I was intrigued by the story, which is a historical mystery, set in Scotland with a time travel element. The plot centres around Mallory, a Canadian police detective who goes for a jog one evening in Edinburgh only to be attacked and find herself in a 20-year-old woman's body ... in 1869. Murder, mystery, and 19th century Scotland make for a cool premise, but it was the way the story was told that had me struggling to finish this book.
The storytelling felt convoluted with way too much time spent in Mallory's head. Her constant chatter about the differences between 2019 and 1869, her continual use of modern terms and mentions of as-yet-discovered police techniques despite knowing her circumstances and the repetition within the story felt more telling than showing, greatly affected the pacing and tension.
The reader is expected to suspend disbelief for this story to work and I don't mind doing that, but too many elements were glossed over. From the time travel element to Mallory's ability to slip into a young girl's life and go from a simple and untrustworthy housemaid to being the right-hand woman to a medical examiner and immersed in a police investigation. And don't get me started on how the 19th century people easily accepted Mallory's time travel explanation with nary an issue. It was too much for me to accept.
I enjoyed how Armstrong describes the 19th century setting and the introduction of Isla's character (she was my fav) and the premise sounded right up my alley. But the story suffers from slow pacing, a lack of focus which made this book feel like its main purpose was setting up a new series. It didn't have enough substance on its own to keep my attention and with Mallory's constant internal dialogue and the inconsistencies, I felt repeatedly taken out of the plot as I tried to make sense of a story that seemed a bit clumsy in its telling.
Disclaimer: My sincere thanks to Minotaur Books for the complimentary advanced digital copy of this title which was provided in exchange for my honest review.
My Rating: 2.5 stars
Author: Kelley Armstrong
Genre: Historical Mystery, Time Travel, Canadian
Series: 1st book in A Rip Through Time series
Type and Source: eBook from publisher via NetGalley
Publisher: Minotaur Books
First Published: May 31, 2022
Book Description from GoodReads: In this series debut from New York Times bestselling author Kelley Armstrong, a modern-day homicide detective finds herself in Victorian Scotland—in an unfamiliar body—with a killer on the loose.
May 20, 2019: Homicide detective Mallory is in Edinburgh to be with her dying grandmother. While out on a jog one evening, Mallory hears a woman in distress. She’s drawn to an alley, where she is attacked and loses consciousness.
May 20, 1869: Housemaid Catriona Mitchell had been enjoying a half-day off, only to be discovered that night in a lane, where she’d been strangled and left for dead . . . exactly one-hundred-and-fifty years before Mallory was strangled in the same spot.
When Mallory wakes up in Catriona's body in 1869, she must put aside her shock and adjust quickly to the reality: life as a housemaid to an undertaker in Victorian Scotland. She soon discovers that her boss, Dr. Gray, also moonlights as a medical examiner and has just taken on an intriguing case, the strangulation of a young man, similar to the attack on herself. Her only hope is that catching the murderer can lead her back to her modern life . . . before it's too late.
Outlander meets The Alienist in Kelley Armstrong's A Rip Through Time, the first book in this utterly compelling series, mixing romance, mystery, and fantasy with thrilling results.
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