Buying Time

by Roland Mann

There are no do-overs in life…or are there? If you had a chance to re-do part of your life, would you? Even if it meant dying earlier?

That’s the decision Tom Morgan and Larry Pace must make when they are approached by a time traveling time salesman. Complete opposites, both men are drawn to the idea for the same reason: to save someone’s life. But is that even possible? Can the past be changed? Should the past be changed? Add to that the problem that it’s very addictive, like a dangerous drug. Each trip back in time shortens life.

235 pages, Kindle Edition

First published May 3, 2010

About the author

Roland Mann is a writer, editor, speaker, and professor. As writer, he is best known for his work on Cat & Mouse, a comic which ran for nearly two years, garnered critical acclaim and led Roland to other work. Other titles Roland wrote include Rocket Ranger, Miss Fury, Planet of the Apes: Blood of the Apes, Krey and Demon’s Tails.

As editor, Roland is best known for his time as a Malibu/Marvel Comics editor where he edited The Protectors line of comics and many Ultraverse titles. While there, he developed a knack for finding and promoting new and budding creative talent. Roland also served as Editor and Publisher of Silverline, a line of independent comics that included such titles as Switchblade and The Scary Book.

Roland received a Master of Fine Arts in Writing from Spalding University, a Master’s degree in English from the University of North Alabama, and a
Bachelor of Science in Creative Writing from the University of Southern Mississippi. In addition to his work in comics, Roland has been a newspaper editor and an advertising flunky, but more recently he has taught English at the university level. He is also a frequent speaker at writing workshops/conferences where many find his sessions encouraging.

Roland is on the Faculty at Full Sail University where he teaches Creative Writing.

Reviews

[Jennifer Kyrnin · Rating 1 out of 5]

This book was a fast read, which was good, as by the time I got near the end I was so tired of it I was glad it was over.

Firstly: If you are looking at this book because it is marked as "Science Fiction" you should probably put it down. Science Fiction, as I understand it, is fiction that is based on a scientific premise. Most scifi authors look at a scientific theory and then think "what if..." As far as I could tell, there was no scientific theory that this book was based on. "Time travel" or "what if you could go back in time" is not a scientific theory that I am aware of. Please let me know if I am wrong.

Secondly, I would classify this book as Christian Fantasy. As such it is a fine book. By the end of the book two men are saved and dedicate their lives to Christ. The protagonist recognizes his errors in seeking to relive his live with his wife and comes back to God. But because I was expecting a real science fiction story, the Christian elements got to be almost painful. I don't need to be hit over the head with a clue stick, but that's what seemed to be happening all the time in the story.


I completely understand that the protagonist would be upset that his wife has died. But his two teenaged daughters seem to have no sadness whatsoever. Even when you know your loved one has gone to a better place to take her place next to God, you still miss them. Yet those girls never seemed to cry.


Also, the women (what few there are) in this story are paper cutouts of people. The wife is a super human Christian who apparently did nothing wrong in her life ever. The two girls are perfect angel teenagers (is that even possible?). And no other woman stood out in the story for me. In fact, Tom sees a woman at Big Ben's house talking to Ben as he walks up. She leaves as he arrives. And her appellation in the book is first "the blonde", then "red dress" -- as in "he slowly walked toward Big Ben and the red dress." And then as she's leaving she's called a girl. Fine, I get that she's an extra, and not terribly important to the scene, but really, must you turn her not only into a child ("the girl") but also into only her physical attributes ("the blonde") and finally, and worst of all a physical object ("the red dress")? This character is displayed over 7 paragraphs on page 45 and not once is she addressed by name, even when Ben is talking to her. And she is twice referred to as "the red dress" rendering her not only not a person, but just a piece of clothing. She isn't even flat as a character she's just a dress.

Finally, the last thing that really annoyed me was all the assumptions that Larry and Brother Joe and others made about the strangers that crossed their paths. Specifically that these strangers had not been saved. The book seemed to be saying that by simply being in the car accident Mike and Tom were automatically assumed to be non-believers. Sure, it became apparent almost immediately that they weren't saved, but that assumption annoyed me. Halos and horns aren't immediately visible to most people. And even if you have accepted Jesus Christ as your lord and savior, that type of x-ray vision is unavailable.

If you come into this book knowing that it's a Christian Fantasy book, you will enjoy it. But if you come into it as I did, expecting Science Fiction, you probably won't. At least I didn't.

[Elden · Rating 2 out of 5]

I won this book on a goodreads first read giveaway. I found the overall writing in this story to be good, though I did find a spelling error on page 92 where the author used correctly when he should have used corrected. Also, the idea behind this story was great, a time-traveling time salesman, and I was excited to see where the author would go with this.

Unfortunately, it turned out that this novel was not a science fiction story like I expected, instead it was a Christian fiction story. The mechanics behind time travel are never explored and absolutely nothing to do with science is done in this novel. In fact, if you replaced time-traveling time salesman with wizard with magic time spell you would have a better explanation behind the time travel in this book, as you could just account it to magic. This does not mean that the book was bad, just that it is not science fiction.

I did a count of how many times certain words appeared in 19 pages (pages 60-79) and this is what I got:
Time: 25 God: 21 Christian/Christ: 6 pray: 3 Jesus/Holy Spirit/Heaven: 8

These numbers hold true throughout the book and is something you should be aware of before you start reading.

Overall this was an easy read if a little heavy on the god side. Towards the end I started to enjoy it more but this is not something I would normally read.

[Schledia Phillips]

I liked the concept behind this book. If you could travel back in time and relive a part of your life, would you? Should you? It does make you stop and think about things like that. I think it could definitely cause some debate concerning death. Is it always a person's time to die when they die? Personally, I don't think that is the case, but this book did a good job of making me question my beliefs on that issue. It urged me to look to why I believe that a life can be taken before God intends for it to be.

[Carol MacInnis · Rating 4 out of 5]

I won this book from a 'Goodreads' contest. Although I am not a spiritual person, I felt myself stopping every so often throughout this book to pause and think back over my life and to change the many wrongs I have done to right them. What a concept to be able to do that. This book gave me a much clearer understanding of how one's faith can alter you forever. This was a wonderful book and certainly one to read for those who are soul searching.

[Michael · Rating 5 out of 5]

I won this book in a give-a-way. This book is an excellent read. It was a real page turner and very thought provoking. The book has a good story line and interesting characters. If you could change the past would you. Even if you could should you? After reading this book you may rethink how you feel about life and death.

[Ben Kline]

Can't wait for it to arrive!