Just One Damned Thing After Another: The Chronicles of St. Mary's series

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Hold on,’ said Chief Farrell. ‘I’m duty officer this week and I want to see if the fire alarms go off.’ Hold on," said Chief Farrell. "I'm duty officer this week and I want to see if the fire alarms go off."

The following are the earliest occurrences of this phrase that I have found, up to July 1909—cf. note: Follow the catastrophe curve from eleventh-century London to World War I, and from the Cretaceous Period to the destruction of the Great Library at Alexandria. For wherever Historians go, chaos is sure to follow in their wake...Over all, I found the story enjoyable and a fun read. The heroine is surprisingly able and competent to handle herself in difficult situations and to save the day for her colleagues. I found this a bit incongruous with the narrator's particular British accent, in that I just could not imagine someone who talked like that punching someone in the face or being rough and tough enough to carry the story. Yet, Max was just that kind of heroine. I guess you just can't judge a book by its accent! Jodi always wanted to write books; being an author was a long-time dream of hers. She also always loved history. She is a self-claimed history nut. Thus she knew that she would have to combine her two passions into writing historical novels. At least, this is what Max, Madeleine Maxwell, the young historian from the St. Mary’s Institute of Historical Research, would like us to believe:) I kind of agree with her - history is almost as good as very good sex, but only if you can relate to it. And in this book, the researchers at St. Mary's are doing more than relating to history - they are reliving it!!! Time travel pods are the means of transport to any desirable point in time and many rules need to be followed if one is to travel in that manner. No traveler should ever try to involve themselves in the historical time they are visiting and no emotional attachments are advisable, since after all, they are from the future and the history is in its proper timeline... This super secret Time project is very secret, and very underfunded. So, not all of the involved parties have honorable intentions as far as the Institute and its survival are concerned. Because if we have learned one thing from historical data, greed and power have always been stronger in the human character then the desire for uncovering the truth and living in near obscurity, while trying to do your best for humanity... *deep sigh* ... Alas... If you're not too keen on history you might find the passages that deal with important historical periods a bit overbearing. However, give it a try because that aside, the drama, fantasy and humour shines through. Personally I love history, and that love stems from our mother who was a font of knowledge when it came to all things history. It brought up many happy memories, a job well done. Human lives are full of such errors, so full that one can but hope for more pitiful judgment hereafter than ever we meet from our fellow-men below; so full that the burden of life is but one weight after another of the foolish, impulsive, shortsighted actions that make up the sum-total of that life’s arithmetic; so full that the only wonder is we glean even a little glimpse of happiness here and there, a something to cheer us with hope, or sweeten our days with sunshine, lest indeed we grow quite desperate, or quite evil, or quite mad.

This is the story of Madeline Maxwell, a historian who is recruited by the secretive St. Mary’s, a institution that “investigates major historical events in contemporary time.” After training, she gets sent to the trenches of WWI France, and other places and times, before things go to hell. In 1926 a novel called “ODTAA” by John Masefield was published. The acronym “One Damn Thing after Another” was not directly specified within the text, but contemporary book reviewers were aware of the explanation for the title. [16] 1926, ODTAA by John Masefield, Published by The Macmillan Company, New York. (Verified on paper) The main character has no personality except to be perfect at everything and drive evil people to fits of revealing rage -- classic Mary Sue stuff. I get annoyed with the overuse and misuse of that term, but it really applies here. Max feels like a self-insert. She, her love interest, and the innumerable interchangeable secondary characters are all amazingly under-characterized and flatly written: I couldn't describe a single one of them to you, nor could I tell them apart much of the time. (Which one was Markham and which was Murdoch again?) Early in the book, Max notes that she often does not react to things in a "normal" way, but this is never used to make a point about her history or to develop her character as the story progresses; instead, it feels like Taylor simply did not know how to write realistic reactions to situations and was using this as an excuse. The book, in fact, shot itself in the foot from the very start by dumping a bunch of information about characters' personalities and relationships in the "Dramatis Thingummy" at the beginning, which is such a breathtaking violation of "show don't tell" that I don't think I've ever seen it in a published book before. This trend continued in the main body of the book, with a lot of supposed character development happening off-screen, via vague description, and/or during the poorly signposted timeskips. I got the distinct impression that the author wanted to give the impression of a tight-knit organization/institution where there was a general sense of camaraderie, shared experience etc., but couldn't be bothered putting the work in to actually develop that. The result was not dissimilar to those films where studios are trying desperately to create a "shared universe" without doing the legwork of developing individual characters before building them into a team. This was a bit disconcerting, as if I'd missed a previous book or something (more on this below), and with the book clearly being Part 1, I simply got the impression that the author was insisting that I believe in these people's supposed camaraderie without any evidence. (Many of the significant character interactions we actually see are negative, such as bar fights, inter-departmental rivalry, personality clashes and poorly concealed villains being unpleasant, which further undermined the supposed "happy family" atmosphere.) Behind the seemingly innocuous facade of St. Mary’s Institute of Historical Research, a different kind of academic work is taking place. Just don’t call it “time travel”—these historians “investigate major historical events in contemporary time.” And they aren’t your harmless eccentrics either; a more accurate description, as they ricochet around history, might be unintentional disaster-magnets.I enjoyed the book very much and am definitely planning on continuing with the series!!! It is a perfect read for fans of Time Travel and some sci-fi:) Unfortunately, both Fforde and Willis write better books than this one. Taylor's time traveling seems to be a rough copy of Willis' but with less rationality or logic. It may be silly to ask for logic when talking about science fiction, but I felt too many things in this booked happened that way because it allowed the author to easily dispatch a problem she had written in. Like many time travel books though, this one had its ups and downs. My main criticism is that, for a novel featuring time traveling academics who label themselves historians (and who also work at an institute for historical research), there was in fact disappointingly little history involved. I don’t consider myself to be a huge history buff or anything, but for me one of the biggest perks of reading time travel stories is being able to absorb interesting historical details and facts behind past events, people, and places. I thought this would be a book like that, but it turned out not to be the case. While the publisher blurb says “From eleventh-century London to World War I, from the Cretaceous Period to the destruction of the Great Library at Alexandria”, the truth is, the most exciting time period Max gets to visit will probably appeal more to dinosaur enthusiasts or paleontologists rather than history fans.

Jodi Taylor is an English author of fantasy-style historical fiction, [1] historical romance [2] and romance [3] [4] novels. JUNE 2020 UPDATE The Kindle edition of this wonderful, delightful first book in the Chronicles of St Mary's is only 99¢ TODAY!! The plot is very involved, but concerns Max being trained in time travel, with various different outcomes. There are madcap adventures in various times and locations, a love story, obviously some baddies and an awful lot of adventures and missions. Although this is obviously a flight of fantasy – time travel, non-stop excitement and danger – there is also enough realism to make you care about the characters. Max faces real issues, for example, with colleagues; including the kind of unpleasant sexist behaviour that makes you squirm as a reader. Still, in some ways, this is essential. Too much derring do and you might forget you are reading about characters who can get hurt, or killed, or wounded. Overall, reading the Jodi Taylor books is an immense joy for every time-travel, history and adventure lover. Praise for Jodi TaylorMax, Doctor B. and Chief Farrell are three of the good and hilariously funny guys in the crew! Most of the story is told from her, Max's point of view and we get to follow her training, her friendships, her frenemies, and her propensity for disaster which obviously follows her around as a faithful puppy. I liked that the way the author let us acquaint ourselves with the main players was through their actions and banter, rather than being spoon fed descriptions and assurances about their characters. The writing stile was a bit different, but very pleasant overall and had a wonderful undertone of humor, without making the seriousness of curtain parts of the story fall flat. There were moments I was surprised by the starkness and bleakness of the mood, since I had expected just a humorous and fantastical tale of not much debt or substance. Here is for low expectations being topped!:):):) Very early, — is just one damn(ed), or darn(ed), thing after another came to function as an independent phrase, i.e., with other grammatical subjects than life. We finished with a tour of the grounds… Even as I opened my mouth to ask, there was a small bang from the second floor and the windows rattled. From eleventh-century London to World War I, from the Cretaceous Period to the destruction of the Great Library at Alexandria, one thing is for sure: wherever the historians at St. Mary’s go, chaos is sure to follow in their wake. A carnival ride through laughter and tears with a bit of time travel thrown in for spice . . . readers will be impatient for later installments. (Publishers Weekly)

A lot happens in this book and it seemed really too much to handle carefully in one book. We are introduced to the main character, her life, her introduction to St. Mary's her first mission, second, etc, on through 5 or so years of her adventures before we even get to what might be the big adventure. But because of our fast paced introduction, we never really get to know most of the supporting characters particularly well. Things happen, then we're suddenly rushed past the results and the unsatisfactory explanation and we're racing on to the next event. I certainly wasn’t where I should be and it would be the cautious, the sensible thing to do. But, for God’s sake, I was an historian and cautious and sensible were things that happened to other people.” ..." There is just enough adult themes to temper the humour, and although it does require a bit of a stretched belief model, I do recommend it. Well where to begin ? The book really grabbed my interest at first, and I thought the premise of the story was good.Early in the story it's established that 'History' (some nebulous entity with no attempt at an explanation) won't allow timelines and events to be disrupted... and from then on all the characters do is lay waste to this principle (guns in ancient Egypt anyone?) with weakly justified motives.