Out of Time (Out of Time, #1)

by Monique Martin

[kalventure]

I go through these phases of reading nothing but time travel books, and I recently found myself in another one of those spells. I am reviewing this book in 2018 - apparently after my third reading, despite not remembering much about the plot at all. I recently nabbed books 4-6 in a collection via BookBub and decided to give the whole series a read.

This is essentially a romance story with some time travel involved, but the main point of the plot is the two-sided unrequited love that Simon and Elizabeth have. Told from both of their points of view, much of the book is dedicated to romantic feelings that they are afraid to express,
which, for me, overpowers the actual thing I was interested in: time travel and vampires. Their traveling to 1929 allows them to fall in love, and is important in a character driven book such as this one. While those elements are there, they are a bit under-developed (mostly because I think Martin's main interest is the romance and the time travel is a means to an end); the "action" of the non-romance aspects of the plot are left for the latter part of the book and I wish there had been more of a balance. It is obvious that Martin conducts a lot of research of both the location and time period that her characters are visiting, but for me I wish that more of the Occult aspects had been explored given Simon's expertise. Perhaps that will play a larger role as the series continues.

This is a good and engaging story, and those that like romances, historical fiction, and strong female characters will enjoy the book.