[5] Each floor of the clinic recreates a decade in intricate detail, aiming to transport patients back in time to revisit their memories.

[10] In an interview with The Booker Prizes, Gospodinov revealed that his inspiration came from the rise of the populism movement in 2016, as well as Brexit, and that his writing was influenced by writers Thomas Mann and Jorge Luis Borges.

[4] In its review, The Guardian commented "from communism to the Brexit referendum and conflict in Europe, this funny yet frightening Bulgarian novel explores the weaponisation of nostalgia".

[5] Sam Sacks, in The Wall Street Journal described the title of Georgi Gospodinov’s novel “Time Shelter” to a sanatorium established in Switzerland for patients suffering from amnesia.

The clinic functions like “a bomb shelter of the past”—each floor represents a different decade and is filled with the minutiae of the era (even its distinctive scents), allowing for full immersion in a cherished period of history.