What do you think?
Rate this book
Alice Payne #1
Alice Payne Arrives
Kate Heartfield's Alice Payne Arrives is the story of a time traveling thief turned reluctant hero in this science fiction adventure.
A disillusioned major, a highwaywoman, and a war raging across time.
It’s 1788 and Alice Payne is the notorious highway robber, the Holy Ghost. Aided by her trusty automaton, Laverna, the Holy Ghost is feared by all who own a heavy purse.
It’s 1889 and Major Prudence Zuniga is once again attempting to change history—to save history—but seventy attempts later she’s still no closer to her goal.
It’s 2016 and . . . well, the less said about 2016 the better!
But in 2020 the Farmers and the Guides are locked in battle; time is their battleground, and the world is their prize. Only something new can change the course of the war. Or someone new.
Little did they know, but they’ve all been waiting until Alice Payne arrives.
At the Publisher's request, this title is being sold without Digital Rights Management Software (DRM) applied.
A disillusioned major, a highwaywoman, and a war raging across time.
It’s 1788 and Alice Payne is the notorious highway robber, the Holy Ghost. Aided by her trusty automaton, Laverna, the Holy Ghost is feared by all who own a heavy purse.
It’s 1889 and Major Prudence Zuniga is once again attempting to change history—to save history—but seventy attempts later she’s still no closer to her goal.
It’s 2016 and . . . well, the less said about 2016 the better!
But in 2020 the Farmers and the Guides are locked in battle; time is their battleground, and the world is their prize. Only something new can change the course of the war. Or someone new.
Little did they know, but they’ve all been waiting until Alice Payne arrives.
At the Publisher's request, this title is being sold without Digital Rights Management Software (DRM) applied.
176 pages, Kindle Edition
First published November 6, 2018
72 people are currently reading
2052 people want to read
About the author
Kate Heartfield
36 books378 followersKate Heartfield is the author of The Embroidered Book, a Sunday Times bestselling historical fantasy novel published in 2022, which was shortlisted for the Ottawa Book Award. The Valkyrie, published in 2023, is a retelling of Norse and Germanic legends. The Tapestry of Time, published in 2024, is about four clairvoyant sisters fighting the Nazis for control of the Bayeux Tapestry in 1944. Her Alice Payne time travel novellas were published in 2018 and 2019. Her debut novel Armed in Her Fashion (2018) was re-published in a revised edition in 2023 as The Chatelaine. She also writes interactive fiction, including The Road to Canterbury, and The Magician's Workshop, published by Choice of Games. She has published two Assassin's Creed tie-in novels: The Magus Conspiracy and The Resurrection Plot. She has won the Aurora Award for Best Novel three times, and her short fiction has been shortlisted for the World Fantasy, Nebula, Locus, Aurora, Sunburst and Crawford awards, and her journalism for a National Newspaper Award. Her short stories have appeared in Strange Horizons, Lackington's, Podcastle and elsewhere. A former newspaper journalist, Kate lives near Ottawa, Canada.
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 30 of 218 reviews
April 12, 2019
More time travel fun! Or maybe "woes" would be a better adjective? Or both. :) Full review, first posted on Fantasy Literature:
Alice Payne arrives on the scene in this 2018 Nebula-nominated novella, and it looks like she’s setting up for a longer but welcome stay. Alice Payne is a half-black, thirty-two-year-old woman living in 1788 England in a mansion called Fleance Hall, with her father and a handful of servants; she’s also a closeted queer woman in a secret relationship with her companion, an inventor named Jane Hodgson. Alice and her father have fallen into financial straits, and her father, who is suffering from severe PTSD as a result of fighting in the American Revolution, is unable to support them financially. So Alice has taken up highway robbery, in the guise of a highwayman called the Holy Ghost, choosing as her victims men who prey on women. (Though I found it improbable, apparently there are enough of these men traveling near Fleance Hall to allow Alice to support her household with her ill-gotten gains.)
Meanwhile, Prudence Zuniga, a black Belizean-Canadian woman born in the 22nd century, is desperately trying to prevent Crown Prince Rudolf from committing suicide in the year 1884. Prudence works for a time travel agency, the Teleosophic Core Command, or TCC, and one of the things they’re trying to do is prevent World War I by keeping Rudolf alive. Seventy times before, Prudence, in disguise as a servant, has failed to convince Rudolf’s lover, a dancer named Mitzi, to refuse to participate in Rudolf’s suicide pact. Unfortunately, things go wrong this time as well, and Prudence’s TCC boss finally pulls the plug on the Rudolf Project.
It’s the last straw for Prudence, who kicks into a higher gear her plot to end time travel permanently. She’s seen all the ways that time travelers have changed history, and it almost always ends up worse for our world. (Given that Prudence’s sister Grace is growing plantains north of Toronto, it’s clear that global warming is one of our future issues.) But Prudence needs a helper ― either a patsy or an accomplice ― in eighteenth-century England. She initially set her sights on Jane Hodgson, the inventor, but when her path accidentally crosses with Alice’s, Prudence decides Alice will do.
Kate Heartfield’s Alice Payne Arrives has three bright, unconventional women as the heart of its story. Alice and Jane, both highly intelligent women, are trying to deal with both the difficulties in their own lives ― financial, social and relationship issues ― and the discovery that time travel not only exists, but that they’re being asked to participate in Prudence’s plan, one that will affect billions of lives. The characters are appealing, and realistic with their human flaws.
Alice Payne Arrives is a well-thought-out novella with some intriguing concepts. Time travel is handled in a logical way; I loved the detail that changing the past also changes everyone’s memories of prior timelines, but Prudence and her fellow time travelers are able to keep track of the shifting timelines by keeping their personal journals safe back in the Precambrian era. Some of the details with the elements in Prudence’s scheme and with the competing time travel factions are a little murky. The “Farmers” are in a conflict with the “Misguideds,” but precisely what that means isn’t explained until quite late in the story.
It’s interesting to compare and contrast this novella with Kelly Robson’s Gods, Monsters, and the Lucky Peach, also nominated for the 2018 Nebula award. Both novellas have people from the future mixing with people from the past, and altering the past, though in Gods, Monsters, and the Lucky Peach it appears that the change is only temporary, while in Alice Payne Arrives, meddling with the past can have disastrous repercussions. Both novellas also have deeply problem-ridden future versions of our world, with people using the past to try to help solve their problems. Also, both are first books in what look to be ongoing series. I enjoyed both novellas, though Gods, Monsters, and the Lucky Peach is more detailed and, I think, more intriguing and creative in its world-building. Despite these superficial plot similarities, the stories these novellas tell and their main characters are quite different. I recommend both, especially to fans of time travel SF.
The ending of Alice Payne Arrives is quite abrupt (yet another way in which it is similar to Gods, Monsters, and the Lucky Peach), though the ending of this novella is more clearly a temporary stopping point in a longer story arc. Since Heartfield has already published the sequel, Alice Payne Rides, its ending is a reasonable stopping point. Though this novella isn’t entirely satisfying as a stand-alone read, it’s a solid setup for a longer ALICE PAYNE series, and I’m definitely looking to read the sequel as soon as I can.
Heartfield has created a Goodreads page with several of her Kindle notes from Alice Payne Arrives; they’re worth reading along with this novella. The tidbit about the genesis of the name Fleance Hall is especially intriguing, and Macbeth fans will appreciate it.
3.5 stars.
Thanks to Tor for the review copy!
Alice Payne arrives on the scene in this 2018 Nebula-nominated novella, and it looks like she’s setting up for a longer but welcome stay. Alice Payne is a half-black, thirty-two-year-old woman living in 1788 England in a mansion called Fleance Hall, with her father and a handful of servants; she’s also a closeted queer woman in a secret relationship with her companion, an inventor named Jane Hodgson. Alice and her father have fallen into financial straits, and her father, who is suffering from severe PTSD as a result of fighting in the American Revolution, is unable to support them financially. So Alice has taken up highway robbery, in the guise of a highwayman called the Holy Ghost, choosing as her victims men who prey on women. (Though I found it improbable, apparently there are enough of these men traveling near Fleance Hall to allow Alice to support her household with her ill-gotten gains.)
Meanwhile, Prudence Zuniga, a black Belizean-Canadian woman born in the 22nd century, is desperately trying to prevent Crown Prince Rudolf from committing suicide in the year 1884. Prudence works for a time travel agency, the Teleosophic Core Command, or TCC, and one of the things they’re trying to do is prevent World War I by keeping Rudolf alive. Seventy times before, Prudence, in disguise as a servant, has failed to convince Rudolf’s lover, a dancer named Mitzi, to refuse to participate in Rudolf’s suicide pact. Unfortunately, things go wrong this time as well, and Prudence’s TCC boss finally pulls the plug on the Rudolf Project.
It’s the last straw for Prudence, who kicks into a higher gear her plot to end time travel permanently. She’s seen all the ways that time travelers have changed history, and it almost always ends up worse for our world. (Given that Prudence’s sister Grace is growing plantains north of Toronto, it’s clear that global warming is one of our future issues.) But Prudence needs a helper ― either a patsy or an accomplice ― in eighteenth-century England. She initially set her sights on Jane Hodgson, the inventor, but when her path accidentally crosses with Alice’s, Prudence decides Alice will do.
Kate Heartfield’s Alice Payne Arrives has three bright, unconventional women as the heart of its story. Alice and Jane, both highly intelligent women, are trying to deal with both the difficulties in their own lives ― financial, social and relationship issues ― and the discovery that time travel not only exists, but that they’re being asked to participate in Prudence’s plan, one that will affect billions of lives. The characters are appealing, and realistic with their human flaws.
Alice Payne Arrives is a well-thought-out novella with some intriguing concepts. Time travel is handled in a logical way; I loved the detail that changing the past also changes everyone’s memories of prior timelines, but Prudence and her fellow time travelers are able to keep track of the shifting timelines by keeping their personal journals safe back in the Precambrian era. Some of the details with the elements in Prudence’s scheme and with the competing time travel factions are a little murky. The “Farmers” are in a conflict with the “Misguideds,” but precisely what that means isn’t explained until quite late in the story.
It’s interesting to compare and contrast this novella with Kelly Robson’s Gods, Monsters, and the Lucky Peach, also nominated for the 2018 Nebula award. Both novellas have people from the future mixing with people from the past, and altering the past, though in Gods, Monsters, and the Lucky Peach it appears that the change is only temporary, while in Alice Payne Arrives, meddling with the past can have disastrous repercussions. Both novellas also have deeply problem-ridden future versions of our world, with people using the past to try to help solve their problems. Also, both are first books in what look to be ongoing series. I enjoyed both novellas, though Gods, Monsters, and the Lucky Peach is more detailed and, I think, more intriguing and creative in its world-building. Despite these superficial plot similarities, the stories these novellas tell and their main characters are quite different. I recommend both, especially to fans of time travel SF.
The ending of Alice Payne Arrives is quite abrupt (yet another way in which it is similar to Gods, Monsters, and the Lucky Peach), though the ending of this novella is more clearly a temporary stopping point in a longer story arc. Since Heartfield has already published the sequel, Alice Payne Rides, its ending is a reasonable stopping point. Though this novella isn’t entirely satisfying as a stand-alone read, it’s a solid setup for a longer ALICE PAYNE series, and I’m definitely looking to read the sequel as soon as I can.
Heartfield has created a Goodreads page with several of her Kindle notes from Alice Payne Arrives; they’re worth reading along with this novella. The tidbit about the genesis of the name Fleance Hall is especially intriguing, and Macbeth fans will appreciate it.
3.5 stars.
Thanks to Tor for the review copy!
March 25, 2019
Real Rating: 4.5* of five, rounded up because damn!
I love writing about an excellent alt-hist novella by a woman, about women acting to improve/change the timeline, in women's history month.
Why does there need to be a women's history month? Same reason there needs to be a Black Lives Matter movement, an LGBT Pride month, any number of other celebrations of not-white not-straight not-male not-US-centric etc etc history/achievement/identity. Y'all've had the megaphone long enough. Hand it over.
Kate Heartfield earned my delighted approval when I read her novella The Course of True Love in the Shakespeare-as-fantasy anthology Monstrous Little Voices: New Tales from Shakespeare's Fantasy World. What a pleasure it is to encounter an author whose command of the demanding art of novella-writing is so complete. Her gift for concise but not reductive prose is flatteringly highlighted in this form. With more scope than a short story, not as much elbow room as a novel, the usual fate of the novella is to exist like old Lycra workout shorts: Way too tight at entry and exit points, uselessly baggy everywhere else.
Ha, says Canadian Author Kate Heartfield, hold my soy chai latte.
This novella, single-needle tailored to fit three women who share a spirit if not a soul, tells the origin story of an eighteenth-century temporal crusader named Alice, her anchor Jane, and their twenty-second century quarry Major Prudence Zuniga of the Teleosophic Core Command. We'll start the admiration engine here: Teleosophy. Time travel, that is. "Tele-" means to, or at, a distance; "-soph-" from "sophos" means wisdom, learning, knowledge. Seeking wisdom at a distance; going far away to impart wisdom. Combined with "Core" or central point and "Command" or the illusion of control, it makes the whole concept of this story's time travel crystal clear: Traveling time to create or control events in accordance with a master plan. Implicit in that is both hubris and desperation.
I'm putting my own words to Author Heartfield's ideas, and can't be certain they represent her thoughts, but there are others just as lovely that she explains. I'd suggest to all who belong to Goodreads that they consult Heartfield's Kindle notes, where she offers sixteen "end notes" about various inspirations and sources for tidbits in the story. I was made particularly smug by "Fleance Hall"'s note; I'd thought to myself, "Oho I see the Shakespeare-based novella wasn't an accident!" and was proved correct.
That type and level of intellectual play is a joy. The idea that someone would use the well-worn time travel trope of coming from the future to save the past in this piquant and creative way is a surprise. The demise of Netflix's extraordinarily well-made and -thought-out series Travelers had rather dispirited me as to the trope's pop-culture future. This novella, and its sequel, exist; there is a pulse in these veins, so there is hope yet!
Alice is unusual in any number of ways. Her created identity of "the Holy Ghost," a feared highwayman, as a means of avenging the powerless and simultaneously assisting the father she still adores; her secret self, lover of the young and supremely intelligent Jane; and her given existence as the dark-skinned Caribbean daughter of a well-to-do white Englishman are none of them ordinary. Alice is over thirty and unmarried. She has carefully kept it that way, despite her attraction to one particular, though completely unsuitable for marriage, man. She makes the awful discovery that a deeply unsuitable and unpleasant man wants to offer her marriage in the course of the story. Jane, no fool and surprisingly quick on the social uptake when her happiness is at stake, squashes both the intent and the desire to marry in the suitor with simple, elegant finality.
Prudence, the Major with a mission to change Time, meets these ladies in the course of the Holy Ghost's highwayman-ing. She's been through the mill, spending a decade making a serious attempt to save an unworthy-but-better-than-the-alternative man from his fate. It should tell you all you need to know that it took a decade...apparently character will out no matter what. As Prudence learns she's failed and her superiors in the Teleosophic Core Command are reassigning her, she concludes that teleosophy is not the answer to humanity's problems. A long-cherished and well-planned act of sabotage, assuring that time travel will stop and not be restarted, is her only hope. She needs someone at several points in time to execute a technological action. Jane, known to be a technological tinkerer but also a socially inept naïf, is her target for 1788, but she gets Alice instead. Alice is anything but a naïf...and anything but socially inept....
Oh dear. Things go pear-shaped in several spectacular ways, and the teleosophical implications are simultaneously dire and delicious. The second volume of the series, Alice Payne Rides , is out now. How you can resist dashing away to buy them both is beyond me.
Oh, you haven't. Addressing empty space never felt so good.
I love writing about an excellent alt-hist novella by a woman, about women acting to improve/change the timeline, in women's history month.
Why does there need to be a women's history month? Same reason there needs to be a Black Lives Matter movement, an LGBT Pride month, any number of other celebrations of not-white not-straight not-male not-US-centric etc etc history/achievement/identity. Y'all've had the megaphone long enough. Hand it over.
Kate Heartfield earned my delighted approval when I read her novella The Course of True Love in the Shakespeare-as-fantasy anthology Monstrous Little Voices: New Tales from Shakespeare's Fantasy World. What a pleasure it is to encounter an author whose command of the demanding art of novella-writing is so complete. Her gift for concise but not reductive prose is flatteringly highlighted in this form. With more scope than a short story, not as much elbow room as a novel, the usual fate of the novella is to exist like old Lycra workout shorts: Way too tight at entry and exit points, uselessly baggy everywhere else.
Ha, says Canadian Author Kate Heartfield, hold my soy chai latte.
This novella, single-needle tailored to fit three women who share a spirit if not a soul, tells the origin story of an eighteenth-century temporal crusader named Alice, her anchor Jane, and their twenty-second century quarry Major Prudence Zuniga of the Teleosophic Core Command. We'll start the admiration engine here: Teleosophy. Time travel, that is. "Tele-" means to, or at, a distance; "-soph-" from "sophos" means wisdom, learning, knowledge. Seeking wisdom at a distance; going far away to impart wisdom. Combined with "Core" or central point and "Command" or the illusion of control, it makes the whole concept of this story's time travel crystal clear: Traveling time to create or control events in accordance with a master plan. Implicit in that is both hubris and desperation.
I'm putting my own words to Author Heartfield's ideas, and can't be certain they represent her thoughts, but there are others just as lovely that she explains. I'd suggest to all who belong to Goodreads that they consult Heartfield's Kindle notes, where she offers sixteen "end notes" about various inspirations and sources for tidbits in the story. I was made particularly smug by "Fleance Hall"'s note; I'd thought to myself, "Oho I see the Shakespeare-based novella wasn't an accident!" and was proved correct.
That type and level of intellectual play is a joy. The idea that someone would use the well-worn time travel trope of coming from the future to save the past in this piquant and creative way is a surprise. The demise of Netflix's extraordinarily well-made and -thought-out series Travelers had rather dispirited me as to the trope's pop-culture future. This novella, and its sequel, exist; there is a pulse in these veins, so there is hope yet!
Alice is unusual in any number of ways. Her created identity of "the Holy Ghost," a feared highwayman, as a means of avenging the powerless and simultaneously assisting the father she still adores; her secret self, lover of the young and supremely intelligent Jane; and her given existence as the dark-skinned Caribbean daughter of a well-to-do white Englishman are none of them ordinary. Alice is over thirty and unmarried. She has carefully kept it that way, despite her attraction to one particular, though completely unsuitable for marriage, man. She makes the awful discovery that a deeply unsuitable and unpleasant man wants to offer her marriage in the course of the story. Jane, no fool and surprisingly quick on the social uptake when her happiness is at stake, squashes both the intent and the desire to marry in the suitor with simple, elegant finality.
Prudence, the Major with a mission to change Time, meets these ladies in the course of the Holy Ghost's highwayman-ing. She's been through the mill, spending a decade making a serious attempt to save an unworthy-but-better-than-the-alternative man from his fate. It should tell you all you need to know that it took a decade...apparently character will out no matter what. As Prudence learns she's failed and her superiors in the Teleosophic Core Command are reassigning her, she concludes that teleosophy is not the answer to humanity's problems. A long-cherished and well-planned act of sabotage, assuring that time travel will stop and not be restarted, is her only hope. She needs someone at several points in time to execute a technological action. Jane, known to be a technological tinkerer but also a socially inept naïf, is her target for 1788, but she gets Alice instead. Alice is anything but a naïf...and anything but socially inept....
Oh dear. Things go pear-shaped in several spectacular ways, and the teleosophical implications are simultaneously dire and delicious. The second volume of the series, Alice Payne Rides , is out now. How you can resist dashing away to buy them both is beyond me.
Oh, you haven't. Addressing empty space never felt so good.
March 28, 2025
A cross between, well, I don't actually know as time-period fiction isn't my thing (yes, I know all fiction is time period. No, I don't care. It's easier to shorthand it in my categories than try and drill down to the difference between Victorian, Edwardian, and plain ol' dull). (Yes, I know those were fighting words. I welcome your gifs). I'd say strong flavors of Connie Willis and Jodi Taylor's Chronicles of St. Marys series.
It begins easily enough, a simple stagecoach robbery. But it quickly becomes so much more: the perpetrator is a young woman in disguise, Miss Alice Payne, who uses the assistance of an 'automaton' created by her companion and partner, Jane.
"Despite the fact that all the victims are men of suspect character when it comes to women, no one has made that connection, or suspected that the Holy Ghost is a woman, much less that it is Alice."
Prudence is slightly older, but so more, a time-traveling crusader from 2145 (more or less) who is fighting a time-war against the Misguides. Although Prudence is having second and third thoughts that are leading to becoming a renegade, noting:
The only way to end this war, to end all wars, is to stop anyone from changing history ever again."
There is, roughly, two active timelines, 1788 and 2070, although it dips in and out of other centuries. Using a limited third-person perspective, we follow both Alice and Prudence. And though I really wanted to like it, it was just too jumpy and didn't hit most of my particular triggers. I'm iffy on the whole time-travel concept in general (which mostly seems predisposed to be an opportunity for playing with set dressing or philosophical meanderings), although there are a few stories that use it well (hello, To Say Nothing of the Dog and One Day All of this Will Be Yours), as well as being generally iffy on steampunk/historical women's fiction (I wanted to appreciate the lesbian twist more than I did).
I think I picked it up on the strength of the Nebula nod, as well as recommendation of professional reviewer, which just goes to show you the value of knowing your book friends, doesn't it? I think it was described as a short book, or a novella or something, which has been suiting my attention span these days. I even made it to chapter 12 or 13, over half way, when I decided I didn't have time to care any more. It was clear Prudence was going to engage in some Extremely Dumb Decision-Making, which I never love, and I wasn't grooving on Alice's drunk-father-is-going-to-marry-me-off plotting, along with complicated relationship dynamics with Jane. Quite possibly some day I'll pick it up again if the fancy strikes me, but it'll mostly be the urge to just finish the book and see if Heartfield can pull some plotting out of the hat.
It begins easily enough, a simple stagecoach robbery. But it quickly becomes so much more: the perpetrator is a young woman in disguise, Miss Alice Payne, who uses the assistance of an 'automaton' created by her companion and partner, Jane.
"Despite the fact that all the victims are men of suspect character when it comes to women, no one has made that connection, or suspected that the Holy Ghost is a woman, much less that it is Alice."
Prudence is slightly older, but so more, a time-traveling crusader from 2145 (more or less) who is fighting a time-war against the Misguides. Although Prudence is having second and third thoughts that are leading to becoming a renegade, noting:
The only way to end this war, to end all wars, is to stop anyone from changing history ever again."
There is, roughly, two active timelines, 1788 and 2070, although it dips in and out of other centuries. Using a limited third-person perspective, we follow both Alice and Prudence. And though I really wanted to like it, it was just too jumpy and didn't hit most of my particular triggers. I'm iffy on the whole time-travel concept in general (which mostly seems predisposed to be an opportunity for playing with set dressing or philosophical meanderings), although there are a few stories that use it well (hello, To Say Nothing of the Dog and One Day All of this Will Be Yours), as well as being generally iffy on steampunk/historical women's fiction (I wanted to appreciate the lesbian twist more than I did).
I think I picked it up on the strength of the Nebula nod, as well as recommendation of professional reviewer, which just goes to show you the value of knowing your book friends, doesn't it? I think it was described as a short book, or a novella or something, which has been suiting my attention span these days. I even made it to chapter 12 or 13, over half way, when I decided I didn't have time to care any more. It was clear Prudence was going to engage in some Extremely Dumb Decision-Making, which I never love, and I wasn't grooving on Alice's drunk-father-is-going-to-marry-me-off plotting, along with complicated relationship dynamics with Jane. Quite possibly some day I'll pick it up again if the fancy strikes me, but it'll mostly be the urge to just finish the book and see if Heartfield can pull some plotting out of the hat.
November 9, 2018
Time travel.
Sure, it has been done a lot over the years, but then, so has detective tales, historical novels running over the same old grounds, or vampires. The key to a good tale is in the depth of detail, the strength of the characters, and the piledriver of the plot.
Fortunately, Heartfield rams it home in this novella. Does it feel like the beginning of a serial? Absolutely. Is the novella still fun to read on its own, with lots of time-jumping, future world-building, and conflict between hoards of other time-travelers attempting to correct other factions' wrongs or fix history, thereby making a botch of all history? Hell yeah.
It's a strong entry. It doesn't hurt that the lead female is gay and her lover is an inventor from 1788, or that there's an almost heist-like feel going on in the plot, or that the young Alice is half-black.
It's still good to be a time-traveler. :)
My only complaint is nothing much of a complaint. I want to have the full arc of the story in my hands, not just the attempted fix of history. :)
Sure, it has been done a lot over the years, but then, so has detective tales, historical novels running over the same old grounds, or vampires. The key to a good tale is in the depth of detail, the strength of the characters, and the piledriver of the plot.
Fortunately, Heartfield rams it home in this novella. Does it feel like the beginning of a serial? Absolutely. Is the novella still fun to read on its own, with lots of time-jumping, future world-building, and conflict between hoards of other time-travelers attempting to correct other factions' wrongs or fix history, thereby making a botch of all history? Hell yeah.
It's a strong entry. It doesn't hurt that the lead female is gay and her lover is an inventor from 1788, or that there's an almost heist-like feel going on in the plot, or that the young Alice is half-black.
It's still good to be a time-traveler. :)
My only complaint is nothing much of a complaint. I want to have the full arc of the story in my hands, not just the attempted fix of history. :)
September 21, 2019
Real Rating: 4.5* of five
I love writing about an excellent alt-hist novella by a woman, about women acting to improve/change the timeline, in women's history month.
Why does there need to be a women's history month? Same reason there needs to be a Black Lives Matter movement, an LGBT Pride month, any number of other celebrations of not-white not-straight not-male not-US-centric etc etc history/achievement/identity. Y'all've had the megaphone long enough. Hand it over.
Kate Heartfield earned my delighted approval when I read her novella The Course of True Love in the five-star Shakespeare-as-fantasy anthology Monstrous Little Voices. What a pleasure it is to encounter an author whose command of the demanding art of novella-writing is so complete. Her gift for concise but not reductive prose is flatteringly highlighted in this form. With more scope than a short story, not as much elbow room as a novel, the usual fate of the novella is to exist like old Lycra workout shorts: Way too tight at entry and exit points, uselessly baggy everywhere else.
Ha, says Canadian Author Kate Heartfield, hold my soy chai latte.
This novella, single-needle tailored to fit three women who share a spirit if not a soul, tells the origin story of an eighteenth-century temporal crusader named Alice, her anchor Jane, and their twenty-second century quarry Major Prudence Zuniga of the Teleosophic Core Command. We'll start the admiration engine here: Teleosophy. Time travel, that is. "Tele-" means to, or at, a distance; "-soph-" from "sophos" means wisdom, learning, knowledge. Seeking knowledge at a distance; going far away to impart wisdom. Combined with "Core" or central point and "Command" or the illusion of control, it makes the whole concept of this story's time travel crystal clear: Traveling in time to create or control events in accordance with a master plan. Implicit in that is both hubris and desperation.
I'm putting my own words to Author Heartfield's ideas, and can't be certain they represent her thoughts, but there are others just as lovely that she explains. I'd suggest to all who belong to Goodreads that they consult Heartfield's Kindle notes, where she offers sixteen "end notes" about various inspirations and sources for tidbits in the story. I was made particularly smug by "Fleance Hall"'s note; I'd thought to myself, "Oho I see the Shakespeare-based novella wasn't an accident!" and was proved correct.
That type and level of intellectual play is a joy. The idea that someone would use the well-worn time travel trope of coming from the future to save the past in this piquant and creative way is a surprise. The demise of Netflix's extraordinarily well-made and -thought-out series Travelers had rather dispirited me as to the trope's pop-culture future. This novella, and its sequel, exist; there is a pulse in these veins, so there is hope yet!
Alice is unusual in any number of ways. Her created identity of "the Holy Ghost," a feared highwayman, as a means of avenging the powerless and simultaneously assisting the father she still adores; her secret self, lover of the young and supremely intelligent Jane; and her given existence as the dark-skinned Caribbean daughter of a well-to-do white Englishman are none of them ordinary. Alice is over thirty and unmarried. She has carefully kept it that way, despite her attraction to one particular, though completely unsuitable for marriage, man. She makes the awful discovery that a deeply unsuitable and unpleasant man wants to offer her marriage in the course of the story. Jane, no fool and surprisingly quick on the social uptake when her happiness is at stake, squashes both the intent and the desire to marry in the suitor with simple, elegant finality.
Prudence, the Major with a mission to change Time, meets these ladies in the course of the Holy Ghost's highwayman-ing. She's been through the mill, spending a decade making a serious attempt to save an unworthy-but-better-than-the-alternative man from his fate. It should tell you all you need to know that it took a decade...apparently character will out no matter what. As Prudence learns she's failed and her superiors in the Teleosophic Core Command are reassigning her, she concludes that teleosophy is not the answer to humanity's problems. A long-cherished and well-planned act of sabotage, assuring that time travel will stop and not be restarted, is her only hope. She needs someone at several points in time to execute a technological action. Jane, known to be a technological tinkerer but also a socially inept naïf, is her target for 1788, but she gets Alice instead. Alice is anything but a naïf...and anything but socially inept....
Oh dear. Things go pear-shaped in several spectacular ways, and the teleosophical implications are simultaneously dire and delicious. The second volume of the series, Alice Payne Rides , is out now. How you can resist dashing away to buy them both is beyond me.
Oh, you haven't. Addressing empty space never felt so good.
I love writing about an excellent alt-hist novella by a woman, about women acting to improve/change the timeline, in women's history month.
Why does there need to be a women's history month? Same reason there needs to be a Black Lives Matter movement, an LGBT Pride month, any number of other celebrations of not-white not-straight not-male not-US-centric etc etc history/achievement/identity. Y'all've had the megaphone long enough. Hand it over.
Kate Heartfield earned my delighted approval when I read her novella The Course of True Love in the five-star Shakespeare-as-fantasy anthology Monstrous Little Voices. What a pleasure it is to encounter an author whose command of the demanding art of novella-writing is so complete. Her gift for concise but not reductive prose is flatteringly highlighted in this form. With more scope than a short story, not as much elbow room as a novel, the usual fate of the novella is to exist like old Lycra workout shorts: Way too tight at entry and exit points, uselessly baggy everywhere else.
Ha, says Canadian Author Kate Heartfield, hold my soy chai latte.
This novella, single-needle tailored to fit three women who share a spirit if not a soul, tells the origin story of an eighteenth-century temporal crusader named Alice, her anchor Jane, and their twenty-second century quarry Major Prudence Zuniga of the Teleosophic Core Command. We'll start the admiration engine here: Teleosophy. Time travel, that is. "Tele-" means to, or at, a distance; "-soph-" from "sophos" means wisdom, learning, knowledge. Seeking knowledge at a distance; going far away to impart wisdom. Combined with "Core" or central point and "Command" or the illusion of control, it makes the whole concept of this story's time travel crystal clear: Traveling in time to create or control events in accordance with a master plan. Implicit in that is both hubris and desperation.
I'm putting my own words to Author Heartfield's ideas, and can't be certain they represent her thoughts, but there are others just as lovely that she explains. I'd suggest to all who belong to Goodreads that they consult Heartfield's Kindle notes, where she offers sixteen "end notes" about various inspirations and sources for tidbits in the story. I was made particularly smug by "Fleance Hall"'s note; I'd thought to myself, "Oho I see the Shakespeare-based novella wasn't an accident!" and was proved correct.
That type and level of intellectual play is a joy. The idea that someone would use the well-worn time travel trope of coming from the future to save the past in this piquant and creative way is a surprise. The demise of Netflix's extraordinarily well-made and -thought-out series Travelers had rather dispirited me as to the trope's pop-culture future. This novella, and its sequel, exist; there is a pulse in these veins, so there is hope yet!
Alice is unusual in any number of ways. Her created identity of "the Holy Ghost," a feared highwayman, as a means of avenging the powerless and simultaneously assisting the father she still adores; her secret self, lover of the young and supremely intelligent Jane; and her given existence as the dark-skinned Caribbean daughter of a well-to-do white Englishman are none of them ordinary. Alice is over thirty and unmarried. She has carefully kept it that way, despite her attraction to one particular, though completely unsuitable for marriage, man. She makes the awful discovery that a deeply unsuitable and unpleasant man wants to offer her marriage in the course of the story. Jane, no fool and surprisingly quick on the social uptake when her happiness is at stake, squashes both the intent and the desire to marry in the suitor with simple, elegant finality.
Prudence, the Major with a mission to change Time, meets these ladies in the course of the Holy Ghost's highwayman-ing. She's been through the mill, spending a decade making a serious attempt to save an unworthy-but-better-than-the-alternative man from his fate. It should tell you all you need to know that it took a decade...apparently character will out no matter what. As Prudence learns she's failed and her superiors in the Teleosophic Core Command are reassigning her, she concludes that teleosophy is not the answer to humanity's problems. A long-cherished and well-planned act of sabotage, assuring that time travel will stop and not be restarted, is her only hope. She needs someone at several points in time to execute a technological action. Jane, known to be a technological tinkerer but also a socially inept naïf, is her target for 1788, but she gets Alice instead. Alice is anything but a naïf...and anything but socially inept....
Oh dear. Things go pear-shaped in several spectacular ways, and the teleosophical implications are simultaneously dire and delicious. The second volume of the series, Alice Payne Rides , is out now. How you can resist dashing away to buy them both is beyond me.
Oh, you haven't. Addressing empty space never felt so good.
March 6, 2019
What an interesting take on time travel!
I’ve read quite a few and this novella is one of the better ones. Heartfield juggles all the strands with prowess, doing some very compelling moves with the narrative. At first, I connected more with Alice and Jane, while Prudence was more of a cipher, but by the end, I was totally engrossed. The only bad thing is having to wait for the next instalment.
I’ve read quite a few and this novella is one of the better ones. Heartfield juggles all the strands with prowess, doing some very compelling moves with the narrative. At first, I connected more with Alice and Jane, while Prudence was more of a cipher, but by the end, I was totally engrossed. The only bad thing is having to wait for the next instalment.
February 21, 2019
Kate Heartfield is fast becoming an author I’m paying close attention to. I first encountered her work in “Armed in Her Fashion”, a medieval monster story peopled with a band of interesting women. “Alice Payne Arrives”, a time travel novella, has a credible future engaged in a time war, with two great characters, Alice Payne in 1788, and Major Prudence Zuniga, fighting in the time war. The dialogue and action are tight, with both women being well-defined. I will admit, I particularly loved Alice’s choice to masquerade as a highwayman, which she carried off with style.
The other woman in 1788, Jane Hodgson, who is Alice Payne’s companion, begins as a support to Alice but becomes crucial to events by the novella’s cliffhanger ending. I look forward to finding out what happens next with these three women.
The other woman in 1788, Jane Hodgson, who is Alice Payne’s companion, begins as a support to Alice but becomes crucial to events by the novella’s cliffhanger ending. I look forward to finding out what happens next with these three women.
February 3, 2019
3.5 stars
This is an interesting and tightly written time travel story that ended just as I was really getting into it! I'm up for the next installment at least, if not more.
This is an interesting and tightly written time travel story that ended just as I was really getting into it! I'm up for the next installment at least, if not more.
April 12, 2021
A truly riveting time-travelling read! If you're into timeline travel, and conspiracy around it - plus strong powerful women of colour - I think you'll be impressed!
There are so many layers to the story, from different timelines to various characters and trying to understand what is going on - yet it was never too overwhelming or complicated for me to understand.
I thoroughly enjoyed learning about our MC Alice Payne living in 1788. She was born to a black Caribbean mother she never knew and a white British affluent father. Her father comes home after war and their wealth is basically gone, as is a lot of her fathers sanity. Alice is a determined and skilled lady of around 32, who flirts a lot - and has taken up disguising herself as a highwayman to steal gold from brutish men of the township who have been upto no good.
She has an established love that started about a year ago - in a lady companion named Jane, who is incredibly smart with gears, gadgets and automatons! While I wouldn't classify this as a romance - the love and devotion between Alice and Jane was clear, as was the frustration at each character in the other. Alice for being so brash and pig-headed, Jane for being so fastidious and also stubborn in her own right. There were many beautiful lines of prose where we get a keen insight into Alice's clear devotion and love toward Jane, and how no other lover had compared and despite her flirty ways, she truly see's no other. But plain Jane with her scientific smarts has her own vulnerabilities about the relationship - and again despite this not being the main theme, it still shown through in beautiful ways!
The main story is definitely about time travel, and a series of various factions in the future(s) all vying to 'correct' history and change outcomes, via small and big nudges throughout the past. Prudence in 2070 and beyond is essentially an agent of time, also a woman of colour and a Major. She is determined to stop the wars and battles for time travel, once and for all. But when Alice from 1788 England suddenly pops into 2070 Toronto, what could these two possibly have in common?
A really interesting story that kept me riveted and reading, but also leaves off on a bit of a cliffhanger, meaning I must get to the next book!
Highly Recommended!
There are so many layers to the story, from different timelines to various characters and trying to understand what is going on - yet it was never too overwhelming or complicated for me to understand.
I thoroughly enjoyed learning about our MC Alice Payne living in 1788. She was born to a black Caribbean mother she never knew and a white British affluent father. Her father comes home after war and their wealth is basically gone, as is a lot of her fathers sanity. Alice is a determined and skilled lady of around 32, who flirts a lot - and has taken up disguising herself as a highwayman to steal gold from brutish men of the township who have been upto no good.
She has an established love that started about a year ago - in a lady companion named Jane, who is incredibly smart with gears, gadgets and automatons! While I wouldn't classify this as a romance - the love and devotion between Alice and Jane was clear, as was the frustration at each character in the other. Alice for being so brash and pig-headed, Jane for being so fastidious and also stubborn in her own right. There were many beautiful lines of prose where we get a keen insight into Alice's clear devotion and love toward Jane, and how no other lover had compared and despite her flirty ways, she truly see's no other. But plain Jane with her scientific smarts has her own vulnerabilities about the relationship - and again despite this not being the main theme, it still shown through in beautiful ways!
The main story is definitely about time travel, and a series of various factions in the future(s) all vying to 'correct' history and change outcomes, via small and big nudges throughout the past. Prudence in 2070 and beyond is essentially an agent of time, also a woman of colour and a Major. She is determined to stop the wars and battles for time travel, once and for all. But when Alice from 1788 England suddenly pops into 2070 Toronto, what could these two possibly have in common?
A really interesting story that kept me riveted and reading, but also leaves off on a bit of a cliffhanger, meaning I must get to the next book!
Highly Recommended!
January 16, 2019
In the midst of a time war, a time traveler from the 22nd century encounters two brilliant women from the 18th.
Major Prudence Zuniga is a warrior for one side of the time war, where two groups of travelers with different philosophies of timeline alteration battle to improve or preserve history. Disillusioned, she has a plan to end the war completely, but she doesn't expect the involvement of Alice Payne, an extremely unconventional woman of 1788, and her lover, the brilliant inventor Jane Hodgson.
I'm fast learning to appreciate the writing of Kate Heartfield. Both this and her novel Armed In Her Fashion have an interesting appreciation of history and an absolutely bonkers approach to world-building that results in complex, incredibly detailed settings that are nothing like anything I've read before.
The concept of a time war with two groups competing to alter history, and history fighting back by its very nature is brilliant.
Looking forward to the next one.
Major Prudence Zuniga is a warrior for one side of the time war, where two groups of travelers with different philosophies of timeline alteration battle to improve or preserve history. Disillusioned, she has a plan to end the war completely, but she doesn't expect the involvement of Alice Payne, an extremely unconventional woman of 1788, and her lover, the brilliant inventor Jane Hodgson.
I'm fast learning to appreciate the writing of Kate Heartfield. Both this and her novel Armed In Her Fashion have an interesting appreciation of history and an absolutely bonkers approach to world-building that results in complex, incredibly detailed settings that are nothing like anything I've read before.
The concept of a time war with two groups competing to alter history, and history fighting back by its very nature is brilliant.
History doesn’t self-correct in response to an attack; it metastasizes.Adding in really well drawn characters with interesting relationships fleshes out the story as well, enough so that it's surprising that it all fits into a novella-length work.
Looking forward to the next one.
April 4, 2021
#2) Alice Payne Rides ★★★★☆
➸ Trigger warnings for .
▷ Representation: Alice (mc) Jamacian-English & sapphic; Prudence (mc) Black; Jane (li) lesbian.
Blog • Trigger Warning Database • Twitter • Instagram
October 28, 2019
This is the beginning of a great thing! Time travelling biracial gay highwayman (woman). Are you kidding me! It's really 4 stars but I'm wanna wait till I finish the sequel before I rated it as such. In the words of Miranda's fictionsl mum, SUCH FUN!
December 30, 2018
So much fun! A much needed light-hearted (yet with an interesting premise) novella. Is it ever alright to try to improve history? Can war be avoided?
November 6, 2018
"Now it is a regular affair, this robbery on the road. There are plenty of villains making their way through Hampshire, ready to be relieved of a purse, a blow struck in secret for womankind. Despite the fact that all the victims are men of suspect character when it comes to women, no one has made that connection, or suspected that the Holy Ghost is a woman, much less that it is Alice. All her skin is covered, lest the colour of it call to any local's mind Colonel Payne's poor daughter."
I am hit or miss with time travel novels, because the majority of them are far too similar.. they don't seem to bring anything new to the table. Oftentimes I feel like they become too complex and the story runs away from the author. Many of them just aren't that great, to be honest. This excludes 11/22/63 and Back to the Future of course.. I'm not a goddamn monster!
Alice Payne Arrives certainly doesn't fall into the same old tired time travel tropes. It's a steampunk tale featuring women of color and it's queer as fuck! HELL YEAH!!
We meet Alice, a notorious highwaywoman known as the Holy Ghost, in 1788. Her accomplice and lover is Jane, an inventor. Jane has invented an automaton that assists them with the robberies. Alice and Jane aren't into this scandalous profession just for the excitement of it all though, but rather, to help Alice's sick father. Meanwhile, Major Prudence Zuniga is going through some shit of her own. It's 1889 and she is trying to complete an important mission to save history, but has been unsuccessful each time. The story jumps through many centuries, as well as throughout various countries. Eventually, Alice and Prudence cross timelines.
Fun fact. I did a shit ton of research back in the day for a paper on female criminals, including highway robbers. Unfortunately, I found it quite difficult to track down solid information about highwaywomen. However, there is the notorious legend of The Wicked Lady that still remains. Katherine Ferrers, originally an heiress, was alleged to have turned to highway robbery to supplement her income after her husband passed away. I find these stories incredibly fascinating, because they are in the forefront. Rather than being the typical decoys for their companions on the road. Stepping outside of the domestic stereotype norms, especially back then. So needless to say, I was pretty fucking excited to read this when it arrived!
I did struggle early on with bouncing back and forth between the multiple timelines and different POV's. I felt like I would just start to grasp what was happening in one century, then it would jump to another one. This is a short novella, so it wasn't always the easiest to follow. There is a timeline at the back of the book which I appreciate while writing this review, although I wish it was incorporated at the beginning without spoiling too much. Somehow.
Highway robberies, fierce females and QUEER TIME-JUMPING ADVENTURES!! This was well-written and had some wonderfully bonkers moments. Even though I had a few issues with this, I'm looking forward to Alice Payne Rides! I'm hoping the sequel will expand upon the story and give the badass Prudence more time to develop.
Alice Payne Arrives is definitely a book that will tick all the boxes for many people!
(Thank you to Tor.com Publishing for continuously sending me random surprise book mail!)
I am hit or miss with time travel novels, because the majority of them are far too similar.. they don't seem to bring anything new to the table. Oftentimes I feel like they become too complex and the story runs away from the author. Many of them just aren't that great, to be honest. This excludes 11/22/63 and Back to the Future of course.. I'm not a goddamn monster!
Alice Payne Arrives certainly doesn't fall into the same old tired time travel tropes. It's a steampunk tale featuring women of color and it's queer as fuck! HELL YEAH!!
We meet Alice, a notorious highwaywoman known as the Holy Ghost, in 1788. Her accomplice and lover is Jane, an inventor. Jane has invented an automaton that assists them with the robberies. Alice and Jane aren't into this scandalous profession just for the excitement of it all though, but rather, to help Alice's sick father. Meanwhile, Major Prudence Zuniga is going through some shit of her own. It's 1889 and she is trying to complete an important mission to save history, but has been unsuccessful each time. The story jumps through many centuries, as well as throughout various countries. Eventually, Alice and Prudence cross timelines.
Fun fact. I did a shit ton of research back in the day for a paper on female criminals, including highway robbers. Unfortunately, I found it quite difficult to track down solid information about highwaywomen. However, there is the notorious legend of The Wicked Lady that still remains. Katherine Ferrers, originally an heiress, was alleged to have turned to highway robbery to supplement her income after her husband passed away. I find these stories incredibly fascinating, because they are in the forefront. Rather than being the typical decoys for their companions on the road. Stepping outside of the domestic stereotype norms, especially back then. So needless to say, I was pretty fucking excited to read this when it arrived!
I did struggle early on with bouncing back and forth between the multiple timelines and different POV's. I felt like I would just start to grasp what was happening in one century, then it would jump to another one. This is a short novella, so it wasn't always the easiest to follow. There is a timeline at the back of the book which I appreciate while writing this review, although I wish it was incorporated at the beginning without spoiling too much. Somehow.
Highway robberies, fierce females and QUEER TIME-JUMPING ADVENTURES!! This was well-written and had some wonderfully bonkers moments. Even though I had a few issues with this, I'm looking forward to Alice Payne Rides! I'm hoping the sequel will expand upon the story and give the badass Prudence more time to develop.
Alice Payne Arrives is definitely a book that will tick all the boxes for many people!
(Thank you to Tor.com Publishing for continuously sending me random surprise book mail!)
April 21, 2019
3.5
This initially started off rather 'messily' for me - too much to take in and too much that was confusing, but by three-quarters of the way through, I felt that it was starting to come together. I found the ending in particular very clever and well thought-through.
I found myself feeling rather irritated by something that seems to be increasingly present in a lot of SF/F and that I'm starting to think of as a kind of anachronistic preachiness (although I admit it does seem odd to use the word 'anachronistic' in relation to a time travel story!), but this was balanced to a large extent by the ending and by the humour that infused the story. I ended up enjoying it quite a bit and will probably read more books in the series when they appear.
This initially started off rather 'messily' for me - too much to take in and too much that was confusing, but by three-quarters of the way through, I felt that it was starting to come together. I found the ending in particular very clever and well thought-through.
I found myself feeling rather irritated by something that seems to be increasingly present in a lot of SF/F and that I'm starting to think of as a kind of anachronistic preachiness (although I admit it does seem odd to use the word 'anachronistic' in relation to a time travel story!), but this was balanced to a large extent by the ending and by the humour that infused the story. I ended up enjoying it quite a bit and will probably read more books in the series when they appear.
March 21, 2023
3.5 stars
November 30, 2018
Heartfield establishes a fascinating, original take on time travel in Alice Payne Arrives. While a bit mind-bendy at times (time travel does that), the intriguing characters and premise kept me glued to the screen as I read this novella. I couldn't help but love Alice Payne, the woman highway robber who craves independence, though the time-wayfaring Major Zuniga was a curiosity to me as well. Ripples across time had inflicted some odd changes within her life. The end is a bit of a cliffhanger, so I look forward to reading the sequel soon!
April 24, 2019
This novella is somewhere between 3 and 4 stars for me, but unlike most of my recent 3 star reads I didn't finish it feeling vaguely cranky, so I am rounding up. Although the plot and timelines were sometimes a little challenging to follow, I really liked the characters and overall enjoyed this approach to time travel. The story is definitely trying to do a lot in a short space, but for me it mostly succeeded with most of the elements, and I had a good time so that counts as a win. I will certainly be picking up book 2 for some more of Alice, Jane, and Prudence.
April 15, 2022
Kiss me, and then take my hand, because I don’t know what happens next.
Review also on Reads Rainbow
Rep: Black lesbian mc, possibly autistic lesbian li
Alice Payne Arrives was always going to be high on my list of anticipated books, just by virtue of being about a lesbian highwaywoman, and it definitely did not disappoint. It's an action-packed, quick read, that will leave you wanting more (now I know how readers in Dickens' time felt when books were serialised...).
Alice Payne is the mixed-race daughter of an English gentleman, who keeps her father out of debt by stealing from the rich (and misogynistic) lords who travel along the road near her home, with the aid of her scientist girlfriend's automaton creation. But after one robbing, the entire carriage disappears inexplicably, and Alice is inadvertently introduced to the world of time travel and the struggle between the Farmers and the Misguided.
While I was initially thrown by the present tense in this book - it's not my favourite thing - but for once it didn't keep me from getting into the story. That's probably because the story was fast-paced enough that the present tense actually worked in its favour for once. And it's only a short book, more like a novella. It will also leave you wanting more because just as it starts to get more intense, the end arrives.
The characters were also really fun. My favourites were definitely Alice and Jane (I didn't like Prudence at the start, but she definitely grew on me), but I also really liked Captain Auden, although I feel like he won't be that much of a main character in later books. Even though the book was so short, the characters were still properly developed, too, and I really can't wait to read more about them.
So, yeah. Read the book.
June 21, 2019
Very good book about a war being fought via time travel as two rival factions seek to wipe each other out by changing history. I would've liked a tidier ending, but at least there's another book...
March 26, 2023
This is an interesting take on time travel with some interesting women at the core of the story, but it ultimately left me a little cold.
November 13, 2019
Lesbian highwayman from 1788 with an automaton caught up in a time war by an agent from 2040/2140 Toronto.
Five stars.
Five stars.
May 5, 2019
Alice Payne Arrives combines time travel shenanigans with some very adventurous ladies and a war that's fought across the pages of history. In 1788, Alice Payne is a gentlewoman (not nobility but not dirt poor either) who moonlights as a highwayman, the Holy Ghost, robbing the deserving men who cross her path with the help of an automaton named Laverna. Meanwhile, in 1888, Major Prudence Zuniga is attempting to change history to suit her side of a war which has been waged for decades and throughout time. When Prudence develops a new plan to win the war for good, she'll have to do her best to recruit Alice Payne or one of her companions and hope that everything turns out alright. It'll be up to these women to finish this time war one way or another.
That I enjoyed this book at all is, quite frankly, a miracle. I'm not much of a fan of the timey wimey sort of stories and only picked this one up because it was nominated for a Nebula this year. I really enjoyed the main characters, both Alice and Prudence as well as Alice's companion Jane. All three were strong-willed and intelligent and interesting in their own ways without all fitting exactly the same mold. And all struggled in some way over restrictions placed on them because of their station. However, there is a LOT of time jumping in this one and a lot of games played with the effects of messing around in the pages of history and that's exactly the aspect of time travel that both confuses and annoys me. Which is why it gets three stars from me rather than four or five.
If you're a fan of time travel, history and kickass ladies, Alice Payne Arrives is a great novella. It got too embedded in the threads and consequences of time travel for my tastes but it still managed to be entertaining and that's saying quite a lot for me.
That I enjoyed this book at all is, quite frankly, a miracle. I'm not much of a fan of the timey wimey sort of stories and only picked this one up because it was nominated for a Nebula this year. I really enjoyed the main characters, both Alice and Prudence as well as Alice's companion Jane. All three were strong-willed and intelligent and interesting in their own ways without all fitting exactly the same mold. And all struggled in some way over restrictions placed on them because of their station. However, there is a LOT of time jumping in this one and a lot of games played with the effects of messing around in the pages of history and that's exactly the aspect of time travel that both confuses and annoys me. Which is why it gets three stars from me rather than four or five.
If you're a fan of time travel, history and kickass ladies, Alice Payne Arrives is a great novella. It got too embedded in the threads and consequences of time travel for my tastes but it still managed to be entertaining and that's saying quite a lot for me.
September 9, 2019
This novella was a fine way to pass a couple of hours, but I kept waiting for it to do more than it did.
I love time travel stories, and love history, so I'm very much the target audience for this book. I enjoyed reading about Alice and her lover Jane. Alice is a highwaywoman when necessary in order to get the money to pay for the home of her father and her, since her father can't seem to take care of business. Jane is a brilliant inventor who has built an automaton to be Alice's assistant in robberies.
Meanwhile, a time travel operative named Prudence Zuniga has decided to change the rules of time travel for reasons of her own. Her storyline felt a bit like the Canadian/Netflix series "Travelers".
Of course, Alice and Prudence end up meeting and joining forces (sort of) during the course of the book.
I was expecting one more twist than this book had. The time travel part didn't feel especially original or engrossing, and I didn't really like Prudence or her goals. I was interested in the idea of an automaton, but it barely featured in the story at all, and I honestly found Jane more complex and interesting than Alice, and Jane wasn't given all that much to do (as she pointed out during the course of the book).
The book felt like it might make an episode of a longer book if it was pared down a bit. It didn't feel like much on its own story-wise- no real surprises.
I love time travel stories, and love history, so I'm very much the target audience for this book. I enjoyed reading about Alice and her lover Jane. Alice is a highwaywoman when necessary in order to get the money to pay for the home of her father and her, since her father can't seem to take care of business. Jane is a brilliant inventor who has built an automaton to be Alice's assistant in robberies.
Meanwhile, a time travel operative named Prudence Zuniga has decided to change the rules of time travel for reasons of her own. Her storyline felt a bit like the Canadian/Netflix series "Travelers".
Of course, Alice and Prudence end up meeting and joining forces (sort of) during the course of the book.
I was expecting one more twist than this book had. The time travel part didn't feel especially original or engrossing, and I didn't really like Prudence or her goals. I was interested in the idea of an automaton, but it barely featured in the story at all, and I honestly found Jane more complex and interesting than Alice, and Jane wasn't given all that much to do (as she pointed out during the course of the book).
The book felt like it might make an episode of a longer book if it was pared down a bit. It didn't feel like much on its own story-wise- no real surprises.
January 14, 2019
There was too much crammed into too small a space (novella vs book).
It had great promise, but the execution left a lot to be desired. And the ending was incredibly unsatisfying. Yeah, I know, there's another one (novella? book?) coming out. I may give it a go, just to see if it gets any better, but I'm not particularly excited about it.
The primary problem was that I did not feel any connection to any of the characters.
It had great promise, but the execution left a lot to be desired. And the ending was incredibly unsatisfying. Yeah, I know, there's another one (novella? book?) coming out. I may give it a go, just to see if it gets any better, but I'm not particularly excited about it.
The primary problem was that I did not feel any connection to any of the characters.
January 28, 2019
Pros:
Time travelling bisexual person of color highway robber and her scientist girlfriend
It's fun. I don't know if there's a time travel equivalent term for space opera (vs. science fiction), but this would definitely fall under the space opera side of things
Dropped some interesting hints of things that might happen in future books
It's a first book of a series, and I want to read another to see where this goes
Cons:
It's short. 169 pages and after every chapter there's a blank page, and there are a lot of chapters
I don't think the time travel is as logical or consistent as some other recent time travel books (Flight of the Silvers, Paper Girls), but could be wrong as things get explained more
Some heavy conversations are settled pretty abruptly
Some stuff doesn't get explained until halfway through the book, and it's a short book, but you gotta roll with it until then
Summary:
It's fun, the characters are fresh and interesting, and I want to read more but (like a lot of time travel stories) it can be confusing. I went back and forth between 3 and 4 stars.
Time travelling bisexual person of color highway robber and her scientist girlfriend
It's fun. I don't know if there's a time travel equivalent term for space opera (vs. science fiction), but this would definitely fall under the space opera side of things
Dropped some interesting hints of things that might happen in future books
It's a first book of a series, and I want to read another to see where this goes
Cons:
It's short. 169 pages and after every chapter there's a blank page, and there are a lot of chapters
I don't think the time travel is as logical or consistent as some other recent time travel books (Flight of the Silvers, Paper Girls), but could be wrong as things get explained more
Some heavy conversations are settled pretty abruptly
Some stuff doesn't get explained until halfway through the book, and it's a short book, but you gotta roll with it until then
Summary:
It's fun, the characters are fresh and interesting, and I want to read more but (like a lot of time travel stories) it can be confusing. I went back and forth between 3 and 4 stars.
May 8, 2021
*Possible minor spoilers*
So i got this book recommended to me. Seeing that i like time travel, and it was very short (it's a novella) i thought i'd give it a shot.
And the result? ...eh?
That's basically my reaction. eh.
The biggest problem with this book is its length Having just read a novella, where the book, albeit with a very quick resolution, actually had one. It had a full story and wrapped itself up. It has sequels yes, but the story was self contained and, in all honesty, could have stopped there. THIS book however, does not do that. This book basically gives you the first part of a book. And then they have the audacity to charge $16 for it. (i'm very glad i got a library copy)
It's like charging you more than full price for half a story. If you can't tell your story in a novella, don't make it a novella, go the extra mile and write the whole novel in an actual novel length format. the story was only 170 pages. the author could have easily written both and squished them together for a full 340 page novel and i'm pretty sure everyone would have been fine with that.
The story itself was fine, even though there really wasn't really exciting time travel shenanigans. There's a pair of lovers in the late 1700's in England (the titular character Alice is both African-British and a lesbian) and she interacts with another African american lady from the future whose name is prudence. Prudence wants to erase time travel because she's terrible at her job at altering time and thinks it would be better if they just erase time travel. But the story ends before they actually do anything. It's a setup for the second book.
The characters are...fine? I didn't really care about Alice's plight or her lover Jane who somehow managed to invent robots in 1788 (And no, as far as i know, Jane's not a time traveler, she just knows how to make robots for some reason) and Prudence is extremely selfish.
The biggest problem in this story is that there's no character that i'm really rooting for. If every single character exploded and the book ended i'd be like "ah. oh well." and move on from there.
MAYBE part 2 of the book will be better? (yes i'm calling it part 2 because i refuse to acknowledge that this was a full book)
As it is, i'm intrigued enough to keep reading it and see where it goes, mainly because of JUST how short it is. Not because i have any real sort of investment in the story or characters.
2.5/5 rounded up to a 3.
So i got this book recommended to me. Seeing that i like time travel, and it was very short (it's a novella) i thought i'd give it a shot.
And the result? ...eh?
That's basically my reaction. eh.
The biggest problem with this book is its length Having just read a novella, where the book, albeit with a very quick resolution, actually had one. It had a full story and wrapped itself up. It has sequels yes, but the story was self contained and, in all honesty, could have stopped there. THIS book however, does not do that. This book basically gives you the first part of a book. And then they have the audacity to charge $16 for it. (i'm very glad i got a library copy)
It's like charging you more than full price for half a story. If you can't tell your story in a novella, don't make it a novella, go the extra mile and write the whole novel in an actual novel length format. the story was only 170 pages. the author could have easily written both and squished them together for a full 340 page novel and i'm pretty sure everyone would have been fine with that.
The story itself was fine, even though there really wasn't really exciting time travel shenanigans. There's a pair of lovers in the late 1700's in England (the titular character Alice is both African-British and a lesbian) and she interacts with another African american lady from the future whose name is prudence. Prudence wants to erase time travel because she's terrible at her job at altering time and thinks it would be better if they just erase time travel. But the story ends before they actually do anything. It's a setup for the second book.
The characters are...fine? I didn't really care about Alice's plight or her lover Jane who somehow managed to invent robots in 1788 (And no, as far as i know, Jane's not a time traveler, she just knows how to make robots for some reason) and Prudence is extremely selfish.
The biggest problem in this story is that there's no character that i'm really rooting for. If every single character exploded and the book ended i'd be like "ah. oh well." and move on from there.
MAYBE part 2 of the book will be better? (yes i'm calling it part 2 because i refuse to acknowledge that this was a full book)
As it is, i'm intrigued enough to keep reading it and see where it goes, mainly because of JUST how short it is. Not because i have any real sort of investment in the story or characters.
2.5/5 rounded up to a 3.
November 8, 2018
3.25 Stars
Alice Payne Arrives is the first book in a new science fiction adventure series of novellas. The titular character Alice is a colorful character. She is a biracial young woman from a good family who has a side gig of being a highwayman (called the Holy Ghost) robbing men who are abusive of women. She also has (rather on the down-low) an engineer girlfriend named Jane who helps her cover her tracks. She uses an automaton, the creation of her girlfriend, named Laverna to assist her in her robberies. She lives in 1788.
In 1888 Prudence Zuniga, a time traveler from the future, tries again and again to change the events of the Mayerling Incident. (The murder suicide of Crown Prince Rudolf of Austria and his mistress, Baroness Mary Vetsera. For those who aren't history buffs, Rudolph's suicide changed the course of history by interrupting the Hapsburg dynastic line in in the Austro-Hungarian Empire and in a way influenced the events that led to the First World War, aka The Great War in Europe.)
Crossing back and forth through time, from the 1700's to the 2100's, the stories of Alice and Prudence eventually connect with one another and they have a chance to change the draft of history.
I have honestly loved most all of the Tor.com novellas that have been released in recent years. This one however, felt uneven. I felt Prudence's chapters to be more gripping but still felt that I wasn't engaged emotionally with the outcomes. And the cutting back and forth through time, though a fabulous device, feels rushed here because of the constraints of the novella length. This is a story I honestly think would do better in novel length form, with more time to build out the characters and the world/times in which they live. I'll still pick up book 2, Alice Payne Rides but I hope Tor.com considers letting the author write longer works for these characters.
I received a Uncorrected Proof of this novella from Tor.com.
Alice Payne Arrives is the first book in a new science fiction adventure series of novellas. The titular character Alice is a colorful character. She is a biracial young woman from a good family who has a side gig of being a highwayman (called the Holy Ghost) robbing men who are abusive of women. She also has (rather on the down-low) an engineer girlfriend named Jane who helps her cover her tracks. She uses an automaton, the creation of her girlfriend, named Laverna to assist her in her robberies. She lives in 1788.
In 1888 Prudence Zuniga, a time traveler from the future, tries again and again to change the events of the Mayerling Incident. (The murder suicide of Crown Prince Rudolf of Austria and his mistress, Baroness Mary Vetsera. For those who aren't history buffs, Rudolph's suicide changed the course of history by interrupting the Hapsburg dynastic line in in the Austro-Hungarian Empire and in a way influenced the events that led to the First World War, aka The Great War in Europe.)
Crossing back and forth through time, from the 1700's to the 2100's, the stories of Alice and Prudence eventually connect with one another and they have a chance to change the draft of history.
I have honestly loved most all of the Tor.com novellas that have been released in recent years. This one however, felt uneven. I felt Prudence's chapters to be more gripping but still felt that I wasn't engaged emotionally with the outcomes. And the cutting back and forth through time, though a fabulous device, feels rushed here because of the constraints of the novella length. This is a story I honestly think would do better in novel length form, with more time to build out the characters and the world/times in which they live. I'll still pick up book 2, Alice Payne Rides but I hope Tor.com considers letting the author write longer works for these characters.
I received a Uncorrected Proof of this novella from Tor.com.
August 3, 2018
I am loving the influx of novellas that Tor is putting out and I was super excited for this one since it seemed like it was going to tick all my boxes. Time travel? Lesbians? Women of color as protagonists? Women kicking ass? STEAMPUNK!? And yet, this first book fell a little flat for me. Time travel is hard to read and consume as media at the best of times, but the overlapping time periods and narratives and multiple points of view left me feeling Dazed and Confused. Add to that a late-in-the-game explanation of what the overarching plot (of what I assume is going to be the entire series), and I am left feeling a little 'meh' about the first book.
That all being said, I love Alice Payne as a character. She was easily my favorite (sorry, Prudence) and I could read a thousand pages just about Alice and Jane and living in 1788 and kicking ass and being secret lovers. That's the story I would want to read about (again, sorry Prudence).
So, if you can hang in there for a little confusion and bewilderment for the sake of steampunk, time-traveling lesbians...this is the book for you.
That all being said, I love Alice Payne as a character. She was easily my favorite (sorry, Prudence) and I could read a thousand pages just about Alice and Jane and living in 1788 and kicking ass and being secret lovers. That's the story I would want to read about (again, sorry Prudence).
So, if you can hang in there for a little confusion and bewilderment for the sake of steampunk, time-traveling lesbians...this is the book for you.
Displaying 1 - 30 of 218 reviews