Rating  - Extremely strong premise
With over 300 reviews, it's clear this book has struck a chord with readers. I found it in a charity book store, and was intrigued by its one sentence 'hook' about what would happen if you could live your life over and over and over again.
For the first three quarters of the book, the author delivers 5 star material. In particular, the 'second time around life' of the protagonist is rendered in exceptionally compelling and believable detail that kept me turning pages with scarcely a thought about anything else.
The book goes off the rails a bit in the last quarter. However, I cared about the main character and his love interest all the way through the book. Moreover, although their is a fantastic premise at the heart of the book, I would not classify this book as fantasy or science fiction. it's really speculative fiction, done well, off of a heckuva premise.
Rating  - Let down ending....
I agree with most of the reviews - it was a great book. After many repetitions of the theme, I had to wonder where it was going. I am not going to spoil the ending, but will say that I was disappointed, apparently others were not. For me it was anti-climatic. It built up to a let down.
There should have been some sort of explanation for the phenomena. Maybe the sequel will cover it, or the movie!?!?
Rating  - 'Replay' delivers big time
I love 'Groundhog Day' and 'Back to the Future' trilogy, so this book was right up my alley. I'm not going to bother with the synopsis; there is already enough of them posted in these other reviews.
I bought this from Amazon and received it in the mail yesterday. I started reading it this morning and finished it tonight. I COULD NOT PUT THIS BOOK DOWN, resulting in a nonproductive day.
After getting nearly halfway through the book, I figured that there can't be much more Ken Grimwood could touch on. Was I ever wrong! Even while reading the last 2 chapters, I couldn't figure what was next.
Ken Grimwood did a wonderful job of thinking this through completely and resulted in a knockout! Definitely a must-read for anybody who has ever daydreamed of 'what if I could do it over...'.
Rating  - Seen This Idea Done Better
A person mysteriously repeats part of their life, usually one day, sometimes longer. The repeating loop plot idea has been around for ages, and Jack L. Chalker's 'The Wonderland Gambit' trilogy took a riff on it involving parallel yet separate worlds.
This particular offering revolves around an everyman with a troubled marriage and unrealized dreams. He dies in 1988 and wakes up in 1963, back in college. He goes a bit nuts, then relives his life and makes a fortune from sports betting and stocks, then dies in 1988 again. The novel continues exploring his situation, and Grimwood 'breaks' the loop by introducing the idea of 'skew,' whereby the time-jump keeps ends up a little later in the character's lifetime with every repeat. It's as explained as much as the typical deus ex subspace anomaly or magic spell.
Overall the book was merely OK, as themes Grimwood played with are much more developed in any popular fanfiction genre, where the 'repeating your life but better' plot is extremely common. Fan authors rush to write super-Harry Potter who uses his foreknowledge as 'the power he knows not' or an Anakin Skywalker who doesn't turn to darkness knowing where it leads. If you are unfamiliar with this branch of fiction, then this average offering will satisfy you, as it does communicate the ideas. As someone who has read science fiction and fantasy novels for over twenty years, I've read and seen superior works that take this idea further.
Check out these if you want to see the idea explored further:
Chalker's take, which blurs reality and virtual reality to create the loop: (The Cybernetic Walrus (The Wonderland Gambit, Book 1), March Hare Network (#2) (The Wonderland Gambit , No 2), Hot-Wired Dodo (The Wonderland Gambit, No. 3)).
Heinlein's superior use of time-travel to alter one's life: The Door into Summer
Groundhog Day (Special 15th Anniversary Edition) and Peggy Sue Got Married the movies. Grim Grimoire the PS2 video game. Episodes from Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Star Trek, Star Trek: The Next Generation, The Twilight Zone, and probably some other sci-fi shows.
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Customer Reviews for Harper Paperbacks,068816112X,9780688161125,068816112X,813.54 |
