By CONNIE WILLIS (Bantam Books; 1992/94)

One of the most inexplicably overrated science fiction novels of the nineties, and possibly of all time. Supposedly the product of five years’ labor, DOOMSDAY BOOK is a severely bloated would-be epic that runs nearly 600 pages yet has an underlying narrative that could have been told just as well in a quarter of that length.

It’s a time travel story about Kivrin, a young woman living in 2045, when time travel is a viable reality. She elects to travel back to fourteenth century England—to the year 1320, specifically, which puts her well ahead of the onset of the Black Death, which didn’t reach Europe until 1348. The trip goes off without incident, and Kivrin settles down with a family with whom she lives out many of the struggles of the era, including mass sickness that would appear to be due to the plague she’s supposed to have avoided. These portions of the novel are quite strong, with a vividness and immediacy that demonstrate the author’s voluminous research and descriptive talent.

DOOMSDAY BOOK’S most pressing problem is that so much of it takes place in 2045. These sections aren’t nearly as compelling as the 1300s set passages with which they’re alternated, as there’s little in the way of futuristic detail and too many uninteresting characters. Foremost among the latter is Dunworthy, the phlegmatic and unpleasant historian who spearheads the time travel expedition, and gets far more facetime than the more sympathetic Kivrin.

Another annoyance is the story’s major twist, involving the fact that the date to which Kivrin was sent back in time somehow got screwed up. This is something we don’t find out about until the book’s final third, as the Bubonic Plague has somehow been unleashed in this future world; its victims include a technician named Badri, who’s unconscious for much of the story and so, despite being the only one of his fellows with any real knowledge about what’s happened with Kivrin, is unable to do anything about it.

Why is this twist a problem? Because it’s the only twist offered in a story that plods and meanders interminably to a none-too-invigorating ending. Again, I’m not sure the novel needed to be nearly as lengthy as it is. So while the author’s descriptive skills are praiseworthy, DOOMSDAY BOOK is a definite case of excess bloat that should have been much leaner.