Doomsday Book (original 1992; edition 1994)

Welcome to the "good old days" -- the nitty-gritty thereof. This is a wonderful view of life around the time of the Black Plague. Warning, this is not a romance. But it's historical fiction that answers the question "but what was happening besides wars"? ( )

recommended for: readers who enjoy historical fiction &/or time travel or any speculative fiction

Because I’d already read Blackout/All Clear at least I knew the fate of two characters; perhaps I should have known about a third character, but I’m glad that it either wasn’t revealed or I didn’t remember.

This is a wonderful time travel book, the third by Willis that I’ve read. Now want to read everything by this author! It was a pleasure in the other two books to go from Oxford 2160 back to WWII Britain, and now from Oxford 2154 (reuniting with 2 characters when they were several years younger) to the 1300s Britain near Oxford.

The characters are the most marvelous part of this book. Many are people I grew to care deeply about, and a couple in each time period I enjoyed detesting. The people are so genuinely real and the two time periods are so vividly described. The Middle Ages portions actually seemed most verisimilar. There were a couple of things about 2154 that I questioned, but I didn’t waste much time with my skepticism. After all, the predictions of what life would be like today when made a half century ago were not all that accurate in many respects. It hardly matters, and that’s because the people that populate this book are completely believable.

I just love this author’s sense of humor, though there wasn’t quite as much humor as I was expecting in this book. Luckily, there was some and it was sorely needed.

There was plenty of heartbreak, yet somehow this was also a perfect comfort read for me.

I guessed so much of what would happen in this book (and in the other two books too) and I knew one thing about this book that was revealed in the other books, but having that knowledge didn’t at all diminish the pleasure I got from reading the story, not one iota, and I also experienced some surprises regarding what happens in this story.

This is a completely engrossing and emotionally moving book, and it has a lot to say about human nature, as do almost all worthwhile speculative fiction books.

I’m considering adding this book to my favorites shelf; in the meantime, I will be adding myself as a fan of Connie Willis, if I’ve neglected to already do that. ( )

This started really slowly - repetitive and a bit confusing. Then about 25% through the book, it picked up, and suddenly I was reading a fantastic book. I'm so glad I kept reading through the slow beginning. Excellent. ( )

Well. I can say I at least tried. I did read more than 200 pages but I was bored out of my mind. I wanted to quit while reading about the people left in Oxford. Weird names, stupid ramblings going on, but I thought it would be interesting once I would read about life in the Middle ages. Well I was wrong. Even then the conversations were stupid and when I realized I did not care one bit what would happen to her I knew I should quit reading this book.So that's what I did. ( )

It took me quite a while to read Doomsday Book. I was intrigued to find it was about Kivrin, who was mentioned in Fire Watch, but it took so, so long to get off the ground. I figured most things out ages before any of the characters did. Following sick protagonists really is no fun at all, and it's frustrating for the same conversations to be repeated over and over again -- "Where is Basingame?" (who never appears), "Did you get the fix?", "I must speak to Gawyn"... The parts in which Kivrin's recordings were recounted were also annoying, given that they simply repeated the action, without giving much more information.

The last thirty percent of the book, though, is pretty good. I'm not sure I'm glad I persevered, because I was seriously being bored to death, but once Kivrin's story really got into its swing -- and I don't think that happened until nearly the end -- the sense of tension and horror was catching me by the heart, and the exchanges between Father Roche and Kivrin at the end of the book made me want to cry. Some of Kivrin's part had real power -- her outburst on the corder, for example, when she swears that she won't let the others die.

One thing that amused/bothered me in equal measure was the inclusion of a character called Gawyn, with a horse called Gringolet, who bragged and was in love, "courtly love", with his lord's wife. Pity that I can't think of a story where Gawain actually commits adultery, and that Lancelot or Tristan would have been a far more appropriate reference.

I'm going to try reading more of Connie Willis' books -- To Say Nothing of the Dog looks to be next -- but I'm not going to stick with them all the way through if they have the same pitfalls as this book. ( )