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Time After Time
The Yoni Civilisation ruled by women. A civilisation without war and conflict which has left men feeling emasculated. They send an assassin back through the web of time, seeking to kill the mother of the future. To prevent her daughter and her ideas from ever being born, to prevent them from ever existing. And thereby to re-establish the dominance of men once again, turning herstory back into history.
The assassin has several impediments to overcome. He has no weapons to bring with him. He has had no exposure to violence. While his target lives on a sink housing estate in the early twenty-first century, so that he is going to have to battle through his belligerent male ancestors to get to her. The estate is controlled by two brothers, one a criminal overlord and the other a pirate radio DJ who serves as his eyes and ears and communicates to their foot-soldiers through his broadcasts and musical selections.
Yet the greatest hurdle the assassin faces is how to get close enough to the woman. Before he can utilise his lethal if theoretical training to dispatch her, first he has to figure out the yet darker arts of seduction; how to make her even notice him. Thus ensues a hilarious spectrum of seduction scenarios between the same man, the same woman, the same opening chat up lines and a myriad of outcomes. For the most difficult aspect he has to contend with, is that due to the nature of time and its paradoxes, he has to be successful many times over in parallel universes. This is the only way he can fuse all the different potential versions of history into a single definitive thread. And as Chaos Theory and The Butterfly Effect suggest, even the tiniest change in the starting conditions of any scenario, can radically alter all that follows.
"Time After Time" is that rare thing, a science-fiction dark comedy. It explores the minefield that is the dance of male and female around one another in an uproarious way, but always against the background of a menacing urban landscape and of course, with the ultimate aim of the seduction being one of murder. It uses science in a light way, though its very structure embodies the notion of parallel universes and the theory of The Butterfly Effect. It also tackles head on the mind-blowing paradoxes of travelling back in time in order to alter future outcomes. But perhaps the most radical element is that of the DJ himself. Spinning records that not only seem to soundtrack the narrative, but to influence it and to actually determine the fate of the leading players themselves. The novel has a Spotify playlist link to all the songs featured within it.
"Time After Time", where "Terminator" meets "Attack The Block" with a DJ providing the soundscape.
The assassin has several impediments to overcome. He has no weapons to bring with him. He has had no exposure to violence. While his target lives on a sink housing estate in the early twenty-first century, so that he is going to have to battle through his belligerent male ancestors to get to her. The estate is controlled by two brothers, one a criminal overlord and the other a pirate radio DJ who serves as his eyes and ears and communicates to their foot-soldiers through his broadcasts and musical selections.
Yet the greatest hurdle the assassin faces is how to get close enough to the woman. Before he can utilise his lethal if theoretical training to dispatch her, first he has to figure out the yet darker arts of seduction; how to make her even notice him. Thus ensues a hilarious spectrum of seduction scenarios between the same man, the same woman, the same opening chat up lines and a myriad of outcomes. For the most difficult aspect he has to contend with, is that due to the nature of time and its paradoxes, he has to be successful many times over in parallel universes. This is the only way he can fuse all the different potential versions of history into a single definitive thread. And as Chaos Theory and The Butterfly Effect suggest, even the tiniest change in the starting conditions of any scenario, can radically alter all that follows.
"Time After Time" is that rare thing, a science-fiction dark comedy. It explores the minefield that is the dance of male and female around one another in an uproarious way, but always against the background of a menacing urban landscape and of course, with the ultimate aim of the seduction being one of murder. It uses science in a light way, though its very structure embodies the notion of parallel universes and the theory of The Butterfly Effect. It also tackles head on the mind-blowing paradoxes of travelling back in time in order to alter future outcomes. But perhaps the most radical element is that of the DJ himself. Spinning records that not only seem to soundtrack the narrative, but to influence it and to actually determine the fate of the leading players themselves. The novel has a Spotify playlist link to all the songs featured within it.
"Time After Time", where "Terminator" meets "Attack The Block" with a DJ providing the soundscape.
- GenresScience Fiction
183 pages, Kindle Edition
First published October 15, 2012
23 people want to read
About the author
Marc Nash
18 books466 followers1) WORDS – voice
2) WORDS – communing
3) WORDS – emotional intelligence
4) WORDS – identity
5) WORDS – metaphor
6) WORDS – origins
7) WORDS – Origins
viii) WORDS – ideas
9) WORDS – alchemy
10)WORDS – trove
11)WORDS – meaning
12)WORDS – ambiguity
13)WORDS – stricture
14)WORDS – porousness
15)WORDS – vapour trails
16)WORDS – lyricism
17)WORDS – Being
18)WORDS – metastasis
19)WORDS – play
20)WORDS – inoculation against mortality
20 years in the counterculture working at Rough Trade Record Shop, now working in freedom of expression NGO world. I hope my books are more than just the sum of the above. I used to be a playwright, but then started writing more for dancers and physical theatre performers. I like a challenge and I like to move out of my comfort zone. Now I’m a novelist and am writing more ‘voice’ than I ever did as a playwright. Go figure!
My Booktube review site: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCmpw...
2) WORDS – communing
3) WORDS – emotional intelligence
4) WORDS – identity
5) WORDS – metaphor
6) WORDS – origins
7) WORDS – Origins
viii) WORDS – ideas
9) WORDS – alchemy
10)WORDS – trove
11)WORDS – meaning
12)WORDS – ambiguity
13)WORDS – stricture
14)WORDS – porousness
15)WORDS – vapour trails
16)WORDS – lyricism
17)WORDS – Being
18)WORDS – metastasis
19)WORDS – play
20)WORDS – inoculation against mortality
20 years in the counterculture working at Rough Trade Record Shop, now working in freedom of expression NGO world. I hope my books are more than just the sum of the above. I used to be a playwright, but then started writing more for dancers and physical theatre performers. I like a challenge and I like to move out of my comfort zone. Now I’m a novelist and am writing more ‘voice’ than I ever did as a playwright. Go figure!
My Booktube review site: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCmpw...
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Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews
September 14, 2022
An oppressed man living in a future where women are the dominant gender is sent back in time to prevent the birth of the catalyst for the future, in hopes of asserting the patriarchy once more.
Social satire paired with an unusual time travel conceit sounds about half my jam, and that’s pretty much the hit rate for this one, in the end. Humour usually doesn’t land on me, unless it’s macro and substantive. We follow F-10 as he is sent back to an estate that’s in a tough neighbourhood. As he attempts to locate and kill Haley, the mother of the woman who births the male oppressed future, we encounter the butterfly effect. Although a variant of it I haven’t personally seen in fiction. F-10 essentially fails forward, advancing the story, or else it rewinds to the mistake, and he tries again. There’s a really effective motif paralleling this of a reclusive Rastafarian DJ plugged into the CCTVs choosing music to suit circumstances, but also the needle tracking the current groove. It’s the song fitting what’s happening, but also the track of time we are currently in. It’s a pretty brilliant device, I think, that helps the reader catch onto what’s happening, but expands the worlds in an evocative manner.
Rather than a run-and-gun, find and kill kill kill narrative evocative of the oft mentioned Terminator movie (a kind of ur text for the oppressed men, which depicts a now erased masculinity), we instead find him sheepishly inverted in gender roles. While he venerates “Arnie”, he can’t ape the patriarchy, having no lived experience. So, it rather becomes a meet-cute, where he attempts to attract her and negotiate a way to get her alone. It’s an effective way to show the gender norms and unique ways in which men have been oppressed, where typically lots of sci-fi just simply mirror the oppression from men to women in a rather one-size-fits-all manner that doesn’t really hold up. Nash has clearly put some thought into how men are oppressed differently, such as not being allowed to gain muscle mass unless they’re gay, and gyms being shut down. It always has a satirical bent because it’s clear that the joke is still on the men. Even though they’re somehow smart enough to make a time machine that functions, their methods of establishing primacy—even over one another—are literally laughable.
Indeed, it becomes a bit easy to tell how the story would play it because of those elements introduced. But there is a satisfying and symmetrical ending that had just a small caveat that really drove home the themes and the satire, even when coupled with the inevitable ending.
This preceding Nash’s latest works, at a craft level I did find the prose work less precise. There are some confusing elements occurring in rooms where choreography would have really helped. Most of the dialogue is in dialect, a stylistic choice that’s just not my favourite. I’m not sure why, but lots of sci-fi from that generation, such as Neuromancer, all have Rastafarians in them, and all have them in dialect. There’s a neat inversion of circumstances and the bringing together of all the characters that was conducive to a good ending as well. But, yeah, I imagine Bob Marley, or perhaps that music just really influenced people of that age. I think with dialogue, I wasn’t fully convinced the characters would be deploying the kind of vocabulary they were, and it’s just not as honed as to when to deploy more complex diction, whereas Three Dreams in the Key of G is perfect with it. There are some themes here that clearly have interested and inform, I imagine, his later novels as well, which is just fun. It’s neat seeing the development of a fantastic writer.
Overall, it’s literary in terms of intersecting with sci-fi in a manner I think is exceptional. Most of the time my gripe with literary intersections with genre, but especially sci-fi, is people having a central conceit that is there as a plot device and nothing more. It doesn’t affect the world in usually any significant way, they just like That Thing and want it, so they insert it. They don’t know how to, or decline to, interrogate it. Time After Time’s conceit is fully married to the concept. From the satirical elements to the social to the play on the Terminator concept, it’s clear that everything is thought out. It also doesn’t conform to sci-fi tropes, plot, or characterization. It’s character driven, withholds catharsis, doesn’t have a typical character arc, isn’t interested in gratuitous, bombastic set pieces. It is doing what it wants, and does it well, imo. Had I been a reader who particularly liked humour saturating prose, it would have been a five star read, I think.
Social satire paired with an unusual time travel conceit sounds about half my jam, and that’s pretty much the hit rate for this one, in the end. Humour usually doesn’t land on me, unless it’s macro and substantive. We follow F-10 as he is sent back to an estate that’s in a tough neighbourhood. As he attempts to locate and kill Haley, the mother of the woman who births the male oppressed future, we encounter the butterfly effect. Although a variant of it I haven’t personally seen in fiction. F-10 essentially fails forward, advancing the story, or else it rewinds to the mistake, and he tries again. There’s a really effective motif paralleling this of a reclusive Rastafarian DJ plugged into the CCTVs choosing music to suit circumstances, but also the needle tracking the current groove. It’s the song fitting what’s happening, but also the track of time we are currently in. It’s a pretty brilliant device, I think, that helps the reader catch onto what’s happening, but expands the worlds in an evocative manner.
Rather than a run-and-gun, find and kill kill kill narrative evocative of the oft mentioned Terminator movie (a kind of ur text for the oppressed men, which depicts a now erased masculinity), we instead find him sheepishly inverted in gender roles. While he venerates “Arnie”, he can’t ape the patriarchy, having no lived experience. So, it rather becomes a meet-cute, where he attempts to attract her and negotiate a way to get her alone. It’s an effective way to show the gender norms and unique ways in which men have been oppressed, where typically lots of sci-fi just simply mirror the oppression from men to women in a rather one-size-fits-all manner that doesn’t really hold up. Nash has clearly put some thought into how men are oppressed differently, such as not being allowed to gain muscle mass unless they’re gay, and gyms being shut down. It always has a satirical bent because it’s clear that the joke is still on the men. Even though they’re somehow smart enough to make a time machine that functions, their methods of establishing primacy—even over one another—are literally laughable.
Indeed, it becomes a bit easy to tell how the story would play it because of those elements introduced. But there is a satisfying and symmetrical ending that had just a small caveat that really drove home the themes and the satire, even when coupled with the inevitable ending.
This preceding Nash’s latest works, at a craft level I did find the prose work less precise. There are some confusing elements occurring in rooms where choreography would have really helped. Most of the dialogue is in dialect, a stylistic choice that’s just not my favourite. I’m not sure why, but lots of sci-fi from that generation, such as Neuromancer, all have Rastafarians in them, and all have them in dialect. There’s a neat inversion of circumstances and the bringing together of all the characters that was conducive to a good ending as well. But, yeah, I imagine Bob Marley, or perhaps that music just really influenced people of that age. I think with dialogue, I wasn’t fully convinced the characters would be deploying the kind of vocabulary they were, and it’s just not as honed as to when to deploy more complex diction, whereas Three Dreams in the Key of G is perfect with it. There are some themes here that clearly have interested and inform, I imagine, his later novels as well, which is just fun. It’s neat seeing the development of a fantastic writer.
Overall, it’s literary in terms of intersecting with sci-fi in a manner I think is exceptional. Most of the time my gripe with literary intersections with genre, but especially sci-fi, is people having a central conceit that is there as a plot device and nothing more. It doesn’t affect the world in usually any significant way, they just like That Thing and want it, so they insert it. They don’t know how to, or decline to, interrogate it. Time After Time’s conceit is fully married to the concept. From the satirical elements to the social to the play on the Terminator concept, it’s clear that everything is thought out. It also doesn’t conform to sci-fi tropes, plot, or characterization. It’s character driven, withholds catharsis, doesn’t have a typical character arc, isn’t interested in gratuitous, bombastic set pieces. It is doing what it wants, and does it well, imo. Had I been a reader who particularly liked humour saturating prose, it would have been a five star read, I think.
January 7, 2013
A ‘hero’ called F-10 is sent back from a future where men are menial workers in a world run by women. His task – assigned him by a spindly-legged man named Roger Jolly who has studied physics and loves the Terminator films - is to find and kill the mother of the ruler of this unfair world, to free the men of the future. The mother’s name is Hayley. She likes a drink and she lives on a rough estate in England where gangsta rappers keep the local population under surveillance and under control.
To succeed, F-10 has to kill an almost infinite number of Hayleys. Time after Time he goes back to the point where he meets Hayley and starts again and again. Through repeated, unremembered meetings, as time bleeds into itself, they begin to develop an affinity with each other – the kind of understanding that would normally come from years of friendship. If they begin a relationship, will he abandon his task? What will become of the men of the future, including Roger Jolly? If he succeeds, will the new future be better than the one Roger and F-10 were experiencing?
The action plays out like a scifi Groundhog day, with dark humour and the rhythms and rhymes of the streets as a soundtrack. The author even provides a playlist on Spotify if you’d like to listen along to the tracks mentioned in the book.
We get Schrodinger’s Cat, time travel, dystopia and butterflies. The butterflies are a motif throughout the book, both as symbolism for their beauty and fragility, and as an acknowledgement of the chaos theory that states that if a butterfly flaps its wings in one part of the world, it can have an effect on another.
As Time after Time reworks and develops the encounters between F-10 and Hayley and shows us the payoff in the future, we get a fun lesson in physics… and a reminder to be careful what we wish for.
To succeed, F-10 has to kill an almost infinite number of Hayleys. Time after Time he goes back to the point where he meets Hayley and starts again and again. Through repeated, unremembered meetings, as time bleeds into itself, they begin to develop an affinity with each other – the kind of understanding that would normally come from years of friendship. If they begin a relationship, will he abandon his task? What will become of the men of the future, including Roger Jolly? If he succeeds, will the new future be better than the one Roger and F-10 were experiencing?
The action plays out like a scifi Groundhog day, with dark humour and the rhythms and rhymes of the streets as a soundtrack. The author even provides a playlist on Spotify if you’d like to listen along to the tracks mentioned in the book.
We get Schrodinger’s Cat, time travel, dystopia and butterflies. The butterflies are a motif throughout the book, both as symbolism for their beauty and fragility, and as an acknowledgement of the chaos theory that states that if a butterfly flaps its wings in one part of the world, it can have an effect on another.
As Time after Time reworks and develops the encounters between F-10 and Hayley and shows us the payoff in the future, we get a fun lesson in physics… and a reminder to be careful what we wish for.
October 21, 2012
I picked this book to read as part of my ongoing mission to step outside my usual reading comfort-zone so time-travel/sci-fi is really not something I am familiar with. This means that I am not sure whether it is good examples of this sort of book, I only know that I thoroughly enjoyed it!
Admittedly, it did take a while to get used to both the author’s writing style as well as to get my head round the whole time travel, parallel universe, paradox thing, but I am so glad I persisted!
The concept of the book is relatively simple – go back in time – change something – change the future (or present to our trusty time traveller). But where this book differs from that concept is that there is no single point of action to change. Instead, that change has to be made many times over in separate parallel universes and to effectively change the future he has to be successful in each and every one.
I actually found this concept and the way the book is set out quite fascinating. Scenes are played out to their conclusion and then the same storyline is repeated, branching out from a single alternative choice made by a character into a completely different scenario. This bamboozled me at the start, but it works – it really does! It gets you thinking about how many decisions you make of a day. How many branches could come out of your own life?
All this action is complemented by a soundtrack provided by a rather interesting DJ character. His influence over the people and situations with his music is such that his importance to the story should not be underestimated.
All in all, a very enjoyable read. To be honest, 24 hours later I am still thinking about it and it has been a while since a book’s ideas have stayed with me after finishing reading it.
Admittedly, it did take a while to get used to both the author’s writing style as well as to get my head round the whole time travel, parallel universe, paradox thing, but I am so glad I persisted!
The concept of the book is relatively simple – go back in time – change something – change the future (or present to our trusty time traveller). But where this book differs from that concept is that there is no single point of action to change. Instead, that change has to be made many times over in separate parallel universes and to effectively change the future he has to be successful in each and every one.
I actually found this concept and the way the book is set out quite fascinating. Scenes are played out to their conclusion and then the same storyline is repeated, branching out from a single alternative choice made by a character into a completely different scenario. This bamboozled me at the start, but it works – it really does! It gets you thinking about how many decisions you make of a day. How many branches could come out of your own life?
All this action is complemented by a soundtrack provided by a rather interesting DJ character. His influence over the people and situations with his music is such that his importance to the story should not be underestimated.
All in all, a very enjoyable read. To be honest, 24 hours later I am still thinking about it and it has been a while since a book’s ideas have stayed with me after finishing reading it.
May 23, 2013
A world ruled by women in which men are nothing more than objects to be used in any way women see fit.
A plan has been concocted to go back in time a kill a specific female in the hope that it will change the future of men in general. Sort of like the Butterfly Effect a la Terminator.
Rather cleverly the theme of butterflies has been interwoven into the story, almost like a ode to the Butterfly Effect.
Once again Nash has produced the type of book/story that demands nothing less than your full attention.
He does love his complexity. Now that works really well in his short stories, but I think in the longer piece the author may have overindulged a little. Saying that, he has a distinct and memorable way of writing and plotting. It is abstract.
Having the soundtrack linked to the setting and message of the plot wasn't something that I really noticed. However if the author could manage an interactive version whereby the links could be played during the read, that would be both en vogue and give the setting a stronger sense of era and time.
There were parts of the book that made me nod my head in agreement, others made me want to growl with displeasure (we don't all pearl one, knit one you know) and of course the moments when I had to blink, think and have a lightbulb moment.
Nash never makes anything easy.
I received a copy of this book for my review.
A plan has been concocted to go back in time a kill a specific female in the hope that it will change the future of men in general. Sort of like the Butterfly Effect a la Terminator.
Rather cleverly the theme of butterflies has been interwoven into the story, almost like a ode to the Butterfly Effect.
Once again Nash has produced the type of book/story that demands nothing less than your full attention.
He does love his complexity. Now that works really well in his short stories, but I think in the longer piece the author may have overindulged a little. Saying that, he has a distinct and memorable way of writing and plotting. It is abstract.
Having the soundtrack linked to the setting and message of the plot wasn't something that I really noticed. However if the author could manage an interactive version whereby the links could be played during the read, that would be both en vogue and give the setting a stronger sense of era and time.
There were parts of the book that made me nod my head in agreement, others made me want to growl with displeasure (we don't all pearl one, knit one you know) and of course the moments when I had to blink, think and have a lightbulb moment.
Nash never makes anything easy.
I received a copy of this book for my review.
February 13, 2013
Time after Time is different to say the least. This is the story of F-10, a curious man from the future who is sent to the past to change History. The future is ruled by women and by ruled I mean they are the genre in charge, they are no longer the weakest sex. The men are in an inferior position and are treated like almost like slaves. Everything is done according to what women say and they are a little evil for what we can read.
F-10 is contacted by Roger and he convinces him to go back in time and kill the Prophet, the woman who initiates the movement that brings this new world. Easy to say, hard to do for a man without violence experience and with no gun.
The story doesn’t have a lineal course. Set in parallel universes, the story goes forward and backward to show us how little details can change the final result. When story start repeating itself I was surprise to see how a word could create a different story. This is what is magnificent about the butterfly effect, life is a chain of decisions and each one presents its own future.
The book is supposed to be a humor story and it is at times. There is more than one funny dialogue and some hilarious situations. Some scenes between Haley and F-10 are amazing and make you laugh out loud, especially because he is naïve and is like a child seeing the world for the first time.
However, I had a hard time trying to read the slang from the Dj and his brother, I am absolutely sure that they are perfectly written but I think the problems was that English is not my first language and I couldn’t really appreciate and enjoy their dialogues. I understood most of it and find it fun but not as gracious as I imagine it is intended to be.
Another good thing is how music helps telling the story. The songs are placed in the correct places and made the reading more gratifying. The cover is BEAUTIFUL and captures the book essence.
In general is a fun book, with good quality of writing and a sincere and innocent main character.
*** I received an ecopy from the author in exchange for an honest review. ***
F-10 is contacted by Roger and he convinces him to go back in time and kill the Prophet, the woman who initiates the movement that brings this new world. Easy to say, hard to do for a man without violence experience and with no gun.
The story doesn’t have a lineal course. Set in parallel universes, the story goes forward and backward to show us how little details can change the final result. When story start repeating itself I was surprise to see how a word could create a different story. This is what is magnificent about the butterfly effect, life is a chain of decisions and each one presents its own future.
The book is supposed to be a humor story and it is at times. There is more than one funny dialogue and some hilarious situations. Some scenes between Haley and F-10 are amazing and make you laugh out loud, especially because he is naïve and is like a child seeing the world for the first time.
However, I had a hard time trying to read the slang from the Dj and his brother, I am absolutely sure that they are perfectly written but I think the problems was that English is not my first language and I couldn’t really appreciate and enjoy their dialogues. I understood most of it and find it fun but not as gracious as I imagine it is intended to be.
Another good thing is how music helps telling the story. The songs are placed in the correct places and made the reading more gratifying. The cover is BEAUTIFUL and captures the book essence.
In general is a fun book, with good quality of writing and a sincere and innocent main character.
*** I received an ecopy from the author in exchange for an honest review. ***
February 7, 2013
Time after Time describes itself on Amazon as Terminator meets Attack the Block,. It’s set in both a futuristic society where men have been emasculated and women rule the roost; and a council housing estate in the present time. The premise is simple, go back, kill the mother that spawned the child who changed the world and, like magic, men will once again be men. However, as we know from our quantum physics, there are many ways to kill a cat and we can’t be sure they’ve worked unless we open the box. Therefore the parallel universe must also be considered and each one has a potentially different outcome. Our hero, or is it anti-hero, must overcome the woman many times and the writing style Marc has adopted reflects this very eclectic approach. This is definitely a book to get your head around and it probably wouldn’t work for those who like a linear sort of story. But it is hilarious and the visual imagery Marc employees in different ways has made me see my other half in a potentially different light indeed. If you are a fan of Terry Pratchett or Hitch Hikers Guide then you might just find this a book to match them. I loved it.
September 4, 2013
The book is about making changes, but changes need to be repeated to be effective. I found it very clever that the author emphasized on this; he didn't go the typical route of having one thing changing everything. Highly recommend it!
August 26, 2013
F-10 goes back in time to kill the mother of the prophetess who creates a society which emasculates men and prevents them from smoking cigarettes and they are goosed and forced to have sex.
Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews