The Time Travelers Wife

Audrey Niffenegger

With this title, you might expect pure sci-fi. And while the plot mechanism is time travel, this is not really sci-fi. Instead, it is a romantic drama. It is an investigation into relationship and self identity. The story follows Henry, who is a CDP (chronally displaced person). That is, he time travels. Sometimes forward, sometimes backward. He does not control any of it, so finds that it happens often when his is stressed or anxious. The brilliant storytelling here is that each section begins with a date and Henry's age. Something like 'October 17th, 1998. Henry is 32 and 41. Claire is 24'. But these sections do not proceed in an strict chronological order, but are presented in such a way as to reveal the nature of the relationship between Henry and his wife Claire. So as the story progresses, as a reader I am working through what each character knows (or doesn't know) based on what they have experienced. This is great fun as a reader. However, as sci-fi, the time travel is nice. That is, Henry gives some soft explanation about fate, what can and cannot be altered based on information shared. But this is never really pushed (nor does it need to be for this novel). The breaking of time continuity is pushed a bit with Ingrid (Henry's ex-girlfriend), but a true sci-fi treatment might really investigate the nature of fate and information. Or the mechanism of the travel itself (which is also touched on superficially). But then it would be a totally different novel. So read this as a dramatic, fictional novel that uses time-travel as a device (much like Black Out is a historical fiction about WWII London that uses time-travel as a device). In both cases, time travel is not the essence, but the mechanism to tell a good story. With that expectation, you will enjoy this book.

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