by Gillian McAllister
Overall: OK, this is definitely a book where too much information will spoil the story, so I’m going to try not to give too much away. We meet Jen on the night when she sees her teenage son murder a stranger on the street in front of their house and immediately get arrested for the crime. Jen is determined to find out why this event happened, but her investigation plays out in a strange way. The night after Todd’s arrest, Jen bizarrely wakes up on the day *before* the crime, not the day after. Can she trace the roots of the murder backwards? And can she cope with the stress of never knowing when in time she’ll wake up each day, not to mention when she’ll return to *her* present?
Likes: I love time travel and stories told in strange ways, so I really enjoyed the structure of this book. There are plenty of twists and turns, many of them unexpected (at least to me). Jen’s narrative alternates with a second character, which provides dramatic tension and the source of many of the switches and switchbacks in the plot. I found the explanation of who’s behind the murder and why satisfying. And the pacing is fast: I had a hard time putting this one down. This would be a great choice for a long plane flight or car ride this week!
Dislikes: Jen is a little slow on the time-travel uptake, which at times was annoying (would you expect a reply to an email you sent in the future?). There are some side plots that wandered a bit. Also, totally irrelevant to the content, but the cover of this book doesn’t do the story justice, and can publishers please NOT print hideous book club stickers onto book covers? I love book clubs but the stickers, not so much. OK, rant over!
FYI: murder, violence, references to suicide, criminal activity, suspicions of marital infidelity.
Liz Helfrich 