This is terrible. Truly, truly dire. It's as if the author was told, second hand, about something called "science fiction," and decided to have a go at it, having read nothing, watched nothing, and done no research.
The premise makes no sense, whatsoever. The mission to Terra-Two shows no understanding of the science of space travel (time dilation, anyone?), and the alternative timeline (thanks to clever Victorian engineers, in this "reality" space travel began before World War I) is nothing more than an unnecessary, confusing flourish. Characters are basically bundles of neuroses, cardboard standees holding character-shaped places in the narrative.
I'm not a big fan of Harry Potter, but something like this highlights JK Rowling's core achievement: taking smart youngsters whose talents and ambitions isolate them from the "real world" and show how they develop as people, and how their upbringing affects their ability to work together, and achieve a goal. Oh tries to jump straight to "what if the kids were in charge?" without doing the hard work of laying the foundations for the kids' characters.
The premise makes no sense, whatsoever. The mission to Terra-Two shows no understanding of the science of space travel (time dilation, anyone?), and the alternative timeline (thanks to clever Victorian engineers, in this "reality" space travel began before World War I) is nothing more than an unnecessary, confusing flourish. Characters are basically bundles of neuroses, cardboard standees holding character-shaped places in the narrative.
I'm not a big fan of Harry Potter, but something like this highlights JK Rowling's core achievement: taking smart youngsters whose talents and ambitions isolate them from the "real world" and show how they develop as people, and how their upbringing affects their ability to work together, and achieve a goal. Oh tries to jump straight to "what if the kids were in charge?" without doing the hard work of laying the foundations for the kids' characters.
