To Say Nothing of the Dog (Hardcover)

by Connie Willis (Author)
Key Phrases: little foxes, distinguishing sounds, bird stump, Professor Peddick, Princess Arjumand, Lady Schrapnell (more...)

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review
To Say Nothing of the Dog is a science-fiction fantasy in the guise of an old-fashioned Victorian novel, complete with epigraphs, brief outlines, and a rather ugly boxer in three-quarters profile at the start of each chapter. Or is it a Victorian novel in the guise of a time-traveling tale, or a highly comic romp, or a great, allusive literary game, complete with spry references to Dorothy L. Sayers, Wilkie Collins, and Arthur Conan Doyle? Its title is the subtitle of Jerome K. Jerome's singular, and hilarious, Three Men in a Boat. In one scene the hero, Ned Henry, and his friends come upon Jerome, two men, and the dog Montmorency in--you guessed it--a boat. Jerome will later immortalize Ned's fumbling. (Or, more accurately, Jerome will earlier immortalize Ned's fumbling, because Ned is from the 21st century and Jerome from the 19th.)

What Connie Willis soon makes clear is that genre can go to the dogs. To Say Nothing of the Dog is a fine, and fun, romance--an amused examination of conceptions and misconceptions about other eras, other people. When we first meet Ned, in 1940, he and five other time jumpers are searching bombed-out Coventry Cathedral for the bishop's bird stump, an object about which neither he nor the reader will be clear for hundreds of pages. All he knows is that if they don't find it, the powerful Lady Schrapnell will keep sending them back in time, again and again and again. Once he's been whisked through the rather quaint Net back to the Oxford future, Ned is in a state of super time-lag. (Willis is happily unconcerned with futuristic vraisemblance, though Ned makes some obligatory references to "vids," "interactives," and "headrigs.") The only way Ned can get the necessary two weeks' R and R is to perform one more drop and recuperate in the past, away from Lady Schrapnell. Once he returns something to someone (he's too exhausted to understand what or to whom) on June 7, 1888, he's free.

Willis is concerned, however, as is her confused character, with getting Victoriana right, and Ned makes a good amateur anthropologist--entering one crowded room, he realizes that "the reason Victorian society was so restricted and repressed was that it was impossible to move without knocking something over." Though he's still not sure what he's supposed to bring back, various of his confederates keep popping back to set him to rights. To Say Nothing of the Dog is a shaggy-dog tale complete with a preternaturally quiet, time-traveling cat, Princess Arjumand, who might well be the cause of some serious temporal incongruities--for even a mouser might change the course of European history. In the end, readers might well be more interested in Ned's romance with a fellow historian than in the bishop's bird stump, and who will not rejoice in their first Net kiss, which lasts 169 years!

From Booklist
What a stitch! Willis' delectable romp through time from 2057 back to Victorian England, with a few side excursions into World War II and medieval Britain, will have readers happily glued to the pages. Rich dowager Lady Schrapnell has invaded Oxford University's time travel research project in 2057, promising to endow it if they help her rebuild Coventry Cathedral, destroyed by a Nazi air raid in 1940. In effect, she dragoons almost everyone in the program to make trips back in time to locate items--in particular, the bishop's bird stump, an especially ghastly example of Victorian decorative excess. Time traveler Ned Henry is suffering from advanced time lag and has been sent, he thinks, for rest and relaxation to 1888, where he connects with fellow time traveler Verity Kindle and discovers that he is actually there to correct an incongruity created when Verity inadvertently brought something forward from the past. Take an excursion through time, add chaos theory, romance, plenty of humor, a dollop of mystery, and a spoof of the Victorian novel, and you end up with what seems like a comedy of errors but is actually a grand scheme "involving the entire course of history and all of time and space that, for some unfathomable reason, chose to work out its designs with cats and croquet mallets and penwipers, to say nothing of the dog. And a hideous piece of Victorian artwork." Sally Estes

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Product Details

• Hardcover: 434 pages
• Publisher: Bantam Spectra; Book Club (BCE/BOMC) edition (December 1, 1997)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0553099957
• ISBN-13: 978-0553099959
• Product Dimensions: 8.3 x 5.6 x 1.1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds
• Average Customer Review: 4.4 out of 5 stars See all reviews (247 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #731,328 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

65 of 67 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Mystery, comedy and time-travel, January 10, 2001

By	Kristin S. (Vermont, U.S.) - See all my reviews

This review is from: To Say Nothing of the Dog (Mass Market Paperback)

It isn't often that I read a book for the first time and it instantly becomes one of my favorites. "To Say Nothing of the Dog" did that, though. I love this novel!

Connie Willis flawlessly combines so many elements in this book: It's part mystery novel, part sci-fi, part time-travel drama, part Victorian romance, part comedy. The characters and situations are extremely funny, but at the same time, there is a deep and serious plot going on.

Ned Henry goes back to the Victorian era to get some rest -- he is time-lagged from going back and forth from 2057 to 1940 to locate an ugly piece of Victorian art. But, he also has an important mission to complete in 1888. Verity Kindle, a fellow time-traveler, inadvertently brought something back from the past. Ned and Verity must put things right before the course of history is changed and the space-time continuum breaks down. Ms. Willis portrays the worlds of 2057, 1940 and 1888 with equal ease and vivid descriptions.

There is mystery (Why was Verity able to bring what she did through the time-travel apparatus? What was it? How does it relate to the Bishop's Bird Stump? What is the Bishop's Bird Stump and why is it important?). There is science fiction (More about the "net" and how it works than in Doomsday Book). And, there is comedy. Ms. Willis' witty characterizations are reminiscent of Oscar Wilde or Jane Austen (Tossie is Cecily from The Importance of Being Earnest. Colonel and Mrs. Mering are Mr. and Mrs. Bennett from Pride and Prejudice.) Ned is hysterical as he struggles through an era he knows nothing about.

Fans of Doomsday Book will enjoy the return of Dunworthy and Finch. But, in my opinion, To Say Nothing of the Dog is much better than Doomsday Book.

I couldn't put this book down, and I was extremely satisfied with the ending. All the mysteries are solved and the facts are presented -- but a twist at the end leaves a new mystery unsolved. A fantastic book! I hope for more time-travel novels from Connie Willis.

38 of 44 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The funniest book in the SFF genre that I've read in years!, April 15, 2000

By A Customer

This review is from: To Say Nothing of the Dog (Mass Market Paperback)

_To Say Nothing of the Dog_ takes place in the same time-traveling world that Willis describes in _Doomsday Book_, but is much, MUCH more lighthearted in tone.

Ned Henry, a time traveler of the 21st century, is sent to the Victorian Age for some badly needed rest.

He doesn't find it. Instead he is drawn into a mission with fellow historian Verity Kindle: stop history from altering itself AND find the most hideous of all hideous Victorian monstrosities, the bishop's bird stump.

This fabulous novel, while at heart always SFF, is also a mystery, romance, comedy-of-manners, and adventure at the same time. With plenty of allusions to Jerome K. Jerome, Agatha Christie, Wilkie Collins (and a spoiler for _The Moonstone_!), and Dorothy L. Sayers, as well as unforgettable secondary characters like Lady Shrapnell, Cecil, and Lady Arjumand, you will find yourself finishing this 400+ page book in record time.

14 of 14 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Penwipers, cats and the Luftwaffe, August 3, 2000

By	Chris Gladis "Chris" (Kyoto, JAPAN) - See all my reviews

This review is from: To Say Nothing of the Dog (Mass Market Paperback)

I swear, Connie Willis must collect awards for fun and profit. I've loved everything of hers that I've read, but this was the first, and still one of my favorites. She's managed to write a historical novel/romance/comedy/mystery/scifi story in one impeccable volume. While trying to unravel the various paradoxes of time travel, you're treated to the inanities of Victorian England, which can (and probably will) have you laughing out loud. With the mystery of the drowned cat, and the atrocity that is the Bishop's Bird Stump, among other things, she keeps you tied to the book up until the end - just when you think everything is sorted out, we find that we're all wrong. Ms. Willis pays perfect homage to the great writers of the past as well, so opick up some Christie and Jerome K. Jerome while you're at it. Highly recommended....