Teaser Tuesday: Invictus by Ryan Graudin

Teaser Tuesdays is a weekly bookish meme, hosted by Ambrosia of The Purple Booker.
To play along just do the following:

• Grab your current read
• Open to a random page
• Share two (2) “teaser” sentences from somewhere on that page
• BE CAREFUL NOT TO INCLUDE SPOILERS! (make sure that what you share doesn’t give too much away! You don’t want to ruin the book for others!)
• Share the title & author, too, so that other TT participants can add the book to their TBR Lists if they like your teasers!

Invictus by Ryan Graudin.

Invictus – Little, Brown Books
for Young Readers

His choices were the following:
1. Fade into the background. Be lost.
2. Step out into the thick of the crowd. Be seen.
3. Walk the line between.
— Chapter 2

If it was his attention she wanted, as she claimed, why run? And why run so fast?
— Chapter 9

As you may be aware from past experience (and you’ll get in a second why I just giggle-snorted while writing that), I’m slightly partial to books that involve history and/or time travel. So here we go again, this book had me hook, line, and sinker with the tag “The Future’s Hope is in the Past”. Given the fact that I’ve read one or two … or more such book there is little to no wiggle room on my favourites’ shelf in that category though I get the feeling that I might have to make room there somehow. The characters are a colourful mix of different personalities and since I have just met one of the main players (I suspect so at least), who is aggravatingly shrouding herself in a combination of glimpses and mystery I can’t actually say very much about them apart from my general impression that this is going to get even more interesting very soon.
The whole premise of travelling back in time to observe and under no circumstances altering anything versus travelling back to partake and possibly disturb the future is very complex and so far well developed. It will be interesting to see how this might shift as the story progresses as the back cover already hints at the fact that the past might not be as stable as the present might think it is … possibly learning this by way of the future. And that is just the big threat. The smaller one is the also very daunting black market dealer who has way too much power over the lives of the characters I already care for.
Big plus, in my eyes at least, is that this is a standalone book. I love my series (more than I can say) but sometimes it is also very nice to have the end immediately in sight. I can also guarantee that I most likely won’t be saying this by the end of the book when I’m not ready to let go. Yes, I am aware that I am a walking contradiction most of the time. Not contradictory at all is my desire for a pet red panda. I can completely understand why Saffron had to become part of the time travelling crew. They’re just so cute.

If you could have any animal (extinct or not, time travelling makes it possible) for a pet, what would it be? Sharwoollyr wooly mammoth love and teasers in the comments!