Book Review: The Time Traveler's Wife

The Time Traveler's Wife by Audrey Niffenegger
This book was another one that I nominated for the book club that I belong to... I had read it before and wanted to share it!

I found some wonderful summaries of this book, but they were really long, and I don't want anyone to get bored with this post. Here is a good short one from About.com. The original can be found HERE.

About.com Review:

If you read the back of The Time Traveler's Wife by Audrey Niffenegger you may wonder whether it is science fiction or romance. It is neither. This is not your average time travel fantasy involving a machine and scientists eagerly trying to break the space-time continuum. In fact, Henry DeTamble wishes he did not travel through time. He does so involuntarily, and when he does, he wakes up in another place and time, naked, nauseous and ravenously hungry. Henry's time travel drives the story, but is not really what the story is about.

The Time Traveler's Wife is about love. It is not, however, a romance novel, or anything close to it. The novel pushes on philosophical questions of meaning and purpose. It is built around connections and longings. At the center, there is love, but there is also a lot of real life description--family tensions, punk rock shows, jobs, friendships. Niffenegger describes the world so realistically that you will find yourself believing that some people are actually plagued with involuntary time travel. If you are like me, you'll also wish Henry and Clare were your friends.

One of the best things about The Time Traveler's Wife is the way it is told from two perspectives. It also does not follow linear time. The structure mimics the lives of the main characters. In doing so, it enhances the empathy you feel for them.

I highly recommend The Time Traveler's Wife for anyone who wants a compelling read that will give you much to think about and feel.

My Review:

As I mentioned before, I had read this book a few years ago, and really enjoyed it. It had been awhile since I read it, and since the movie is supposed to be out later on this year, I thought I'd nominate it for our book club to read (we like to go see movies together too!).

I enjoyed this book just as much as I did the first time I read it. It has a very unique and interesting story-line, as well as a wonderful love story. I know that from the title and description this may sound like a sci-fi book, but I hardly think it could completely fall under that classification, so don't let that scare anyone off!

While one of the main characters (Henry), is a time-traveller, the story doesn't revolve around the science or details of his time travelling. Rather than focus on this (which could turn this into a Sci-Fi genre), the story focuses on the relationship between Henry and Clare, and their most uncommon and NON-sappy/mushy/cliche love story (if that makes any sense). While Henry is involuntarily time travelling, Clare must patiently wait for him, sometimes for years at a time.

I don't want to go too much further into the plot, since it is summarized pretty well above without giving any "spoilers".

Bottom Line: I would definitely recommend this book. I do want to say that the book club had mixed feelings on the book, mostly due to the sometimes confusing issue of the time travelling, and where he is, and how old he is (and as a result, how old Clare is). This is something that I had to overlook (and NOT over-think)... I think in the end it all makes absolute sense and was a beautiful love story. Although some of the other readers were confused about the time-travelling issue, they did say that they liked the love story aspect of the book.

As I mentioned before, the movie comes out later this year (IMDB currently says August, but still no trailer for the movie). Since there isn't currently a trailer, here are some pictures from the movie that were on IMDB. The leads will be played by Eric Bana (The Other Boleyn Girl, The Hulk, etc) and Rachel McAdams (The Notebook, Mean Girls). I'm really excited about the casting choices!

Have you read this book? If so, what did you think?

-K