Tanglewreck

Silver is has been recently orphaned and has come under the care of the awful Mrs. Rokabye ( who claims to be her father's sister) at Silver's family home called Tanglewreck. The world is also experiencing very strange "Time Tornadoes" which are either taking things and people from our time and dropping them in the past or the future , or vice versa (Hence a Wooly mammoth is found walking down a London Street). There is the disappearance of an entire busload of school children at the start of the novel. Mrs. Rokabye falls under the spell of a sinister person called Abel Darkwater, who believes that Silver knows the whereabouts of the Timekeeper - the only device that can actually control time - because her father had it in Tanglewreck show more just before he died. Unfortunately for Silver, there is also another mysterious character after the Timekeeper - the beautiful Regalia Mason - the owner of a company Quanta that sells Time to stressed out people with more money than sense! The concept of the book is great although I found I had to re-read some of the time/space explanations to understand some of the logic and even then it was a bit hard going. It will be interesting to see if the nerdy boys at school "get" this better than me. I also liked the refernces to real people such as Steven Hawking, Einstein etc interspersed with the fantasy elements. One for those who like Garth Nix, Scot Westerfeld, etc - thinking kid's fiction! show less

Eleven-year-old Silver Rivers has been living in her families home, Tanglewreck, in the outskirts of London with her aunt and guardian, Mrs. Rockabye. Silver's parents and sister had been caught in a 'time tornado' (a swirling disruption in the flow of time) along with a busload of schoolchildren and many others. No one knows where these people have been sent but creatures (a wooly mammoth) and people from other centuries have begun appearing in London. A prophesy has stated that a 'golden-faced child' will find the clock, or 'timekeeper', and will control time, but two evil-doers, Abel Darkwater and Regalia Mason, each want the timekeeper for their own greedy reasons.

Silver's adventures begin when she is kidnapped by the nefarious show more Darkwater and is rescued by a young boy named Gabriel who lives underground with his clan of Throwbacks. Together they time travel to find the timekeeper and foil Darkwater and Mason.

This is way out of my normal reading genre but I am always willing to try something new. I enjoyed the adventures of the children but some of the science and fantasy aspects just escaped me; and this is a YA book so I guess that doesn't say much for my understanding of science. It was a fun tale and I do like Winterson's writing style. show less

Funny how everyone thinks this book is very much like the Golden Compass. Well, in one way it certainly is not: I actually liked the kid in Tanglewreck. I hated the kids in Pullman's books. I could not care less what happened to them; in fact, at certain points, I wanted them to just go away. Silver, on the other hand, is not annoying or obnoxious or stupid or overly melodramatic.

Winterson has always toyed with relativity and quantum physics in her books; Tanglewreck is no exception. But Winterson takes many liberties and, let's say, she draws out the poetry in these cosmic concepts, or blurs them rather well using her poetic license. The plot is action packed and often hilarious, with bumbling pirates and alchemists and Popes (yes, show more yes, ALL of them!). Winterson pokes fun at the Catholic Church (only one hour of torture!) and at science. Every character, from the grumpy "aunt" to the rhyming butler, from the house to the Home-Alone-type burglars who attempt to break in, shines in that special Winterson way.

What can be faster than the speed of light? Winterson's philosophy on life and love continues in this book. The themes she weaves in earlier works like The Passion and Written on the Body are surprisingly present here.

All in all, Tanglewreck was a great, fun read. Loved the cat, the individual wave function, and the black hole. And got the strange feeling that Winterson has a hang up about twins?! show less

Our world could sure use Silver, Gabriel, and TANGLEWRECK.

Though the plot eventually wears down with only the two tiny Good Guys agains the many Monster Evils, readers may still enjoy and be challenged by the exploration of our concepts of Time.

Younger readers will not benefit from the instances of torture, death, and murder.

"Grown-ups were always worrying about money, she knew that,
but what did you need if your could eat and sit in from of the fire and read books?"

A young adult fantasy novel by Jeanette Winterson seemed like too good of an idea to pass up. And I was definitely not disappointed. There was nothing groundbreaking about this novel: it was your standard fantasy-adventure story, with a plucky young heroine who has lost her parents and needs to find a special something (the Timekeeper, in this case) to save the world. Of course, she is helped by funny-looking characters and hindered by dark and frightening villians, including a distasteful aunt who 'cares' for her, along with her evil pet bunny. But while there is nothing incredibly new, it is all done incredibly well. The main character is a red-haired, green-eyed girl named Silver--how could I not adore this book? This might be a show more pulpy young-adult fantasy novel, but it's among the best of those. It was incredibly entertaining, and I'm hoping dearly for a sequel. show less

Great concept, though quite a lot of plot holes patched over by weak and sloppy things like "Love is faster than the speed of light." Still, a fun read. It seems like the author, who hadn't written young adult before, thought she could get away with not fleshing out plot points because of the demographic of the audience. She'll hopefully improve with her next attempt.

Fun, and with a surprising amount of actual scientific ideas packed into this kids book. I love Jeanette's writing and it's fascinating to see how she pitches it to a younger audience. It also clips along at a wonderfully fast pace. The only issue I had was that the rules of this world are a little hard to determine, which made some of the latter section harder to become invested in.