A Symphony of Echoes, a review by Joanna

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A Symphony of Echoes

Jodi Taylor

235 pages/8hrs 55 mins

Audible Audio

First Published 2015

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This is the second book in the Chronicles of St Mary’s series, about an anarchic bunch of time-travelling historians in an alternate version of near future Britain. After the first one, I confidently pronounced that we would definitely be buying and listening to the rest of the series, but now I’m not so sure, as I was rather put off by the completely disjointed plot and appalling behaviour of the main character in this one.

Max and her team mates are only just over a death-defying mission to Victorian London, when a key member is kidnapped and taken to the future. Uncovering another of Ronan’s nefarious plots to change the course of history for his own ends, Max must then visit 16th century Scotland to reset the timeline, even if it means destroying the life of a queen.
I once more enjoyed the irreverent humour and slightly bonkers premise of this – with the most valuable technology in the world at their disposal, a small under-funded group of idiots are allowed to roam around through time with essentially no oversight. However the unreasonably high risk, and indeed mortality rate, of their missions, stretches the plot beyond credulity. Similarly, the completely contrived fall out with Chief Farrell seemed utterly unbelievable, and that the supposedly smart Max would get taken in so easily, and then act out so immaturely, really put me off her, quite apart from the way she casually murders people – even if they do have it coming. What she then does to Mary Stuart is unforgivable, even if it is supposedly done to save history – surely they could’ve found another way!
I do like the audiobook narrator, and am willing to give the series another chance, but we’ll listen to some other genres first, and hope that some of the plot arcs raised and then discarded will be dealt with (like what exactly Jack the Ripper was, and where did he come from, and why Kal suddenly decided to leave St Mary’s – and what is Mrs de Winter doing in Bolivia?!)

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