Into the Dim

The premise of Into the Dim really intrigued me. It's claimed to be the Outlander of the YA genre. A time travel story set in Scotland. It has to be good, right?

I had high hopes for this one but in the end I was both disappointed and frustrated. I really enjoy time travel stories and that aspect of Into the Dim was OK, not great but not overly bad either. The way the stories interweave and jump back and forth was for the most part done well and not hard to follow. Where I did have huge problems was with the whole set in Scotland part. I'm Scottish born and bred, I've lived in Scotland my whole life so perhaps I'm harder to please when it comes to the dialect etc but I found the dialect and portrayal of the Scots in this book to be way show more off the mark. The Scots dialect got me more and more annoyed the further I read. You don't want to know how many pages of highlights I have marked!

Apparently being Scottish means we either talk like Yoda: "It's happy we are to finally have you here." "But I'm knowing one thing for certain." "And it's pleased we are to have you here." Or use the word "bloody" all the time in our conversations: bloody cold, bloody brilliant, bloody queen, bloody big emerald, bloody amazing, bloody bizarre, bloody wanker, bloody damn, the list goes on. That's more an English thing than a Scottish thing, and even then it's way over used here. And don't even get me started on the "Cheese an' crackers!" or "How in the name of Mary and Bride.." and "Hill of beans." Don't know where the heck the author found those. In the name of the wee man, yes, but in the name of Mary and bride?

Add to that the over use of pure: pure sorry, pure furious, pure tired, pure unusual. The only Scot you'll hear saying "pure" anything are wee neds from Glasgow. And baked beans for breakfast. It's the norm? Perhaps with the occasional full Scots breakfast fry up and certainly not with a fried egg and jam piece. Boke! We have the same as everyone else, you know cereal, toast, fruit and often porridge. And it's clootie dumpling here in Scotland, not spotted dick.

The language in general just didn't work for me. The characters go back in time and just magically understand the dialects and nuances of the people of that time. They don't stand out despite the fact that they don't adapt their language to that of the times. There's a lot of little things like the use of "Okay" in the dialogue in the year 1145. Okay wasn't in use until 1840 and not well known and used commonly until the 1880's.

(Few Americanisms have been more successful than OK, which survived the political campaign of 1840 that fostered it, quickly lost its political significance, and went on to develop use as a verb, adverb, noun, and interjection. The expression was well known in England by the 1880s. - Dictionary.com)

A character traveling back in time using the word "Okay" would stand out and draw attention to themselves but here it's just brushed over.

Authors if you are going to set your story in another country, using a dialect you are not familiar with, please do proper research. Ask someone who lives there and uses the dialect for advice or find a beta reader who is also familiar with it. The Scots in this book is awful, it's like a cross between Outlander (exaggerated and outdated), Rab C Nesbitt, gibberish and English slang.

I cannot stress enough the importance of research, it would have made a world of difference here. Instead it seems like the author has taken silly stereotypes and ran with it, then thrown in a little Yoda for the hell of it.

Not one I would recommend. show less

This is one of the better time travel books I've read. It begins with Hope Walton trying to overcome the enemy that is her mind at the empty coffin funeral for her mother. Almost immediately, she's off to Scotland to meet her mom's sister for the first time while her dad and his new girlfriend go on vacation. Hope's convinced her mother isn't dead, but nothing she's been able to find yet supports that. She hopes her aunt will have answers. Aunt Lu has answers, but they create more questions, and are the beginning of a journey Hope couldn't have imagined. It involves an unexpected romance, a history of treachery and an invention that boggles her mind. The weaving of historical events and figures adds much to the tale. There are twists show more and surprises aplenty leading to an ending that sets up the second book very well. show less

This is a very strong time-travel adventure, with added bonus of secret societies, mysterious blood feuds, and a heroine who's learning her own strength. Looking forward to the next one.

Advanced Reader's Copy provided by Edelweiss.

Thank you NetGalley for the ARC for this book.

This is a mashup of time travel sci-fi with a historic fiction bent to it and a bit of young adult romance. I definitely liked the time travel and historic fiction aspect of this book. The YA romance - not so much. I still can't get past the fact that when your life is in danger, you are in the presence of Eleanor of Aquitaine, and the future of the world lies on your shoulders, that some characters still have time to swoon over some hot guy. But, the historic fiction and action for this book was definitely fun and I know this book will be a hit when it releases. And... it looks like this is just book 1 of a series, so more to come.

Mourning the death of her mother, Hope travels to Scotland to visit family she has never before met. She learns that her mother's side of the family hides a fantastic secret: they can harness the power of the earth's ley lines in order to travel through time. Even more incredibly, Hope learns that her mother is not dead, just trapped in the past. If she wants to save her mother, Hope must travel back in time to the court of Eleanor of Aquitaine. It won't be easy, but Hope is willing to do whatever it takes. The past can be a dangerous place, though . . . and her mother's family are not the only time travelers out there. . . .

This is a very enjoyable read, with great characters and a gripping plot. While I'm not sure I completely buy show more into the mechanics of time travel as described in the world of this book, those details didn't bother me while I was reading. I'd recommend this, especially to fans of Outlander. While it's likely that this will become a series, the story wraps up sufficiently in order to make for a satisfying reading experience. show less

My reservation of the rating is largely based on whether this will stay a single title, or if this becomes another "surprise!" series.

As a solo title I really enjoyed this. I found Taylor's framing device for Hope's "eidetic" memory to be interesting (I don't have an eidetic memory, but to cope with anxious situations I will start rambling in my head facts and details about something, usually books, and find it hard to stop) and Hope's genuine interest in history helped to keep a lot of the esoteric facts from being boring.

I was okay with the romance--on the one hand I think it had a lot of unnecessary drama attached to it, but overall Taylor didn't focus on that aspect too much (beyond how it effected Hope's interactions. The obstacle show more to the romance was important to the plot, but the actual romance was treated as a by product not a focus).

Man though Hope had hella lot more patience then I would have.

If this becomes a series, or even gets a companion novel, my feelings may change. This works VERY WELL as a stand alone. Let's keep it that way folks.

Suck an egg and love a lemon it is gonna have a sequel. Okay. Reserving judgment overall starting....NOW. show less

Into the Dim is essentially a conglomeration of book features I loathe. We have the beginnings of the now ubiquitous love triangle. The ever charming slut shaming used as a device to make the protagonist more interesting. Obnoxious displays of male bravado and machismo. Nauseatingly overblown teen romance. Hope, sixteen and oblivious, embarks on tantalizing journey through time to rescue her mother from the clutches of the 12th century. Complete with backstabbing, medieval courts, and a race against both the clock and a tribe of evil time travelers, all the while Hope is learning the limits of her potential and the truth of her mysterious origins, Into the Dim is heavy with drama, but rather light on substance. While the setting, from show more modern-day Scotland to Middle Ages London, is beautiful and the premise intriguing, unfortunately Into the Dim is little more than predictable, cheesy, and overwrought with stereotypes. show less