Birdyline Book Blog

I recently took a trip to the library while at home for winter break and picked this book off the shelf with varying expectations. On one hand, the premise seemed exciting- a mother witnesses her son commit a murder, and then wakes up the next day to relive the day. She’s in a time loop- and yet stopping the murder doesn’t break her out of it. The next day, she wakes up another day earlier. That’s right- she’s not just stuck reliving that specific day, she’s moving backwards in time. On the other hand the whole time paradox thing is so painfully overdone, and I feared that nothing could make up for it.

Fortunately, my fears were for nothing. This was a very enjoyable book.

I entered the book with hope and was met with- confusion. I won’t lie, the book started slow and underwhelming. I wasn’t invested and I was a little confused. On page sixty something, the perspective randomly changed and that made me angry. I hate split perspective books, especially when I didn’t know they were one. This book really isn’t though, it just lets the reader in on some secrets on occasion by switching to a side character. This might still be annoying to some readers but believe me- it’s worth it.

I didn’t feel like I’d end up liking the book until page one hundred thirty six. On my Goodreads status I wrote “Ok book… you got my attention. I’d like to note that this book is nothing special so far BUT it has its moments and it isn’t bad. It’s not deserving of the judgy two stars I have it last night. It’s up to three for me today.” A little while later the rating went up to four, and I ended up being more and more satisfied as I continued reading.

The place where this book really shines is the plot twists. “It seems like everyone has something to hide” is a frequent description of mystery books- and yet this is the first one that I felt it was a fair statement. These plot twists aren’t particularly shocking, but that’s because you’re led gently into some of them. Early on in the book you’d never guess. I have to say I almost prefer that to the punchy, sudden plot twists that mystery books try to push on you. This book kept me invested in discovering them. The only two I was disappointed were a set that were both revealed the exact same way- at the very end of the split perspective portions.

Now, as in many books that deal with science, (though I wouldn’t call this one science fiction) the actual science was lacking. The only scientist character in this book was used as a plot device to explain things to the MC and reader. He even explained things that just would not be defensible by science. When asked if he thinks her actions on the days she lives will affect the future he says no unless they effect the thing you were sent back in time to fix… boy what? How would a scientist make that assumption about a theoretical and technically impossible scenario? Why would a scientist assume without reason that someone is in a time loop to stop something from happening outside of the fact that that is the case in movies? Why would he assume she wouldn’t affect anything else? I guess the readers were expected to be so conditioned to this aspect of time loop plots that they would be blind to this silliness.

If it helps, we are offered an explanation on the last page that explains how it was possible for her to enter a time loop. I won’t spoil it but believe me i want to. It was good. It was a simple definition of a word that explained everything without needing to add subtext. It defended the science and closed out the book simultaneously, and well.

Overall, I ended up giving this book four stars and I stand by it. It could have been better- both by fixing whatever was wrong with the whole scientist bit, and by speeding up the plot at the beginning.