The Time Traveler's Wife

Written by Audrey Niffeneggar and having now been made into a film starring Rachel McAdams and Eric Bana, The Time Traveler’s Wife is magnificent book that I think contains the most amazing romantic story of all time. It’s completely original and will have you flipping through its pages at amazing speeds, dying to know what happens next. A balanced story of love, drama, complications, and loss, The Time Traveler’s Wife is one of my favourites and, since reading it, I have been on the lookout for more of Audrey Niffeneggar’s works. The excitement that ensued when I discovered Her Fearful Symmetry, another Niffeneggar book about twins, cannot be described. It’s original stories like these that create a love of writers and you’re eager to grab any other works that they’ve done to see what other ideas they can come up with. 

The power of Audrey’s books comes in the in the form of her completely original story ideas and her ability to make the abnormal and strange seem almost commonplace. The thrills and emotions and complications that make the book so captivating and impossible to put down evolve naturally and that is because Audrey has come up with a simple but strange story idea and these characters that are strong enough to hold their own. This book is a fantastic book! 

This is the extraordinary love story of Clare and Henry who met when Clare was six and Henry thirty-six, and were married when Clare was twenty-two and Henry thirty. It’s impossible but true, as Henry suffers from a remarkably rare condition where his genetic clock spontaneously resets and pulls him suddenly into his past and future. In the face of this force that neither can be prevented or controlled, Henry and Clare do the best they can to lead normal lives, but with a time traveller for a husband, it was always going to prove to be a struggle. 

Aside from the obvious time travelling complication, the story is remarkably simple and one that everyone, couples in particular, can relate to. The characters are your carbon copies of everyday people and lovers and although sometimes their dramas do not seem all that engaging, the way Audrey writes them makes them real hotspots of emotional turmoil and adversity. 

The book is written in the first person from both the perspectives of Henry and Clare, which makes the love story all the more real and intricate and emotionally substantial. There is such a strength in the way Audrey writes when she’s writing for Clare and Henry that it is almost like having a heartfelt conversation with your closest friend, and not just reading a book. 

Audrey’s style of writing and format of the book is very reflective of its characters, in particular that of Henry, as it spontaneously jumps from time to different time, character to different character. On one page we are reading about Clare meeting Henry in the present, when she knows him but he does not know her and the next, we are reading about how they first met when Clare was six and Henry thirty-six. It’s very jagged, very wonky, but once you get used to the spontaneity of it, it becomes second nature to be reading in the present and then suddenly reading in the past. 

The one thing I found tricky was the becoming familiar with all the different dates. Some dates are revisited and it becomes important for you to remember them; remembering dates, for me, is not a strong point. You pick up the gist of what’s going on at any rate. 

Filled with strong characters, drama, time travel, empowering romance, emotional turmoil, and a nice touch of comedy, The Time Traveler’s Wife is a magnificent book that, once you’ve picked it up, you simply cannot put down.