Kate Atkinson

writer
Novel

Todd Family 1

Life after Life

In one instantiation of her life, Ursula Todd dies just moments after her birth in 1910. Fortunately (for the sake of the novel), time seems to be cyclic, so she and the rest of the world get many chances at life. At times, she partially recalls her other lives, resulting in many consequences to history and her personal development. —Michael Main
So much hot air rising above the tables in the Café Heck or the Osteria Bavaria, like smoke from the ovens. It was difficult to believe from this perspective that Hitler was going to lay waste to the world in a few years’ time.

“Time isn’t circular,” she said to Dr. Kellet. “It’s like a palimpsest.”
“Oh, dear,” he said. “That sounds very vexing.”
“And memories are sometimes in the future.”
A young girl faces a wall with Roman numerals of a clock and an arch leading to a war scene.
  • Fantasy
  • War
  • Debatable Time Travel
Novel

Todd Family 2

A God in Ruins

In the first of the Todd Family books, we saw Ursula Todd live different lives over and over through the two world wars of the 20th century. Now—in the second book—we see the lives of Ursula’s sensitive younger brother, Teddy, as he becomes an RAF bomber pilot in World War II. —Michael Main
He had never met the farmer’s daughter in the yard, feeding the geese. Wasn’t there a nursery rhyme in there somewhere? No, he was thinking of the farmer’s wifem wasn’t he?—cutting off tails with a carving knife. A horrid image. Poor mice, he had thought when he was a boy. Still thought the same now that he was a man. Nursery rhymes were brutal affairs.
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  • Fantasy
  • War
  • Debatable Time Travel