By Guy Adams

Angry Robot, out now

The assorted crew who have banded together inside the World House now have to capture the House’s escaped prisoner and ensure time stays on track…

If you haven’t read Adams’s novel The World House then it’s probably best to do so before tackling this sequel: although there’s a recap of events that reminds you of what’s come before, much of what transpires within Restoration will make little sense without that knowledge.

Whereas the first novel was a journey through the House, trying to make sense of what’s happening to the various protagonists, the second is an exploration of fate and destiny. The complicated relationships between the characters is central to this and while The World House had echoes of various Doctor Who stories, this one reads at times like a twisted version of Back to the Future II, with people interacting with their own time streams in a highly complicated way.

Adams has a knack for creating a situation with just a few words, a turn of phrase that makes you look at familiar things in a very different way, and an ability to show evil as something that can be banal. Although at times he seems to have a downbeat view of humanity, there’s a nice nod to Stephen King’s Dark Tower sequence in the epilogue that possibly offers a ray of hope.

Verdict: Complicated but eventually very satisfying, this is a fine complement to The World House.  8/10

Paul Simpson

Read our review of The World House here.

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