Customer Reviews

Time Machines Repaired While-U-Wait

5 star:		(3)
4 star:		(4)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

I have a bit of a love-hate relationship with science fiction. On one hand, I love reading about incredible future technologies and 'what-if' future scenarios... but on the other hand, I can't stand the horribly overused cliches that 90% of the books in the genre use, like galactic empires, everybody using military titles all the time, spaceship jargon, pioneer colonies on alien worlds and the token telepath, etc etc. 'Time Machines Repaired While-U-Wait' was fortunately the kind of science fiction story that I love!

One thing that immediately endeared me to this story was the lack of made-up technical jargon. The characters in this story (despite being largely technicians and engineers) speak like real people, and I could actually understand what they were talking about. For example, wouldn't you much rather read something like: "Looks like we can power down the Cave," than: "Roger, Commander. Adjust velocity-directive 70452 to warp setting 9 above Red Delta level Alpha 6 and ensure that all systems are inoperative"? I know engineers occasionally get reputations for being odd, but I can't bring myself to believe they'd ever actually speak in such cold, meaningless terms, even in the distant future. Pet peeve.

It wasn't just the way the characters spoke, either. They really came across as being real people. Characters were placed in some pretty horrid situations, and I thought their subsequent reactions were utterly believable and understandable. Again compared to the 'bad' kind of science fiction, I felt that these characters were so much more human and easy to relate to, and that's extremely important for me in a book.

The light-hearted tone was also really nice to read. Again, I feel that many sci-fi books take themselves way too seriously. People just don't act that unemotionally in real life. I thought this story had exactly the right balance between the odd little foibles of life and the gravity of the situations the characters were forced into to make it very believable. For the first chapter, I thought it was going to be a humourous novel - but as I read on, I realised it was actually more of an insight into how people would really be likely to act if this technology ever did become real. Because people *are* humourous in real life, and *do* make mistakes, and *do* start taking new things for granted quite quickly.

The other thing I loved about this story was the technology of the world. Time machines were just the beginning - there were artificial universes and ultra-advanced medicine as well. Just the idea of time travel being available to everyone, including the average layperson, was fantastic to see! (I can only take so many stories of amazing technology being restricted to the hands of secret organisations and governments at war, really.) Little comments, such as one made by a character whose grandson regularly visited her from the future, made the technology seem more vivid, more realistic.

In short, this book ignores all the cliches that have built up around the science-fiction genre over the years, and this is an excellent, excellent thing. It's a sci-fi adventure that focuses on the adventure part and doesn't worry too much about the details of how the technology works. And that's the way it should be, I think.

I'd give this book 4.5 stars if Amazon allowed it, but have to settle for four since it doesn't. Definitely worth a read!

Interesting characters, with warts and all! Great story, plot so thick you could stand a spoon up in it! Impossible situations, both heart warming and heart wrenching!
I love the humour that pervaded this story even when Spider(s) were low. I like the realistic understanding of despair and hope without it being depressing. I like that the scifi was relaxed in technicality yet exciting in utility. This was a modern tale of crime, overtime and end of time and I loved it!

Humerous Sci-Fi story without getting whacky. Not "Douglas Adams" humor - but a low key approach that will appeal to fans of writers like Joseph Heller. The book shows that while you can break the laws of time and space, you can't escape the laws of unintended consequences.

A caper involving a murder and a time machine fixit guy! I think my expectations were different, though. I wish I could give this 3.5 stars. Rounding down because I didn't really like Spider.

It was great at first: Spider was all gung-ho about solving the murder, and then there was Iris, the cop who had a thing for him. But then it went downhill from there. Spider seemed to lose all likeability as things got worse, and my head hurt from the convoluted plot (time paradoxes are a bitch).

Still, I met the author in person at Aussiecon 4 and he's a cool dude. I just wish I had better things to say about the book. I might try Orbital Burn some day. If I see it around.

KA Bedford is, once again, a finalist for Australia's Aurealis Award. This time around his book, Time Machines Repaired While-U-Wait, is up for the Best Australian Science Fiction Novel of 2008. What this means, my friends, is that he writes good books! I know this too, as I have read and enjoyed all four of them.

One of the things I like best about reading KA Bedford's novels is his intelligent exploration of the bigger science fiction questions. In this book we explore what it would be like if time machines were available to the public at large. I'll be honest, I am not a huge fan of time travel stories overall. They make my head hurt. But I'm glad I ignored that predisposition and read Time Machines Repaired While-U-Wait anyway, because I really enjoyed thinking about the nuances of such a culture with time travel at their disposal. Add a bit of mystery and conspiracy theory, and I was completely hooked!

KA Bedford's characters and their relationships are always intriguing, engaging, and still very much rooted in real life. Spider is a great protagonist, a bit down and out, but definitely likable, and stuck dealing with the complicated people in his life, including several future versions of himself. I love gritty and dark elements in my science fiction and this story delivers that perfectly with murderers, narcissists, and delusional zealots, to name just a few.

I definitely recommend this book. Happy reading!

In this novel Time Travel is commonplace and completely mundane. The author doesn't spend a lot of time geeking out on how the mechanics work, but it seems as though even though time machines are a regular consumer item, the multiverse structures itself in such a way as not to cause continuum destroying paradoxes. The protagonist is an overworked, underpaid consumer time travel machine mechanic, with time machine repair is something you learn at the local community college / TAFE and a profession run out of a garage rather than a high-tech lab. What I really liked about this book is that the plot moves quickly and in unpredictable (though not unbelievable) directions. Little about the book is predictable, which was refreshing because I find the plot setup of many novels leads to a somewhat predictable resolution. Even 95% of the way through Time Machines Repaired While You Wait I wasn't sure how plot threads would get get tied up. By the end of the book, most plot threads are tied off. Enough is left dangling for the author to bring the hero back in future novels, but the book stands on its merits rather than requiring you to wait for the next installment. If you like the idea of a time travel story mixed with the real life soul destroying reality of KPIs and first level customer support (where the customers can't find the "any" key on their flux capacitor), you'll love Time Machines Repaired While-U-Wait.

After reading and enjoying the K A Bedford's rather dark novel 'Eclipse', I eagerly sought out another book by the author and the unusual title 'Time Machines Repaired While-U-Wait was too hard to resist. It is totally different in style from the dark 'Eclipse', showing K A Bedford has equal skills in writing humorous fiction, although there are sombre aspects to the book when the author explores the opportunities time travel provides for corruption. I found it provided a fascinating glimpse of the near future post Peak Oil when time travel becomes a commodity item. The author does a great job portraying the main character Aloysius "Spider" Webb and anyone who has worked in a corporate environment will identify with Spider's work challenges as his boss attempts to motivate him.

While I enjoyed the book, I found the latter part of the book dragged somewhat with the ending not as satisfying as I was anticipating. Mind, the author did set a high standard the first 70% of the book!

This book is in the classic 'golden days' Science Fiction style, exploring how humanity accommodates commodity Time Travel. If that style appeals to you, you'll enjoy this book.

This is the fourth novel by this author and, in my opinion, his best work to date. It is an exciting and at times very humorous adventure but also an interesting and original explorstion of one of SF's great themes, time travel. The lead character, Aloysius " Spider" Webb, is a wonderful creation and hopefully will be seen again in further stories.
K A Bedford is a multi-award winning author in his native Australia and this novel has been nominated for this year's Philip K Dick award.
I can highly recommend this novel as well as his earlier works. He is certainly a writer to watch.

Genre savvy characters can be quite delightful, but Bedford's protagonist crosses the line into "genre smarmy".

More inexcusable, however, Bedford never bothers to figure out how time travel is supposed to work. As a result, his novel is essentially unintelligible nonsense. Characters will babble on about how changing the past only results in a new timeline being created (while leaving the old timeline unchanged)... and then mere pages later they'll find their memories rewritten by their own time traveling exploits. And then a couple pages later we'll be back to forking timelines because that's convenient for whatever stream-of-consciousness nonsense Bedford decided to spit out that day at they keyboard.

In short, this is a truly atrocious book. It's a madlib of genre conventions spewed haphazardly across the page.