For the most part, I’ve enjoyed this story. I did get a bit burned out after a while and kinda lost the motivation to continue.

Overall, the concept is fantastic. I love anything to do with time travel but a lot of the logistics are seldom mentioned. It’s rare or never mentioned from my experience when writers mention the difference in accents, dress style, etc. While this story does a fantastic job in that regard, it seems silly to me to focus on the characters’ accents and clothing but neglect to mention diseases. People from the future or a different region would be bringing back new diseases and the person going back would likely be subjected to different diseases in turn.

The biggest failing of this novel to me is its focus. It sets up a world where people can travel back in time, but it has to be done under strict guidelines. So naturally, people figure out a way around them and do so in secret. To me, this opens up a world of possible stories. The potential is practically limitless.

With the story focused on Lilia and her story with Margaretha, I eventually got bored. There was too much back and forth drama that felt like it was never really going anywhere. It made the story feel too padded out and lost my interest about 3/4 of the way through. I think the story would have worked better if it had a co-plot to keep things moving and add a level of tension and excitement to the story. If “The Mirror” had 2 people in the past he had to manage and then something goes wrong with one, it would have left me on the edge of my seat, wondering how they get out.

If you’re reading this on one of those sites that use the stupid star/number rating system, you’re probably wondering why I’ve rated this 5/5 (or whatever). It’s entirely for the concept. Despite this novel putting me to sleep (literally), I’m still excited to see what’s in store for the characters and world in the sequel.

The narration was excellent. All I wrote down notes-wise was “Oh em me, the accents”…. yeah, the narrator does a wonderful job with accents. Normally, my notes are full of complaints towards narrators who can’t pronounce basic words properly. So this was a real breath of fresh air.

Final thoughts: The world is well done, the concept is pretty well fleshed out. It’s exciting and interesting … until it’s not. But the potential alone makes it worth reading.

NOTE: This copy was provided to me free of charge as a digital review copy. The opinions stated in this review are mine and mine alone, I was not paid or requested to give this book a certain rating, suggestion, or approval. ( )

I liked the mixture of sci fi and fairytale - a little reminiscent of "Cinder". Margaretha ends up the source of the fairytale "Snow White" and it was clever to see all the ways the author includes different aspects of the tale with plausible reasons in the modern storyline. ( )