17393023Title: Time After Time

Author: Tamara Ireland Stone

Publisher: Disney Hyperion

Publication Date: October 2013

Genre: Young Adult Fiction/Fantasy

Series or Stand Alone: Series, Book Two

Synopsis can be found here.
I received this book free from the publisher in exchange for an honest review.

Review:

Anna and Bennett. Two people who shouldn’t be together. But Bennett’s gift, time traveling, has enabled him to find Anna, to love Anna. And maybe even lose Anna. Bennett has to skip his own present to live in Anna’s past. But at what cost?

Book Two picks up right where book one left off, so if you haven’t read book one of Time Between Time, then go buy it now. This isn’t a series you can jump into easily.

Anna only gets to see Bennett every few weeks as he shuttles back and forth between her present/his past and his present/her future. Hopefully that made sense to you. Go ahead, re-read that sentence. I’ll wait.

Of course this isn’t an ideal situation and it is slowly taking its toll on both his present and his relationship with Anna. Then, Bennett does something he swears he would never do again- alter an event. Suddenly, Bennett is seeing his ability in a whole different light. I liked how this pulled Bennett’s character into deep struggle to understand his power and also what is morally right and wrong. It also added depth to his relationship with his family, his father in particular.

Now here is where it gets interesting. In the first book, there was an instance when Bennett changes a major occurrence and therefore, alters the present day, shooting them off onto a new time line. While although this new time line may not be better or worse for these characters, it was certainly different and gave the reader their first taste of what happens when you alter major events in the past. Book Two allows us to see what happens when Bennett, with good intentions as always, changes huge events. He may save lives, but he also alters the course of the universe, and there will always be consequences to that.

I am a little disappointed that there were more consequences, actually. I love time travel books and the actions Bennett takes in this book are so drastic and over the top, it seems like there should have been way more repercussions than there are. Shying away from these potential disasters in the time line made the book less real for me, and greatly decreased the level of urgency and danger I felt the characters were in.

Bennett’s voice is deeper than Anna’s and book two adds some interesting layers to Bennett and his gift. Shifting through these different times, his story was really interesting, and introduced me to all of these different characters.

The ending left me  luke warm, as it doesn’t seem like anything is really resolved. And there are some major plot holes that keep coming up that continue to frustrate me. These holes are usual whenever someone deals with time travel and going back and changing the past. I may have screamed against them during the first book, but by now, I’m invested in the characters and story and I look past them. Will they annoy others who read this book? Yes, probably. But my gift of suspended belief is pretty strong! 🙂

Overall, a good sequel that continues the story. But I wish there was more to it.

Rating 5 Okay