Review of Wayfarer by Alexandra Bracken

All Etta Spencer wanted was to make her violin debut when she was thrust into a treacherous world where the struggle for power could alter history. After losing the one thing that would have allowed her to protect the Timeline, and the one person worth fighting for, Etta awakens alone in an unknown place and time, exposed to the threat of the two groups who would rather see her dead than succeed. When help arrives, it comes from the last person Etta ever expected—Julian Ironwood, the Grand Master’s heir who has long been presumed dead, and whose dangerous alliance with a man from Etta’s past could put them both at risk.

Meanwhile, Nicholas and Sophia are racing through time in order to locate Etta and the missing astrolabe with Ironwood travelers hot on their trail. They cross paths with a mercenary-for-hire, a cheeky girl named Li Min who quickly develops a flirtation with Sophia. But as the three of them attempt to evade their pursuers, Nicholas soon realizes that one of his companions may have ulterior motives.

As Etta and Nicholas fight to make their way back to one another, from Imperial Russia to the Vatican catacombs, time is rapidly shifting and changing into something unrecognizable… and might just run out on both of them.

It took 2 days and a mammoth 3 hour reading session tonight but I am FINISHED. I'd read a few reviews that discussed how slow going this book is, and that it literally took them months to finish it, so I was pretty determined not to get into that slump, especially with the amount of Bad Books I've read this month.

Wayfarer isn't as good as Passenger but it's not terrible. It's just okay, I wouldn't re-read it. While Passenger seemed to run through passages at breakneck speed, travelling to centuries and countries at the blink of an eye, Wayfarer seemed to content to sit down and have dinner for a while. Literally, in one case. Actually if I stretch the definition, a few cases.

This book introduces new characters which is a Very Good Thing because it's the best way to keep a book feeling fresh, in my humble opinion. However I do not like when a character is introduced only to disappear a few chapters later. Julian was my favourite new addition, he's about as useless as I would be and I could picture us together, casually leaving the rest of the family squabbling in favour of a nice bookstore and plenty of cake.

There's a few tropes thrown in that I did not like - the big one is character separation for plot purposes. If you have to separate them, do not make me wait a good 400 pages for them to be reunited again. Especially after I just deal with The Exact Same Trope during multiple Maze Runner books. The whole Nicholas being a martyr thing got real old fast too.

An extra star for A Good Ending, without wrapping up everything in a perfect pretty bow. I appreciated that.