I’ve never been particularly good at choosing books. My tastes are broad, but I can rarely tell from a back-cover blurb whether a story will actually appeal to me. That’s why I once joined a book club at Myli, and why these days I often rely on the recommendations of library staff—usually without giving them any context about my preferences. Which brings me to this novel: Just One Damned Thing After Another is a book I would never have picked up on my own, if not for the suggestion of Leanne at Connected Libraries in Cranbourne.
When Madeleine Maxwell is recruited by the St Mary’s Institute of Hostircal Research, she discovers the historians there don’t just study the past – they revisit it.
But one wrong move and History will fight back – to the death. And Max soon discovers it’s not just History she’s fighting… Because wherever the historians go, chaos is sure to follow.
In a genre crowded with paradoxes, tropes, and overly technical takes on time travel, Taylor’s novel feels refreshingly different. From the moment I opened it, I was engrossed—less by the mechanics of time travel than by the messy, hilarious, and occasionally heartbreaking realities of being human while tumbling through history.
At the center of it all is St. Mary’s, a seemingly respectable academic institution hiding an extraordinary secret. Its historians strap themselves into experimental pods and hurl into history’s most dramatic moments, tasked with observing and recording events without altering the timeline. Of course, things rarely go according to plan. As the title suggests, life at St. Mary’s is a relentless cascade of disasters and drama. For the most part, this works brilliantly, though at times the pace felt almost too breathless, with little room to process the emotional fallout before the next calamity arrived. Depending on your taste, that either keeps the story exhilarating or slightly exhausting.
Our guide through the chaos is Dr. Madeleine “Max” Maxwell, a sharp-tongued, witty, and vulnerable narrator. Max is flawed and funny, whether she’s dodging dinosaurs in the Cretaceous or navigating the treacherous politics of her workplace. Her voice lends the book a confessional intimacy, as if she’s sharing the world’s most absurd workplace diary.
That said, Max occasionally falls into the “typical hero” trope. Impossible situations arise (both positive and negative), and she always emerges not just intact but triumphant—often in spectacular fashion. If she has a romantic encounter it will be heightened to the most passionate extremes, if there’s a disaster – it escalates to the worst-case scenario. This rollercoaster of highs and lows drives the story forward, but by the end I found myself a little fatigued. The events reinforce Max’s character rather than deepen it, leaving her growth somewhat limited.
Supporting characters, meanwhile, often feel two-dimensional, existing primarily to facilitate Max’s journey. Some are fleshed out, but many serve as narrative devices rather than fully realized individuals. The novel also occasionally bends its own sci-fi rules in favor of dramatic events, which can be frustrating if you prefer strict internal consistency.
Still, Taylor’s prose is brisk, conversational, and very British. She leans into comedy with gusto, filling the narrative with slapstick disasters and sardonic commentary. Yet beneath the humor lies a genuine reverence for history. The book revels in sensory detail such as the smell of woodsmoke, the terror of battlefields, the awe of standing in the shadow of ancient civilizations.
Ultimately, Just One Damned Thing After Another succeeds because it doesn’t take itself too seriously. It’s a book about historians who blow things up, fall in love, and occasionally get eaten by prehistoric creatures. But it’s also a book about curiosity—the irresistible pull of the past and the human desire to see history rather than simply read about it.
Taylor’s novel invites us to imagine what it would be like to stand in the middle of Agincourt, to watch the Library of Alexandria burn, or to witness the quiet moments history forgot. And then, just as we’re swept up in the grandeur, she reminds us that someone has probably misplaced the tea.