Stolen Time

Seattle, 1913 // Dorothy is trapped. Forced into an engagement to a wealthy man just so she and her mother can live comfortably for the rest of their days, she’ll do anything to escape. Including sneaking away from her wedding and bolting into the woods to disappear.  New Seattle, 2077 // Ash is on a mission. Rescue the professor—his mentor who figured out the secret to time travel—so together they can put things right in their devastated city. But searching for one man means endless jumps through time with no guarantee of success.  When Dorothy collides with Ash, she sees it as her chance to start fresh—she’ll stow away in his plane and begin a new life wherever they land. Then she wakes up in a future that’s been ripped apart by earthquakes and floods; where vicious gangs rule the submerged city streets and a small group of intrepid travelers from across time are fighting against the odds to return things to normal. What Dorothy doesn’t know is that she could hold the key to unraveling the past—and her arrival may spell Ash’s ultimate destruction.

Stolen Time by Danielle Rollins - release date February 5, 2019

I don't know what I expected was going to happen in this book but LEMME TELL YOU that was TOTALLY not it.  It was so fascinating.  The way this played out was sort of confusing at times because it's time travel so that's to be expected but it was done in such a way that the revelations you had as the book progressed were genius.  (IT ALL MAKES SENSE NOW!!) 

Dorothy is a con artist.  She accidentally stumbles across Ash and his time machine and stows away it in to show up in the year 2077 after a huge earthquake/tsunami destroyed Seattle (or New Seattle, since it's underwater now).  Ash and his crew of the greatest minds of history (the best doctor, the strongest man, the mechanic, and him being the best pilot) are searching for the missing Professor who invented the time machines.  Ash thinks that by finding him, he will figure out a way to stop his "pre-memories" of being killed by a woman with white hair who he will fall in love with (but hasn't met yet because currently he has no idea who she is).  Things are complicated enough with him swearing off girls completely to try to make sure this doesn't even have the chance to happen and with Dorothy's mistrust of every person to exist besides herself, but it gets more complicated as they find a way to get past each other's defenses.  Last, small (in this book) but not to be overlooked characters, Roman and Quinn Fox, leaders of New Seattle's ruling gang the Black Cirkus.  They are...important.
The whole concept of time travel is extremely ~out there~ but Rollins made it work excellently.  She thought of everything and all the plot twists she has been hinting at since the beginning.  Nonetheless I was still extremely shocked at the end.

I liked how Dorothy was able to be more than just the pretty-faced tool her con artist mother had groomed her to be; it was very satisfying.  Also the ingenious that it took to write this book and think of the concepts and plan accordingly and have everything work was amazing.  There was only one thing I didn't like though, but maybe it's just in my ARC because hopefully the fixed it in the real version.  There are times where it's like "1913, just one year off from the planned destination" when the planned destination was 1918.  That is 5 years.  There's another point where it says 1929 is "27 years after [Dorothy] was supposed to be married" which makes no sense because that would put her wedding date in 1902 when it should be in 1913.  So despite the amazing cleverness it took to perfectly plan out the time travel concepts, the author can't do math??

5 stars just for how shocking it was and how wowed I was when everything finally came together.  I really want the next book right now.  I think this is going to be a trilogy but I'm not sure but I know after that ending there is definitely going to be at least a sequel.  YAY.  ALSO the cover is gorgeous and I needed a copy immediately when I saw it.  Took me 4 days to read.

-Taylor

Reviewed on February 1, 2019