“History is just one damned thing after another.” Arnold Toynbee
I’ve often said on the SFFWorld Forums that there are two elements that can make or break a novel for me. And whilst characterisation, setting, internal logic and appropriate names are all very important, it’s none of those. (Well, actually, names can be a deal breaker, sometimes.) No – the two things that work, or don’t, for me are humour and romance. They are the most personal of elements for a reader, and I know to my own cost that what works for one reader can leave another remarkably unimpressed.
With that in mind, this is a novel that by taking on both of these aspects is possibly the worst I could choose to read.
It also doesn’t help that the blurb at the bottom of the front cover made me wince – “Meet the disaster magnets of St. Mary’s as they hurtle around History…” “Disaster magnets”… yuck. (It is used in the book, too.)
But here’s the thing – when such books work, they work well. I loved most of Jasper Fforde’s Thursday Next series, which balanced absurdity with literary intelligence, Douglas Adams’ Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy (though it has dated since I first read it) and in my opinion Terry Pratchett’s Discworld novels are about as skilful as you can get in the genre (or at least the ones I have read.)
Also on the positive side is the point that I do like a good alternate history or time travel story. Connie Willis’ Doomsday Book was one of the first to go on my “50 at 50” list, for example, and is still a regular re-read. Looking at this one, the publisher’s blurb suggests that there’s a lot I might like:
“Time travel meets history in this explosive, bestselling adventure series. At St Mary’s Institute of Historical Research, the historians don’t just study the past, they revisit it. Behind the strait-laced façade of a conventional academic institution, the secret of time travel is being used for ground-breaking and daring historical research taking the historians on a rollercoaster ride through history: from the destruction of Pompeii to the Normandy trenches; from the Great Fire of London to Bronze Age Troy and even to the time of the dinosaurs… Meanwhile, within at St Mary’s itself, there are power struggles and intrigues worthy of a book in themselves. In Book One, we follow new recruit Max as she rides the catastrophe curve from eleventh-century London to the First World War, and from the Cretaceous Period to the destruction of the Great Library at Alexandria. For wherever Historians go, chaos is sure to follow in their wake …“
Ignoring such things, picking up the book without preconceptions is perhaps the best way to decide whether it is for you or not. The first chapter guides the reader quickly though the novel’s setup. The narrator, Doctor Madeleine Maxwell (‘Max’), tells of how she is approached by an old mentor to take up a position at St. Mary’s Institute of Historical Research. Once through the preliminaries and “the interview” Max finds herself quickly amongst a group of unusual colleagues and into situations she was not expecting.
And that’s the first place where the book scores. The characters are unusual enough to be interesting and memorable and you quickly engage with them. There’s a small amount of information-dump, but not a lot of backstory, nor too much focus on the inner angst of the lead person. Instead, particulars are given as you read, allowing the fast pace to carry the reader along without superfluous details.
The setting is great fun, filled with all the clichés of education – intense academics, mad scientists, harassed administrators – think Hogwarts transferred to a time travel setting. Max’s training at St. Mary’s is as dangerous and as amusing as you’d expect, and yet all done with a knowing nod and a wink.
It is pretty clear from the start that the author, and Max, are passionate about their work. One of the great things about the book is the unbridled enthusiasm shown over the possibilities of time travel creates. Max is repeatedly asked about which time she would like to travel to and there’s a list of places mentioned. Jodi manages to capture that youthful enthusiasm and combine it with a sheer joy of history, of visiting places you might love to see yourself (or in some cases, not.) We go to the Somme into a medical centre near the front line, the Cretaceous Period and look at dinosaurs, Georgian times, the Peterloo Massacre and even go to save scrolls from the legendary library at Alexandra, amongst others.
Some places are better than we expect, others are not somewhere we’d like to visit ever again. The potential of such journeys is exciting enough to create that ‘Wow’ factor, even when the premise is based on some obscured scientific flim-flammery. It is important to realise that it is the journey that’s important here, not so much the means of travel.
But at the same time, Jodi conveys the idea that time travel can be very dangerous – there’s a reason why the travellers are given weapons training! This leads to the fact that there are also a number of deaths along the way, which ramps up the tension. As you get to know the quirky characters it can come as a bit of a shock to find that not all make it to the end of the novel. Some of the shocking moments are quite brutal, but done well.
I also enjoyed the fact that this is also deliberately a very British story – the amount of tea drunk throughout, but especially in times of crisis, is impressive. (It made me laugh that the time travel pods have a kettle built-in.) As you might expect with such a setting, there’s a lot of good manners shown, social niceties maintained, and general misunderstandings given, which are often the crux of British drama. The humour throughout is witty and intelligent, with the fine line between whimsy and absurdity generally managed. There’s a knowing wink perpetually throughout the writing, but one which is less Carry On and more PG Wodehouse in nature.
Even the romance is not as wince-worthy as it could have been, although there are graphic details the book could have done without. This was perhaps the weakest point of the novel for me but it was far from the worst example I’ve read.
In summary, Just One Damned Thing after Another is one of those books that, once started, is difficult to put down. It is surprisingly engaging and a real page-turner, to the point where as soon as I had to stop reading, I couldn’t wait to get back to it. I finished it in a weekend.
It’s not particularly clever, but it is great entertainment. It reminded me of how much enjoyment I got from reading Jasper Fforde’s Thursday Next stories. Think of Gail Carriger’s novels, but in my opinion better, or Connie Willis’ time travel stories with more absurdist fun. I loved it.
Sometimes it is worth challenging your perceptions and ignoring the warning signs. For what it’s worth, the cover blurb does no favours on this one, but the book raises its game to overcome this and become a satisfyingly entertaining read. This is one of those books that entertains from the start, creating characters that are fun and that the reader cares about by the end of the book. Despite my worries at the beginning, and the occasional misstep, this book won me over. File under ‘Guilty Pleasure read’, one to be read for its sheer entertainment value. I can’t wait to read the next one.
Just One Damned Thing After Another by Jodi Taylor
Book 1 of The Chronicles of St. Mary’s
First published in 2013 by Accent Press. This edition published in 2015.
280 pages
ISBN: 978-1910939529
Review by Mark Yon
