Wrong Place, Wrong Time by Gillian McAllister
Book Overview:
In Wrong Place Wrong Time by Gillian McAllister, we follow the story of Jen and her family after an unthinkable act of violence takes her on a journey to uncover the truth before it’s too late.
Jen is a successful divorce lawyer who’s happy and content with the mundane daily trappings of her life. She’s happily married to Kelley the man of her dreams and they have a brilliant son Todd. And on Halloween, she eagerly awaits for her teenage son Todd to return home. Sitting by the window she notices him walking towards home when suddenly he veers off the path and violently murders a mysterious man hiding in the dark near her home.
Shocked by the brutality of the act that her son committed she rushes out of the house calling for her husband Kelley to help. Trying to make sense of her son’s actions and the dying man in front of her she tries to get answers from her shocked son and visibly upset husband. The police and paramedics arrive and her bright young son is arrested. The traumatizing night carries on with Jen and Kelley feeling helpless as to how to help their son.
After a fitful night of sleep, Jen wakes up the next morning expecting to take charge of the situation but through a series of events realizes she’s moved backward in time before Todd committed the heinous crime. This pattern continues leading Jen to believe she’s supposed to unravel the truth about what drove her son to murder. The farther back in time she goes the more she realizes that the life she’s come to love isn’t what it appears to be. And, that a dangerous secret has infiltrated her family and led to the unthinkable happening.
Book Review:
I enjoy books that manipulate time and found this idea of being able to travel back in time to prevent a person you love from committing a crime to be immensely intriguing. From the beginning, this story was well-structured and executed with flawless finesse. While this story isn’t action-packed or fast-paced it isn’t a slog. McAllister’s ability to maintain your attention while slowly revealing the clues indicating the key twist in the story allows you to play detective and piece everything together which I found intellectually stimulating.
The elements I found to be the meat and potatoes of this story are the time travel, Jen’s determination to save her son, and how everything built up to the final twist being revealed.
The time travel was such an interesting choice for this story. Who wouldn’t want to travel back in time and get the answers for life’s more life-altering situations especially those concerning our loved ones? So, this appealed to me immediately. While in the beginning, it took Jen a little bit to understand what was going on and accept she was the only one in this time loop once we get over that hump the story really takes off.
Each successive jump back in time reveals key information that initially makes no sense at first glance. However, I found this to be super intriguing as it got the wheels in my head turning trying desperately to uncover the truth. I found McAllister did an excellent job maintaining the plot and keeping the story on track as we traveled further back into the past.
Next, Jen’s love for her son is another key piece in this story. I believe that the whole reason this phenomenon was kickstarted was due to her dogged determination to protect her son at all costs and get to the truth. It also does a brilliant job of exploring the depth of a mother’s love with her child. Jen often questions if her busy career has led her to neglect her son causing damage to their relationship and leading to his violent behavior.
Her guilt as a mother was thick and palpable as she worked to unravel what led to her son’s actions and what if any role she played in the events that transpired on Halloween. This was such an interesting topic to explore and gave Jen an air of believability making her relatable. I’m sure many mothers can connect to Jen’s feelings and struggle to be a good mother while simultaneously pursuing her career aspirations.
Lastly, the build-up to the twist was exquisite. I mentioned earlier how little clues and reveals shared throughout the story didn’t make sense in the beginning making it a challenge to piece everything together. McAllister did an excellent job of misdirection by casting suspicion on another character making you believe one thing and then slowly reveal their true nature.
So, when the twist is finally revealed it all makes sense building a complete picture as to not only why Todd was compelled to commit murder but also hidden truths directly impacting her and her family. Everything came together perfectly and made sense as you looked back and connected the dots. I felt the story was well-rounded and the conclusion was satisfying.
I enjoyed this book except the author continually repeating certain words or phrases for emphasis. This drove me a little crazy but aside from that this was a highly engaging and well-executed thriller.
