/lit/ - Literature

The tittles of modern popular books really get on my nerves. It's like they're meant to be all profound and eye catching or whatever when the books are absolute fucking trash.

Weird one this, a book that's well written and yet repetitive enough in form that it begins to drag a bit by about chapter 6.
I've never read El-Mohtar before but that's very par for the course for Gladstone who is always a clever and knowledgeable writer but never one who I find captivating.

This Is How You Lose the Time War - Amal El-Mohtar & Max Gladstone
There's little reason to discuss the plot since it's about style over substance.
Two societies that want to control all of time and space are destined to an eternal stalemate. Red & Blue, the protagonists, are on opposing sides but begin communicating with each other and eventually become unable to stop doing so. It's unclear how old they are. They're quite possibly several 1000s of years old. The setting is the far, far, future, but since it's time traveling, it's really all over the place in time and location, though they're always on Earth. It's unclear how the time traveling works. There are many timelines and life is simply a matter of subjectively experiencing what has already occurred.
This is a romance with a science fiction background. I'd say it's 80% romance and 20% science fiction. This may be the closest to a romance novel that I'll read.
Half of it is love letter epistolary and the other half is how they find the love letters. Generally I dislike epistolary works.
Red & Blue are not so much star-crossed lovers as they are two desperate outcasts ravenous for the slightest bit of intimacy, in whatever form it may present itself, which they then extrapolate to an all-consuming obsession with each other. Despite their outpouring of confessions of eternal love for each other, I have doubts that's what it actually is. If you're expecting them to do anything more than than write letters to each to each other, you'll be disappointed. Physical intimacy is not included. I understand why that's the case. While it seems to be seen as a LGBT romance, I'd argue that's inaccurate as both protagonists are post-human, if even that, and can be whatever they want to be at any time.
It's unclear what the authors intended by by having both Red & Blue meddle with the lives of each other when they were young. I found it to be mildly unsettling, but I assume it was meant to be romantic. To me it was only was only a step removed from an adult traveling back to when their partner was like 6 years old and told them, "We're going to be lovers one day, so let me help you with your problems." That may be hyperbole, but it expresses shades of the sentiment I felt.

I didn't like the inclusion of the various pop culture references. It felt out of place and character. I suppose I just hate "fun" and it isn't my kind of humor.
Examples:
Hello, I'm Mackint-
Hush, Siri
Ontario sucks
Mad props
Your mission objective's in another castle.
Mood Indigo
there ain't no mountain high enough
I know Socrates, I served with Socrates, and you, senator
Everybody's building them big ships and boats.
...and so many more

Rating: 3/5
I was going to give this 2/5, but the last 25% brought forth a sufficient amount of feeling from me to barely bump it up to a 3. I can certainly understand why a large number of people, especially women, would give this an easy 5/5 and perhaps call it one of their favorite works ever.