The Time Traveler's Wife is a love story - Henry, aged 36, meets Clare, aged 6. But Henry is time traveling - his body jumps backwards and forwards through time, without warning, and he arrives naked at some point on his own personal timeline. Minutes or hours later he will jump back. He regularly meets himself, and while he meets Clare many times as she grows up, he also meets her for the first time, when he is 28 and she is 20. His 28 year-old self doesn't know that in his later years he will meet Clare as a child, so while she greets him as a lost love, he has never seen her before.
It sounds confusing and unlikely, but is written with such a deft touch that time travelling Henry seems perfectly ordinary. This leaves room for the love story to develop, and it does so with a gentle passion that grabs the reader by the lapels.
This book has been compared the The Lovely Bones, and it is a fare comparison - original, engaging, enchanting and deeply moving.
Five stars (out of five)
Comments (3)
Great book. It is in my top ten. I have purchased 5 copies for friends since I read it. One of the best presents I have ever recieved.
Posted by John | December 29, 2005 7:49 PM
Posted on December 29, 2005 19:49
My top ten is in progres (see tomorrow's post) and now needs to be rejigged to accommodate this one :-)
Posted by Gerald | December 29, 2005 8:53 PM
Posted on December 29, 2005 20:53
I enjoyed this - we read it at my book group and I got really into it - though not everyone felt it was believeable - I think they might just lack imagination at times! I didn't like lovely bones in comparison I thought was over-rated
Lx
Posted by Leelou | December 31, 2005 12:33 AM
Posted on December 31, 2005 00:33