2025 Reading Challenge discussion

This thread is to discuss This Is How You Lose the Time War by Amal El-Mohtar.

Pages: 209 pages

Length: 1 month (February)

Participants: Thieryn, BarbaraBrubru, juls.books, Carrie

Everyone reads at their own pace during a Buddy Read. Because participants can be at different parts of the book at different times, it is extremely important to mark spoilers so that the book is not ruined for someone who is not as far along as others!!!

Mark spoilers by placing {spoiler} before the text and {/spoiler} after the text but use the < and > instead of the { and }.

Here are some questions to help get the conversation started! Feel free to look up discussion questions specific to this book or come up with your own. Just make sure any questions that contain spoilers are under spoiler tags.
Discussion questions are not required but may be a fun way to talk about the book and get to know each other!

Prior to starting:
What prompted you to join this buddy read?
Have you read this author before? What do you think of their other books?

Mid-read:
What character or ideas do you relate to the most and why?
Do you have any favorite quotes or scenes?

After reading:
What was enjoyable or not-so-enjoyable about this book?
Did this book change your perception about anything, either within the book (character development) or in real life?

hii guys how r u doing? i'm in the middle of exam's period but i always try to find time for reading! For me personally is the first time that I do a buddy read here on gr, but I am very excited. Can't wait to start the book of the month, I heard beuatiful thing soo I have pretty high expectations! And you? What are ur thoughts on the book? And what r u reading now? My cr is Fall

I loved the idea of this book and my college library had it out on the shelf so I wanted to read it. Also, I did a lot of nonfiction, hard philosophy books recently so I wanted a cozy fantasy.

Hi there! I wish to give a second chance to this book, I heard so many good reviews but somehow it was too difficult a reading for me 2 years ago so I DNFed it.

What prompted you to join this buddy read?
Second chance but this time I read it in French, my mother tongue. That may help, we will see!
Have you read this author before? What do you think of their other books?
I read half of this book. NO other ones from this author.
I will start soon, after I finish "the burning god" by RF Kuang ;)

I just started this and I have a sneaking suspicion I will finish it before I go to bed tonight, because it is exciting! It is quite short too, but given how much I am enjoying it so far (at the 10% mark so it has room to disappoint me still, but let's hope not) I think every page will be worth it.

This is a favorite of a friend of mine, so I'm looking forward to hearing your thoughts and sharing them all with her as well :)

I meant to post before, during, and after but I ended up starting before I intended and finished it very quickly.

I had never read this author before. The main reason I joined this buddy read is because it fit several different prompts that I needed to fill. I probably would not have chosen it on my own but found the description very intriguing.

There are not very many characters in this book and I didn’t feel like I got to know any of them well enough to relate to them in any way at all but I did find them interesting.

I only gave this book 2.5 stars but I can’t say that I did not enjoy it. It was probably the strangest book I have ever read, but was also beautiful. I can appreciate it but it just wasn’t my cup of tea.

I finished it last night and I am in awe. The writing is exceptional, the plot is incredible, and the characters are so intriguing. There's humor and heartache, and intrigue and high stakes, and I live for it all. "How many boards would the Mongols board if a Mongol horde got bored?" I laughed out loud at that.

I loved that I didn't need the entire background details to be invested in Blue and Red, and their blooming relationship. Two warring factions - that's all we get, and it really is enough. I see their bond expand and deepen through their writings to one another, and it really did warm my heart.

I also found the ending so perfect, the most fitting for this kind of story, beautiful details sown throughout the story, that bring it all together. (view spoiler)[The fact that Blue gave the idea to Red to go back in their strands to plant herself in Blue, which is the reason Blue had the hunger and the idea in the first place, is inception-level genius and done so beautifully! It could have been so badly executed, but the authors kept it simple and to the point. (hide spoiler)]

I adored this book. Very rarely do I find a piece of literature that I feel truly deserves all the awards it has won, and this one is the bright exception.

I basically didn'tt understand anything that happened. I had high expectations because I honestly expected everything different. The concept is very nice and appealing but the writing is particularly evocative and fragmented. You struggle to understand where you are, what the worldbulding is. It's all very confusing. The letters are definitely the best part. There are some reflections that I also enjoyed quite a bit but it's all absolutely confusing. Towards the end I started to pull the strings a little bit and put some point but after a few hours from the end I can say that I read something that was also good but that I understood very little of or rather I am not sure that I understood correctly and I am still missing some pieces. The first half I was simply confused. the second half I was resigned to the fact that I would not understand. I also liked the love story between the two main characters but I did not understand how they came to fall in love and then had any interaction? the parts beyond the letters were quite strange.
It is a text full of lyricism and repetitiveness a bit like this review of mine. It could have been a beautiful text or extremely boring, I think I am in the middle but for the umpteenth time still too very very confused.

I really enjoyed this book, (translated in French) it became maybe one of my best readings ever. I usually don't re-read a book, as there are so many to discover but this one is special, I will read it again. The way Red and Blue leave messages to each other, all these ideas are so creative and very beautiful. It's tender, loving....Sometimes I was a bit lost but all in all, one of my favourite books!