This one was a great surprise. I thought it was going to be a middlegrade dystopian, but it has some complexity and scifi elements with great plot twists. After the 50% mark, I couldn't put it down. The story becomes more and unveils a larger plot that may or not include space elevators, people who quit life to live in their "holodecks," and time traveling to save the planet. The mutation of the trees brings urgency. The use of time marbles shows creativity. I love the artwork as well. Great characters, great progressive journey, and concept.

I absolutely adored The Girl Who Sold Time by VS Nelson! I loved the characters, and the worldbuilding was phenomenal. You had the lovable characters, fun and interesting world, and some mystery/intrigue to propel you forward and keep you fixated. The relationships between characters were so sweet and genuine, I couldn't get enough of the main character and her friends.

We adored this book. It is so immersive that you really don't want to come back to the real world until you have finished the book. We really need more books from this wonderful author.

I was humming and hawing when I saw this on NetGalley, my TBR from them has got a little big right now.

I’m so glad that I did.

This is about the Earth in the future where humanity has basically destroyed the world through it’s machinations and waste, the scientists had developed a space elevator and a space ring to work at saving the rest of humanity and the planet.

Meanwhile within the ever dwindling forest that is constantly mutation lives Violet and her companion Jackdaw, a robot programmed with the personality of a young boy as her protector, this is because her dad went up the space elevator to work on a solution there. Violet is adamant that she is going to save the forest and keeps inventing things hoping that the next one will be the one.

Violet is the only person who can handle the time marbles safely without too much confusion. Yes, time marbles, small marble-like objects that when placed in the mouth and swallowed freezes time for the person who consumed the marble.

DO NOT EAT MARBLES!

A brilliant science fiction adventure with lots of twists and turns, also takes an interesting exploration of time and how it interacts with other fields in physics, but at its core its about friendship and family in the face of difference and adversity.

The reveal is absolutely heartbreaking and the banter between Violet and Jackdaw so funny, stormed through this.

I received this from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

12-year-old Violet, lives with her robotic best friend, Jackdaw in their hidden underground caravan. She has the skill to search and trade time marbles, she seems to be the only one Immune to their debilitating effects. Time marbles can freeze time for the person using them for seconds, minutes, days or weeks depending on the marble. Violet is desperate to use the marbles to save the remaining humans from the mutating forest and has been trying to build a machine to do so. She trades with the villagers living in the remains of the forest surrounding a space elevator, which can be dangerous especially as she has discovered a year long marble that desperate people want for themselves. This the best book I've read for a long time, well described, action packed and fast paced bring the reader along Violets journey of discovery.

In the beginning, I was attracted to this book while browsing the titles here and thought that the cover looked really appealing and the premise sounded very interesting having not read nor seen anything of it before. The author was unknown to me too. Upon jumping in, it became quickly apparent that I (a man in his 30's) was not the target audience for the book though.

Nevertheless, Nelson has crafted a world that is very interesting. Post apocalypse settings are a well worn path at this point in time but this one is very refreshing and has a good lead. Violet's interactions and character are well handled throughout. She's a good protagonist that you want to succeed in her endeavours. The artwork within the book is also very well thought out and drawn. Chapters are snappy and not too long. Just a good length where you finish one, look ahead to the next one and say "maybe just one more..." I could see it as book and a world I would have been obsessed with when I was younger.

Also thanks go to NetGalley for giving me the opportunity to check it out.

So the reason I wanted to read this book was genuinely because the synopsis sounded super cool so I applied for an ARC. Friends, I'm really happy I got to read this one. I'm not going to lie, Sci Fi is not usually a genre I typically pick up so this could've gone either way for me. The start of this story is a little slow because of the world building and explaining the time marbles and how everything works as well as Violet's relationships with other people. However, the moment this book picked up it picked up. This book was so much fun and my favourite thing about it is it had one of my favourite tropes which is found family. Not only were the characters caring towards each other but they truly treat each other with the respect and love that I expect from these types of friendships. I loved how much this book highlighted good female friendships especially with such a badass main character such as Violet. I LOVED Jackdaw so much and I found it really hard to remember that he wasn't human (literally every time he was referenced to as a robot it was a little shock to the system). I really appreciated how much detail the author went into on how the time marbles worked and how they were used throughout the story. I feel like we got a very clear and concise vision of what the author was trying to portray. I definitely would recommend this book to anyone and everyone and think it's a perfect beginner book for getting into sci fi (for me personally anyway). I will 100% be reading more of V.S. Nelson's books.

4 stars. I really enjoyed this for a middle grade dystopian! The banter Violet had with her robot companion, Jackdaw, was really fun especially at the beginning of the book which really helped me get through it. I thought it was really interesting that she traded time marbles for technology but I wanted to know more about them. The marbles stop time and I found that really interesting as they don't stop for a specific amount of time, one marble can be a year the other can be a minute etc. Violet needs to find a way to stop the forest from changing/mutating which is a very shortened version of the blurb/plot.

I thought this was very fun, I haven't read a middle grade book in the longest time! I'm almost 28 so reading one years later it was somewhat of a breath of fresh air for me personally. I would go further into the plot etc but there are so many well thought out and well written reviews on GRs about this book. I love reading ARCs but sometimes I struggle to actually get the words out lol.

Deffo recommend and I think when my niece is old enough I will end up getting her a copy as she is really intrigued already with science, nature and fantasy style stuff.
Thank you for sending me this ARC NetGalley! Can't wait to see more from this author.