Synopsis
This is a detective story. A murder mystery. But it's a rather different one. The killer is already known, you see. The problem is to find the killer and measure out a proper punishment. For the killer is time itself, and this is the story about a boy named Otto, his bird Virgil and their best friend Ana, and the strange journey they embark on together to find and kill time.
The Time Chase is set in an anachronistic world full of gothic melancholy, seafarers, mermaids, clockmakers and pirates – and death, of course, loves to play chess.
By taking our sayings about time literally and exploring them, the protagonists of the story learn that measuring time is only a means to understanding it, but doesn't really affect time itself. They also learn, that without time, there would be no meaning in our world at all.
Besides being a story of time, it is also a story about life and death, loss and coping with it; a story about friendship and especially a story about choosing your own path and trusting your gut feeling, even when it leads you to act against the current of normal convention.
Reviews
"It takes a writer of calibre to keep track of the incredibly influential nature of proverbs about time in our part of the world, as well as science-based information about e.g. the speed of light and the qualities of the chronometer. Gertrude Kiel has it all completely under control. And without revealing too much, the ending of the novel will unlikely disappoint the reader." – (4 hearts in Politiken)
"There is suspense and horror and dizzyingly strange passages such as the one about Sander, whose unhappy love story is saved in the house as a painful frozen moment" – (4 stars in Jyllandsposten)
"It turns into a fantastic and dramatic journey around the world where they among others encounter a time pirate, a clockmaker without a heart and Death, who prefers to sit and have a beer and play chess. **The Time Chase** is a quirky and well-written book that poses philosophical questions such as What is time? and Does time ultimately have anything to do with clocks?" – (Weekendavisen)
