The Tolliver family members are cursed by their ability to slip outside the time stream and travel backwards or forwards – or even make it stop.
Waldemar Tolliver thought that time travel was a ridiculous notion found only in the third-rate pulp sci-fi novels written by his father.That was until Waldemar himself stopped moving forward in time. Abandoned and alone after a failed romance,Waldemar takes to writing the history of his family, from the first moment his grandfather slipped in and out of time with enough frequency to understand what he had done but not quickly enough to avoid being run over by the one car in the small Czech town of Znojmo.
At that point, the accidental loss of time had an impact on the lives of the Tolliver family members for generations.Waldemar’s journeys through his family history, guided by his eccentric aunts, brings him face to face with his uncle’s past as a war criminal, his grandfather’s theory of time slips and his father’s willingness to embrace a role as the figurehead of a quasi-religious order based on the science fiction stories he wrote about intergalactic time wars. However, his real problems don’t start until his uncle steps into contemporary New York, fresh from escaping Russian soldiers in 1945.That’s when things really get strange.
John Wray’s novel takes the reader through the past, present and future of Waldemar as he wrangles with the demons of his own life and tries to make sense of the memories and reminiscences of the lives of his forebears.
By exploring how people create their own memories and history, Wray has given readers a challenging but enjoyable read.
Reviewed by David Johnson
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