Time Out

by J. Cassidy

Given a key that offers all the joy that time has, Ben is more than a little sceptical. It's too much to believe that he really could save his wife, go back to a time when everything was still full of promise or even see the dinosaurs...
“Try it. Go on, prove me wrong.”

16 pages, Kindle Edition

First published July 2, 2015

About the author

I'm J. Cassidy and I used to be an oak tree growing in a park in England. I still like to be decorated once a year.

I like pink, sparkly fluffles and rainbows.

Reviews

[Adam Oster · Rating 5 out of 5]

Although this book is only 16 pages long, it tells a story that could easily have been a novel. Yet, that's a credit to Cassidy's talent, in that she (he?) is capable of condensing something so dense down to so few words without making it feel like anything was left out.

Here we see a rather fantastical time travel tale, but one that, although at first seems quite light-hearted, ends up being one of the darkest of such tales I've ever read...and the most thought-inducing.

I loved this book and have a very difficult time reviewing it without giving too much away, but if you've got a spare thirty minutes (you know, for you slow readers), I'd highly suggest you pick this one up immediately!

[Niels Saunders · Rating 5 out of 5]

Time Out is gripping, emotional and powerful read. It starts with an extraordinary event: a man named Ben is offered a mysterious key by a shifty man in an alley who promises it will change his life. The key, supposedly, will allow the wielder to travel in time. Ben is naturally incredulous but follows the man's instructions to satisfy his curiosity. Amazingly, it works.

Needless to say, Ben makes the most of his time-travelling key, revisiting important moments in his life in an attempt to make things better. I'm sure we've all wondered what we'd change about our lives if we could, and Time Out is a fascinating study of that idea. It also neatly sidesteps time-travelling paradoxes in a very clever way which made me wonder about the nature of memory and how memories can resurface suddenly with no apparent reason.

The way Time Out tackles family tragedy is well-observed and believable. Although it's never spelled out, the reader can guess at the terrible event which has befallen Ben in the past through indirect references in the dialogue. It's just like the way, in life, we skirt over the details of tragic events because they're too painful to discuss.

Although this is a story ostensibly about time travel, the real focus is on emotion and regret and the way our minds deal with emotional trauma. Despite the fantastical premise, the characters all act sensibly and believably, which really draws you into the story and gets you emotionally engaged.

Highly recommended!