When Alex gets a laptop for his birthday from his zany godfather, he is a bit disappointed. It's not as new as the computer he got for Christmas, and he's not sure what sorts of games he can play on it. He takes it to his room anyway, and starts setting up the computer. He accidentally sets the time to 20 minutes earlier, so he presses Ctrl-Z to undo it... and finds himself exactly where he was 20 minutes ago. Alex discovers that Ctrl-Z will take him back to any time he punches in, and he goes about making the most horrendous mistakes, consequence-free! He takes a spin in his mother's car, trashes the fancy dinner plates, and hoses down the class know-it-all. For Alex, it seems like nothing in his life can go wrong ever again!
This is for sure a "lessons" type of book, and it can seem quite boring in the beginning, when Alex keeps repeating scenes. The pace picks up after a few chapters, and Alex's misadventures get pretty daring. The magical element of Ctrl-Z is never explained, but the reasoning behind some plot points is pretty interesting--especially when Alex finds himself in a dangerous infinite loop when his best friend tries to undo his own mistake with Ctrl-Z! The family stuff was dumb, with Alex trying to undo his parents' fights and solve their problems for them. I was really hoping they'd get divorced and he'd realize there were some things that couldn't be fixed, but it all ends happily. Boo! A pretty didactic story in some parts, but overall interesting enough to recommend as a short-ish chapter book for kids old enough to be familiar with keyboard shortcuts.