting. I also thought that the debate on a shallow concept of time travel being used for sales and marketing was very interesting and unusual. This story is more linked to the first story, so it seems some SF writing is also moving into exploring commercialism and environmental degradation.
A Visit to the Husband Archive by Kaliane Bradley
In a dystopian setting, a woman with limited memory goes on rotations where she works also as a killer, murdering the so-called gods or strangers, as they are also called, in either case, aliens who have stolen memories and time from humans by conquering the planet. A very interesting take on conflicts between planets and what aliens might be interested in on Earth, in this case, memories and time. However, this is a darker story exploring what makes humanity unique.
All Manner of Thing Shall Be by Olivie Blake
This is a story of immortal/vampire characters from different eras living together in a Victorian museum in Santa Monica, where they encounter a time loop effect and face their immortality and pasts. Lots of humour and twists about loop mechanics, and all with an element of the supernatural. I was not keen on this story because I am not generally keen on stories about vampires, but some readers might enjoy it and find it very well written.
Cronus by P. Djèlí Clark
This is, by far, my most favourite story. Set in a near future in the year 2030, where a time travel company sends clients to the past, segregation exists in the US, and Black people are separated from White people. However, a hidden timeline has been discovered through recovered memories of what used to be, which is labelled as a disease, but it eventually results in a resistance movement. I would have absolutely loved to read this as a novel, and I truly hope the author will consider expanding this story to a full novel. I have no doubt that the book would then end up on TV or in Hollywood. The story premise is absolutely fab. The author skillfully explores race relations, the legal system, and resistance. This is a blend of time travel and alternate histories, changing timelines. It has absolutely everything one would want from SF.
