#BookTwins If You Like The Time Traveler’s Wife you might like All Our Wrong Todays by @elanmastai

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Book Twins

“If you read … you’ll like …”

When you’ve read a book, do you sometimes find yourself thinking “oh, that really reminds me of *insert name of another book*”?

Welcome to a new feature, in which my team and I make reading suggestions based on your favourites, be they classics, or newer best sellers.  Our recommendations consider not just genre, but writing style, plot—and that ‘feel’ you can’t quite put your finger on.

This week’s choice is from team member Alison:

If you liked ‘The Time Traveler’s Wife’ by Audrey Niffenegger, you might like:

‘All Our Wrong Todays’ by Elan Mastai

Tom lives in a different 2016. A better 2016 than the one we had (which, to be honest, isn’t that difficult) made possible by a never-ending source of clean energy discovered in the 1950s. Tom’s world is peaceful, carefree, perfect. But his life isn’t. His father, a brilliant scientist, is distant and disinterested. Tom feels like a failure.

It’s quite a complicated plot, but suffice it to say, Tom falls in love with the beautiful Penelope, messes with his father’s time machine, changes the course of history and ends up in our 2016.

The concepts behind time travel give me a headache. I just can’t get my head around the whole idea. I loved ‘The Time Traveler’s Wife’ though, because it’s not really about time travel – it’s about relationships and life and it’s so much about the characters. And ‘All Our Wrong Todays’ is about the characters too – and Tom can’t get his head around time travel either. But he has to sort things out to save all those people he accidentally got rid of. Of course, it isn’t that simple. There’s his new family to consider, who are much nicer that the old one. And there’s the new Penelope too.

Tom is a great main character. Aware of his short-comings, he’s an honest narrator. The reader really feels his panic about what he’s done, the dawning reality of where he is and what his new life means. The novel explores his complex relationships, and at the heart of this is a love story, just like ‘The Time Traveler’s Wife’.

It’s clever, well-written and very readable despite its complexity.

I still don’t really understand time travel though.

Amazon.co.uk   Amazon.com

Have you read either of these books?

23 thoughts on “#BookTwins If You Like The Time Traveler’s Wife you might like All Our Wrong Todays by @elanmastai”

  2. I’ve looked at ‘The Time Traveller’s Wife’ a few times, but I always put it back down again. Not sure why. Not heard of the other book though but can see the correlation between the two.

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  3. Ah, time travel has long been one of my greatest wishes – not the future, far too scary, but I’d love to go back….

    I’d like to write a book based around it some time; I’ve made tentative steps with a reincarnation based short story in Patient Zero!

    Good to see another Book Twins post – I hope this idea starts to gather momentum 🙂

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  5. Enjoying the new feature. Oh, time travel has me scratching my head too, but I keep reading books about time travel in the hope that eventually I’ll ‘get’ it. I loved The Time Traveler’s Wife, so I’m going to put All Our Wrong Todays on my to-read list. Thanks.

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  6. I love this feature, Rosie! I did enjoy The Time Traveler’s Wife (although sad to read) so I’ll check this one out. Thanks! MRS N

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  7. Thanks, Alison. I can’t say I understand time travel either (although I like the idea). I’m another one who’s looked at the Time Traveler’s Wife but never actually read it. Intriguing!

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  9. The Time Traveler’s Wife (which was written in a unique style) broke my heart…as did the movie. It was such an original idea and a complex relationship story. Decades ago, I enjoyed Jude Deveraux’s romantic time-travel novel, A Knight in Shining Armor. She since updated the book, and I wish she hadn’t. I liked the first version better!

    Thanks for sharing, Rosie. Did the same.

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