I love time travel. To me, nothing is better than a good time travel book. (I know I say this every time I review a book with time travel.) I have read and enjoyed Emma Straub’s other books, so I was eagerly looking forward to this one. I was thrilled when I learned it would have time travel in it. (Also, you have to love Straub, as she owns an independence book store in Brooklyn.)
In This Time Tomorrow, Alice’s life at 40 is not what she expected. She is single, in a dead end job she has had forever, and her father is dying. Alice wakes up after her disappointing 40th birthday to find herself reliving her 16th birthday. Alice tries to figure out what to do differently this time around, so that her life at 40 will be better than the one she remembers.
In a clever twist, Alice’s father, Leonard, has made a fortune from a novel he wrote about a pair of time travelers (which was made into a very successful TV show).
Straub is an excellent writer. I love how she captures the city, both today and back in 1996. (She does city so well in her books, one of the things I love about them.) She also does a wonderful job of portraying the loving relationship between Alice and her dad. It is so refreshing to not have a dysfunctional family at the heart of a novel. Straub said she wrote this book when her father (Peter Straub, also an author) was sick in the hospital.
The plot is well drawn, with a few surprises thrown in. In addition, Straub is so insightful (I loved the quote from the book which I have used to title this post). I highly recommend this book, even for those not obsessed with time travel!
