The Time Traveler's Wife by Audrey Niffenegger

I have just arrived home from my two week holiday in Greece (I am beautifully burnt) where I spent around 99% of my time reading. I started my little book challenge absolutely ages ago now, and had got a little way into this book (the theme being a book that was made into a movie) but had to stop with exams and the end of term and then the summer holiday hibernation and Guidepost.

Nevertheless, I got on the plane and clicked onto The Time Travellers Wife on my kindle, excited for everything that would await me within its pages.

I have seen the movie three times before, so I did have a pretty good idea about what was going on, but I can imagine that if it was your first time reading it, the premise would be quite confusing.

Basically, it is about a man called Henry who involuntarily travels through time. As he goes through his life, getting older he just pops up at random places in random times. He is drawn to important events more and more. The story is really about his wife (but you'd never guess it by the title) and how they met, and the struggles that they face as she goes through her life with him constantly disappearing.

The first time that Clare (the wife) met Henry, she was 6 and he was 36 I think, when he travelled back in time. The first time Henry met Clare was when he was 28 and she was 20, but she had already known him for 14 years. See what I mean? It's quite difficult to wrap your head around.

When you do manage to understand what's going on (because Henry jumps around A LOT at the beginning) the story is absolutely lovely. It's quite a long book with only a few things that happen in it really, but because if the way that it is told with so much detail and all of the added complications of Henry jumping around it makes it really interesting to read.

One thing that I do really quite like about it is that Henry really isn't a very nice person, he's what we can an anti-hero. When he turns up somewhere in time nothing comes with him, not even his clothes, so he has to break in and steal and pickpocket whatever he can find and often gets into trouble with the police because of this. Of course, he can never stay under arrest for long because he disappears back to the present.

Now, fair warning, it's a pretty sad book and a sad story. Personally, I think that the overall premise is quite a sad one - a woman forever waiting for her husband to come home from wherever he is in time and not being able to do anything about it. But the ending is very sad. I didn't cry at it, but both my mum and my sister did when they read it, so I am clearly the cold hearted one in the family. I feel like the sad ending comes really quite suddenly in the book, whereas in the film there is much more of a build up to it.

Of course I do need to talk about the film, starring Rachel McAdams and Eric Bana, it's actually really good. It is a very good and close adaptation of the book, though it does of course miss out some of the less important points in the book due to it being like 500 pages long. I would recommend watching it, but I'm a great believer in reading the book before watching the film (though I am sadly very hypocritical here!).

So there we have it, my review (or my ramblings) about The Time Traveller's Wife. I did enjoy it and I do recommend it to anyone who enjoys a slightly teary romance to curl up with! The next category in my book challenge is a book that you picked solely because of the cover, and I am going to be reading I'll Give You The Sun by Jandy Nelson.

See you soon!