Passenger Book Review

Passenger by Alexandra Bracken
My rating: 4 of 5 stars

"But she wondered if, in moving outside of the natural flow of time, they had forgotten the most crucial point of life—that it wasn’t meant to be lived for the past, or even the future, but for each present moment. "

Passenger is a scavenger hunt through space and time . a wholesome adventure story . the book is written from the points of view of the two main characters , Etta Spencer and Nicholas Carter . 17 years old Etta is a violin prodigy , from the 2015's New York , she is about to make her debut as a professional violinist when suddenly the night of her debut goes disarray . she encounters some strange events and wakes up somewhere else , and figures , sometime else too . Through this dilemma , on a ship in the middle of the Atlantic She crosses paths with Nicholas, a pirate from 1776 , He's dark-skinned and so experiences all of the societal issues that comes with at the time and he does handle them well . Nicholas hang up on claiming freedom and independence while Etta trying to salvage the life she had , they set out in a journey around the world between different eras looking for something that may change the time line and write a whole new history .
One of these things i admire in novels is when they hold a message , novels should not be written to merely serve as stories , they should hold a message between the lines so like this one do . passenger covers some pretty serious social issues. tells of the role of women in the eighteenth century and how different from that of the twenty first also racism and slavery . and its done in a way that it doesn't seem forced into the story . we get to see how societal issues evolve and change over time.
Etta is an admirable character , she isn't whiny which i really like, though she was a bit extra "badass" at the beginning that at some point it felt fake and unreal but then things changed , she started coming to life few chapters after . Nicholas is a fully fleshed out character where his race is only a part of how he interacts with the world .
Seriously books like this one reinforce my belief that no book should be left unfinished . Because any moment things may change and the book would exceed your expectations . this one did , it fills me with a nice feeling , i love when books do this . I cant elaborate . I mean not like i want books to put me down at the beginning , but for a book to pick itself up is like an extra unconsidered perk .

Generally Time travel maybe confusing but it always is an interesting subject to read a novel about . This novel offers an interesting take on time-travel, particularly as the time-travel within it has so many limitations. in this world one can not cross path with themselves , means if you were somewhere sometime at some point of your life you just cant revisit that year ,the passages are limited for certain times and places and it explains a lot about the concept this book is using . its compelling how through time people who were long dead can still be found in the future sightseeing as they've traveled to these years at some point of their lives , there are traveler and guardians and the whole thing is interesting . I loved the world building as it was so carefully nicely crafted .
The end is cliffhanger(ish) , twisterific , it added an extra layer of tension overall , I am interested to see how things would turn out and i expect more of the next book so Wayfarer would be one of my 2017 anticipated books .

All in all , aside from some minor issues I do like the book , of course it could do with some polishing like there definitely were some slow parts and a moment here and there that didn't feel right but the second half of the book was laudable and the book is worth the read. It just takes a while to get into . Passenger would take you through different times all over the world to America, England, France, Bhutan, Cambodia , Syria , etc . Its an interesting journey , you may want a ticket .

"I’ll be seeing you, in all the old familiar places"

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