What do you think?
Rate this book
Time Travel Rescue: Escape from the 21st Century
Could you live in a world where personal vehicles are outlawed? Where coffee is a luxury for the elite? Where you are limited to three ounces of alcohol a day? Where food is manufactured? Could you live in a cube measuring 21-feet on each side and connected to thousands of other cubes in a massive complex that sits on the toxic remains of Mother Earth? This is the only life Rick has known in his 32 years. Now, in the year 2212, he has the means to go back in time and set things right. A chance, online meeting with a young hacker named Chen leads to a perilous journey through a wormhole back to the 21st century where he and Chen hope to set things right before they go terribly wrong. Unbeknown to Rick is Chen’s propensity for violence. Rick’s 21st-century guide, the smart and attractive Jill Strawbridge, takes an interest in her visitor from the future, a work assignment that becomes more than just a work relationship. While Rick is charmed and intrigued by 21st-century life, Chen racks up murderous misdeeds that complicate their altruistic mission. In the end, did Rick accomplish his mission to change the course of events in Time Travel Rescue.
288 pages, Kindle Edition
Published November 23, 2019
11 people are currently reading
8 people want to read
About the author
Tom Kranz
14 books5 followersTom is a Philadelphia native whose 40-year journalism expertise includes radio, television, print and online. He holds a bachelor’s degree in communications from Temple University. He was a New Jersey certified EMT from 1999 to 2021 and served as a volunteer EMT on his local rescue squad in New Jersey. He is still a certified CPR instructor and a life member of the rescue squad.
He worked in Philadelphia radio and television from the mid 1970s until 1991. From 1992 to 2007 he was a producer and senior producer at CBS News. After retiring from the TV news business in 2007, he spent 12 years as director of communications for Chelsea Senior Living and two years as public information officer for the borough of Fanwood, New Jersey.
Tom has written seven books. His single non-fiction book, Liveshot, details his on-scene assignment as a producer for WCAU-TV in West Philadelphia during the ill-fated 1985 MOVE confrontation. During this event, the city attempted to evict the MOVE group from a rowhome but succeeded instead in burning down the house, the entire city block and killing all 11 people inside.
His other six books are novels. Three focus on a married couple, the Bud & Maggie Series, and their struggles with Bud’s sublimated anger and Maggie’s ambition. Two are science fiction stories with climate change as the backdrop, the Earth-Moon Series. His latest work, Wreck and Return, is the story of Griffin Ambrose, a volunteer EMT whose volunteer life and professional life in the TV news business lead to stress, self-medication and a disastrous turn of events that result in a death, injured colleagues, jail and Griffin's exile from EMS. He finds a path to redemption, however, as patients who he helped in his 20 years as an EMT wonder if all the good he did should be erased by one mistake?
Tom resides in New Jersey where he hosts a podcast on creativity and does freelance communications work.
He worked in Philadelphia radio and television from the mid 1970s until 1991. From 1992 to 2007 he was a producer and senior producer at CBS News. After retiring from the TV news business in 2007, he spent 12 years as director of communications for Chelsea Senior Living and two years as public information officer for the borough of Fanwood, New Jersey.
Tom has written seven books. His single non-fiction book, Liveshot, details his on-scene assignment as a producer for WCAU-TV in West Philadelphia during the ill-fated 1985 MOVE confrontation. During this event, the city attempted to evict the MOVE group from a rowhome but succeeded instead in burning down the house, the entire city block and killing all 11 people inside.
His other six books are novels. Three focus on a married couple, the Bud & Maggie Series, and their struggles with Bud’s sublimated anger and Maggie’s ambition. Two are science fiction stories with climate change as the backdrop, the Earth-Moon Series. His latest work, Wreck and Return, is the story of Griffin Ambrose, a volunteer EMT whose volunteer life and professional life in the TV news business lead to stress, self-medication and a disastrous turn of events that result in a death, injured colleagues, jail and Griffin's exile from EMS. He finds a path to redemption, however, as patients who he helped in his 20 years as an EMT wonder if all the good he did should be erased by one mistake?
Tom resides in New Jersey where he hosts a podcast on creativity and does freelance communications work.
Ratings & Reviews
Friends & Following
Create a free account to discover what your friends think of this book!
Community Reviews
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews
Read
December 10, 2024I am one of the judges of team Space Girls for the SPSFC4 contest. This review is my personal opinion. Officially, it is still in the running for the contest, pending any official team announcements.
Status: Cut
Read: 30%
Yes, just as the title hints, we have a time travel story! Chapter 1 is pretty intriguing... or more like it feels like a prologue. Random guy enters a cube(?) semi floating subway car for a routine business trip, and before he knows it, the poor sap stumbles on a cornfield... 150 years into the past!
There's a few chapters in the POV of the 2130's timeline issuing reports about the errant time traveller Rick who doesn't seem all that happy about being stuck in the past. These chapters were arguably the best in the book while much to my chargin, also the shortest.
I did like some elements in the book along with the general plot. Rick is for the most part likeable and acts endearing when he eats ice cream for the first time. Apparently the future in the 2200s sounds like a technocratic dystopic nightmare where the world is polluted and humans live most of their lives in tiny prison cubes watching big screen tvs all day. Rick is used to being a reclusive shutin and I quite wished this book had made him more fearful of seeing the outdoors. I also was left yearning for him to play with grass and maybe fall into some poison ivy due to sheer ignorance. That would have been real fun.
In fact, while I liked Rick, I just felt like he was more a clumsy foreigner from a megacity during a brief trip to suburban USA than a guy from the future. He understands 2130s English perfectly well and there is no mention that vanilla is now artificial. Given orchids are unbeknownst to most laymen an endangered species with critically low reproduction rates, I was expecting natural tasting vanilla to become an immensely expensive treat reserved only for the highest echeleons.
Likewise, the US government quickly realizes Rick is from the future, but he isn't locked up in a secure military bunker or in the best of cases, a gated community where he has some freedom of movement. It seems odd they just let him wander everywhere without knowing what he knows about the future. Even odder, the 2130s is supposed to be riddled in petty crime, yet Rick doesn't seem to worry about random muggers. I am surprised the US military didn't even do a full body CAT scan the day he showed up acting confused.
Jill is supposed to be his handler whose job is to teach him how to ride cars and gain his trust. There seems to be a romance plot going on, although I didn't feel much chemistry between them. I enjoyed the POV chapters happening in the 2200s where some scientists investigate Rick's cube condo and the transport wagon for anything suspicious.
Writing quality seems to dip in quality depending on the kind of POV we get. The interview report chapters were great, along with the scientists from the future. But the chapters describing what Rick sees in the 2130s used way too much telling and not enough showing. Most sentences in these descriptive chapters start with pronouns, where we get up to 7 sentences in a row starting with the word He.
Despite these issues, the book is endearing, it's cute, feel good and certainly promises to entertain the reader. We are starting to discover Rick's true intentions within the 30%. Despite enjoying the book, I feel there's other books in the competition group with much more consistent writing. Therefore, this is a cut for me.
Status: Cut
Read: 30%
Yes, just as the title hints, we have a time travel story! Chapter 1 is pretty intriguing... or more like it feels like a prologue. Random guy enters a cube(?) semi floating subway car for a routine business trip, and before he knows it, the poor sap stumbles on a cornfield... 150 years into the past!
There's a few chapters in the POV of the 2130's timeline issuing reports about the errant time traveller Rick who doesn't seem all that happy about being stuck in the past. These chapters were arguably the best in the book while much to my chargin, also the shortest.
I did like some elements in the book along with the general plot. Rick is for the most part likeable and acts endearing when he eats ice cream for the first time. Apparently the future in the 2200s sounds like a technocratic dystopic nightmare where the world is polluted and humans live most of their lives in tiny prison cubes watching big screen tvs all day. Rick is used to being a reclusive shutin and I quite wished this book had made him more fearful of seeing the outdoors. I also was left yearning for him to play with grass and maybe fall into some poison ivy due to sheer ignorance. That would have been real fun.
In fact, while I liked Rick, I just felt like he was more a clumsy foreigner from a megacity during a brief trip to suburban USA than a guy from the future. He understands 2130s English perfectly well and there is no mention that vanilla is now artificial. Given orchids are unbeknownst to most laymen an endangered species with critically low reproduction rates, I was expecting natural tasting vanilla to become an immensely expensive treat reserved only for the highest echeleons.
Likewise, the US government quickly realizes Rick is from the future, but he isn't locked up in a secure military bunker or in the best of cases, a gated community where he has some freedom of movement. It seems odd they just let him wander everywhere without knowing what he knows about the future. Even odder, the 2130s is supposed to be riddled in petty crime, yet Rick doesn't seem to worry about random muggers. I am surprised the US military didn't even do a full body CAT scan the day he showed up acting confused.
Jill is supposed to be his handler whose job is to teach him how to ride cars and gain his trust. There seems to be a romance plot going on, although I didn't feel much chemistry between them. I enjoyed the POV chapters happening in the 2200s where some scientists investigate Rick's cube condo and the transport wagon for anything suspicious.
Writing quality seems to dip in quality depending on the kind of POV we get. The interview report chapters were great, along with the scientists from the future. But the chapters describing what Rick sees in the 2130s used way too much telling and not enough showing. Most sentences in these descriptive chapters start with pronouns, where we get up to 7 sentences in a row starting with the word He.
Despite these issues, the book is endearing, it's cute, feel good and certainly promises to entertain the reader. We are starting to discover Rick's true intentions within the 30%. Despite enjoying the book, I feel there's other books in the competition group with much more consistent writing. Therefore, this is a cut for me.
September 14, 2021
I have to admit it wasn’t until I got about a third into this story that I moved from three stars to five. It took me a while to get in to it and it didn’t seem to have the pull that I’d experienced with other books that took my fancy, however, once past that 33% it began to wind me in hook, line, and sinker and I couldn’t read it fast enough. I think this publication could be turned in to a neat little mini-series and to me well worth the five stars I’ve given it. Try it, you’ll like it.
July 26, 2024
Enjoyable action packed book
I was hooked from the beginning. Anything to do with time travel fascinates me, and the author has one heck of an imagination.
Found it interesting, some parts humorous, never a dull moment.
Who knows if one day we'll have flying cars like in the story, that would be cool. I liked the main character and was rooting for him on his mission. Looking forward to reading book 2.
I was hooked from the beginning. Anything to do with time travel fascinates me, and the author has one heck of an imagination.
Found it interesting, some parts humorous, never a dull moment.
Who knows if one day we'll have flying cars like in the story, that would be cool. I liked the main character and was rooting for him on his mission. Looking forward to reading book 2.
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews