Time Salvager (Time Salvager, 1)
Time Salvager (Time Salvager, 1) book cover

Time Salvager (Time Salvager, 1)

Paperback – April 26, 2016

Price
$18.81
Format
Paperback
Pages
400
Publisher
Tor Books
Publication Date
ISBN-13
978-0765377197
Dimensions
6.27 x 0.81 x 9.12 inches
Weight
1 pounds

Description

“Chu creates a fascinating world, strange and familiar, infused with humor, sorrow, courage, greed, and sacrifice. This page-turner is a riveting, gratifying read.” ― Publishers Weekly (starred review) “An utterly captivating time-travel adventure. To put it simply, Chu's worldbuilding is extraordinary.” ― RT Book Reviews (4 ½ stars, a Top Pick!) “A gripping, taut space opera about keeping hope in hopeless circumstances. Immensely enjoyable. ” ― Robert Jackson Bennett, author of City of Stairs “Time twisting action-adventure as only Wesley Chu could imagine it. I enjoyed it a lot. Read this book!” ― Ann Leckie, author of the Hugo and Nebula Award-winning Ancillary Justice “Smart, fast, and fun.” ― Brent Weeks, New York Times bestselling author of the Lightbringer series “Chu has taken a simple, brilliant premise and built upon it an epic universe full of thrills and wonder.” ― Jason M. Hough, New York Times bestselling author of The Darwin Elevator “More than a compelling, innovative take on the perks and pitfalls of time travel - Time Salvager is a sharp study of how human nature might prove mankind's salvation, or eventually doom us all. This is world-building that will make you fear for the future. In a good way.” ― Cherie Priest, author of Maplecroft “A powerful and compelling search of the past for redemption in the present, by turns thrilling and sweet and gut-wrenching.” ― Kevin Hearne, author of the Iron Druid Chronicles “A clever, cautionary sf tale with cool gadgets, characterization that surprised me in the best possible way, and multiple cunning twists.” ― Kate Elliott, author of the Crown of Stars series “With time travel, force-field kung fu, and a huge helping of wit, Wesley Chu transmogrifies a bleak long-whimper apocalypse into vicious, high-octane fun.” ― Max Gladstone, author of the Craft Sequence “A fast-paced ride that offers a fresh spin on time travel, combines it with a high-stakes plot and genuinely innovative action, and spices the blend with a healthy dose of irreverent humor.” ― Jacqueline Carey, author of Kushiel's Dart “Exciting, interesting, and never forgetting the fun of ideas, this is brilliant new stuff.” ― Paul Cornell, author of London Falling “A time-warping science fiction thrill ride.” ― Jaye Wells, author of the Sabrina Kane series “Gripping” ― Howard Tayler, Hugo Award-winning creator of Schlock Mercenary WESLEY CHU was a finalist for the John W. Campbell Award for Best New Writer. His debut novel, The Lives of Tao , earned him a Young Adult Library Services Association Alex Award and a Science Fiction Goodreads Choice Award Finalist slot.

Features & Highlights

  • Time Salvager:
  • a fast-paced time travel adventure from Wesley Chu, the John W. Campbell award-winning author of
  • The Lives of Tao.
  • In a future when Earth is a toxic, abandoned world and humanity has spread into the outer solar system to survive, the tightly controlled use of time travel holds the key maintaining a fragile existence among the other planets and their moons. James Griffin-Mars is a chronman--a convicted criminal recruited for his unique psychological makeup to undertake the most dangerous job there is: missions into Earth's past to recover resources and treasure without altering the timeline. Most chronmen never reach old age, and James is reaching his breaking point. On a final mission that is to secure his retirement, James meets an intriguing woman from a previous century, scientist Elise Kim, who is fated to die during the destruction of an oceanic rig. Against his training and his common sense, James brings her back to the future with him, saving her life, but turning them both into fugitives. Remaining free means losing themselves in the wild and poisonous wastes of Earth, and discovering what hope may yet remain for humanity's home world.

Customer Reviews

Rating Breakdown

★★★★★
30%
(250)
★★★★
25%
(208)
★★★
15%
(125)
★★
7%
(58)
23%
(191)

Most Helpful Reviews

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Will not be reading more

Very disappointing. I have expectations of good sci-fi, and time travel story lines in particular. In terms of practical believability the behavior of the characters is absurd nonsense. We are supposed to believe these people are potential world saviors and they persist in the most short sighted shallow and ridiculous lack of planning or understanding, they act more like immature adolescents than adults. The world constructed is presented as having been an unlivable biological wasteland for centuries, yet we have hoards surviving in crumbling towers in a flooded Manhattan, supposedly grazing their animals and farming on the upper floors of office towers. Not the roofs, the upper floors. It's stupid. I can't go on, it's too annoying to revisit. I read the second book to see if it pulled together, but it was even worse. I feel less for even having it in my head now.
2 people found this helpful
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Warning

Warning: if you bought the book early on, you might not know that is the first of what will probably be a trilogy, given the author's history. I took one star off for misleading packaging. Wesley Chu is a good writer; but moreover, he is very creative. He can mine ideas in speculative fiction where others have not thought to go. In this instance, time travel. It has always had its taboos, mostly from pathfinders like Asimov. And when you deal with time travel, no matter what you do, you encounter paradoxes. Chu actually comes up with a contradictory premise which avoids the problem. Well done on his part.
2 people found this helpful
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Good, but not that good

It’s a good book, had to buy for school. Expensive
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High-octane adventure

Sci-fi novel featuring one of the most depressing environmental dystopias I have coming across. Also, which there is time travel it is typically from the far future to the near future, so it doesn't involve the fun historical bits the genre usually indulges in. Still, it's fairly high-octane adventure and worth a look.
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Why So Much Negativity?

3 of the last 4 reviews were 1 star. What?
I just don't get all the negative reviews.
This was a fun, fast, well written book that will make a good summer blockbuster movie.
Interesting, complex characters with a good, swift moving plot.
I'm stingy with my stars, one star makes no sense.

Time Siege is a cheeseburger deluxe and a pitcher of beer with friends, not filet mignon with fine wine at a NYC steak house.

It has its problems.
You can create an artificial singularity to tear a hole in the space time continuum but you can't create artificial light to grow barley, corn, rye, and wheat to make a good whisky? Grow food? Can't find a way to clean the oceans? Distillation? Desalination? What about getting a library card and learn something, don't worry about late fees.

Just not sure why all the hate, i recommend this book.

On to book 2 Time Siege
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Four Stars

Pretty good book
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Another great book!

I've come to expect excellent characters, plots, and writing from Chu, and this is a case where he does not disappoint! Time Salvager is intriguing and complex, but not to the point where the reader will get confused. The concept of a time travel agency that is working to keep mankind afloat in a bleak future is fresh-- at least it was to me-- and it progressed in ways I did not see coming. As for the characters, I was more than once brought to tears by the actions they took, the meaning behind them, even though I saw them coming.

The biggest problem of the series, introduced somewhere around 2/3 through the book, I have a potential solution for already, pending some developments that I hope happen. It's not a total solution, but I have a feeling it's a key action that will need to take place. It's not often that I come up with something like this, so I'm eager to see if my idea pans out in the plot. Frankly, I really hope Chu sur[rises me! Considering some of what happened late in this book, there's a high probability he will. Chu is full of surprises, and I cannot wait to get into book 2!