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Time After Time

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Megan Gallagher has only ever seen her mother as neurotic and overworked.

When a Whitney Houston song at the 80s dance sends Megan back to 1987, she discovers her teenage mom dressed in all black and sneaking liquor in the bathroom. After preventing her mom’s drunk car accident, Megan realizes she has one month to get her teenage parents to stop partying, and learn enough about her family's secret to get back home. Too bad the much cuter teenage version of her history teacher is such a distraction. With time running out and her future at stake, Megan must learn that, when it comes to family, you can't always get what you want, but you might just get what you need.

Unknown Binding

Published August 18, 2020

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About the author

Sara Crawford

20 books75 followers
Sara Crawford is an author, a playwright, and a musician. Ever since she was five years old, she has lived for art in one form or another. This manifested itself as writing plays at age eight and convincing (forcing) the neighborhood kids to perform them on her driveway, auditioning for Atlanta Ballet's The Nutcracker three years in a row before finally landing a small role as a toy soldier, starting an all-girl band in high school, writing and producing her own plays and short films, and most recently, writing a YA trilogy about a girl who falls in love with her Muse (THE MUSE CHRONICLES). Sara has been an actress, a singer, a playwright, a songwriter, a guitarist, a keyboard player, a poet, a screenwriter, and an author of both fiction and non-fiction.

She graduated in 2008 from Kennesaw State University with a B.A. in English and in 2012 from the University of New Orleans with an M.F.A. in Creative Writing (emphasis in Playwriting). She has taught creative writing courses for Southern New Hampshire University, and she has been in numerous bands in Atlanta, including Pocket the Moon. She also loves to talk about books, music, and writing on her YouTube channel. For more information visit http://saracrawford.net or https://www.youtube.com/user/saracraw....

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Displaying 1 - 12 of 12 reviews
Profile Image for Christina Rothfusz.
955 reviews25 followers
April 18, 2023
When thinking about time travelling, the 1980's is hardly the first time period that comes to mind, but boy, for nostalgic value, this was fabulous.

Megan has a fascination for fashion and loves nothing more than to be the stand-out at any costume party. When her school has a 80's themed dance she is sure to win - after all, she's just done extensive research on the decade for a history project, even making a mix tape as part of her presentation.

At the dance, she feels herself at one with the music and the time period that a song sends her back to the 80's - 1987 to be exact. Where her serious and overworked mother is a goth, dressed in black sneaking alcohol in the bathrooms.

I loved the references to songs and fashion in the 80's and the socially acceptable norms then and had a smile on my face almost throughout.

A very lite read and I would recommend the audio
Profile Image for Nick.
140 reviews33 followers
August 9, 2022
Great Neon cover! So very 80’s.

That title takes me to the end of Stranger Things and Napoleon Dynamite where the classic Cyndi Lauper song from 1983 plays and is danced to. It is one of the greatest 80’s songs ever!

Megan loves the 80’s and can’t wait to attend her schools 80’s dance. “I wanna dance with somebody” by Whitney Houston (1987 release) starts to play and before she knows it Megan is back in the 80’s.

Megan meets up with her family and stops a car crash that changes the future. What has she done! It turns out her family has a secret which she is a part of and only now, in the 80’s, does she find out.

She meets her teacher who in the 80’s is an attractive, handsome, cute, fun school kid. Way different and younger than his adult self!

Megan’s 80’s family includes her grandpa who died later when she was very young. This is a very emotional moment and Megan loves to spend time with her grandpa while she is in 1987.

Memories come flooding back as I recall the times I spent with my two grandpa’s before they died. How much fun would it be to go back in time and spend some time with my two grandpa’s before they go away.

This is a story very much in the theme of the movie Back To The Future (as many reviews point out) but that is not a negative comparison. I love time travel stories like this as well as hard science time travel.

Time Travel, The 80’s and Nostalgia.

Time After Time has all of these and is a fantastic read.
Profile Image for Nick Vossen.
Author 13 books30 followers
August 26, 2020
Those that know me know that Back to the Future is my all time favorite film ever. So when I got wind of Time After Time I knew it was something I had to read. And it did not disappoint. Sara Crawford has managed to create a fun and quirky novel filled to the brim with an undying love for the 1980s. Sure it might not all make perfect sense, but in a book about timetravel, that is exactly what the term suspension of disbelief is used for. Time After Time is a true loveletter to the 80s and it exemplifies why we still love the decade so much after all this time. Great job!
Profile Image for Elizabeth.
219 reviews26 followers
April 21, 2021
This book was pure nostalgic bliss for me! I'm definitely one of those people who has always been obsessed with the past, so Megan reminded me a lot of myself as a teen, when I longed to live in the 60s. I tore through this book in two days; it had a bit of a slow start, but then I was hooked. Some other reviewers have complained that they think this book is too much like Back To The Future, but I disagree - sure, it resembles BTTF in some ways, but in my opinion, it's just because BTTF is a classic time travel story. Almost all time travel books, especially with the MC traveling to the more recent past, are going to encounter similar problems of "What if I run into my parents/relatives?" or "What if I mess things up and I'm never born?" Those are just time travel problems, and I love them every time. I think TIME AFTER TIME has a fresh, fun take on it!

If you love time travel stories, if you live in a state of constant nostalgia, and especially if you love the 80s, you'll really enjoy this book.
Profile Image for Emma Katherine.
271 reviews15 followers
December 20, 2020
Read my full review here: http://lifesanovelty.blogspot.com/202...



Opinions: To put it simply, Time After Time is a cute story. To put it complicatedly, Time After Time is a heart-throbbing, long-winded, emotional, electrifying tale that will leave you on the edge of your seat and a billion questions boggling your mind. Although it is nearly a scene-for-scene remake of “Back to the Future” (complete with time travelling, a school dance, meeting your parents when they were teenagers, and struggling to not use modern language), this is a fresh and resonating read for its themes on respect, empathy, and self-worth. Not only are readers taught such things through Megan’s 180° personality flip between the beginning and middle of the book, but we’re taught to not judge a book by its cover when we learn that Megan isn’t the entitled, revolting teenager we assumed she was in the beginning. By the climax, Megan and the rest of her family, whether from the original timeline or the past, have a place in my heart.

My Favourite Thing: The abundance of themes is my favourite part, but I also must mention the writing style of Crawford. It is smooth, easy to understand, and very engaging! Not once did I reread a paragraph to understand the sentence structure nor did I yawn because I’d lost track of who’s speaking ten sentences ago. Crawford’s gentle and natural tone made the read easy and fun, how I believe reading should be!

My Least Favourite Thing: Personally, I didn’t have a problem with this, but other readers may have a problem with how similar Time After Time is to “Back to the Future”. Granted, there are only so many traveling time adventures to write AND the overall theme of the novel is different, but objectively, the storylines are very similar.
Profile Image for Heather Kindt.
Author 30 books110 followers
July 6, 2020
I was excited about reading this book because I was in elementary/middle school in the 80s. The book had a slow start for me because Megan spent too much time listing off songs she was excited about hearing at the 80s dance. You have to get through that part and then the story can begin. There were interesting concepts like: what if you thought the younger version of your history teacher was cute? or what if your parents drank and did drugs in high school? Megan was definitely more responsible than her parents. I would have preferred if the author called her parents by their names after a while because "teenage mom" gets to be old. Megan also gets to see how she changes things in the future. Overall, I thought it was a cute story to dream about times when everyone wasn't attached to their cellphones.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
Profile Image for Energy Rae.
1,756 reviews55 followers
August 18, 2020
I asked to review this because I thought the premise of going back to the 80s was fun and could go really far. The cover, with the pink and the neon, suits the theme, and it draws the reader in. However, I think I was more excited about the prospect of traveling back to the 80s than the execution of it. It got a bit repetitive at times, and I was blown away by the number of times Megan kept insisting this was a dream. She would sound convinced but then go back to unbelieving. But when I look past that, there is a fun story here. We get to find out why her mother is strict about certain things, and it gives her some closure about other things. The music mentioned was reminiscent of the junior high dances I attended, which made it fun.
163 reviews7 followers
January 28, 2021
3.5 Stars
Thank you to Sara for gifting me the audiobook for an honest review! Overall, I struggled to get into the story right away, kind of a slow burn. However, once you get to a certain part of this book, it becomes a lot of fun! The amount of 80’s fun that is packed into this book is admirable. So, if you are a fan of the 80’s, you will definitely be tickled pink by this book. While there are so many time-travel stories out there, I could not help but see a lot of similarities to “Back to the Future" (a more fresh and modern version of "Back to the Future"). In sum, this book is easy to understand and keeps you engaged. Time After Time is an easy read that is refreshing while also a fun blast from the past.
Profile Image for Daniel Lewis.
480 reviews3 followers
August 18, 2021
I am a bit of a time travel junkie so I read a LOT of time travel books, its always interesting to see the different takes on it. Its also funny to hear the mistakes an author makes that slips through the editing process. So I had to laugh when the young girl closed the back door of the Porsche in 1987 seeing as how there had not been a Porsche with back doors yet in 1987. Other than that it was pretty entertaining. The author did repeat a few things just a bit too long like she could not get past a certain point in the book, but once she got past the early part where she seemed to have trouble getting the story started the rest of the book was very entertaining.

I hope the author turns this into a series, I would enjoy more stories in this universe.
Profile Image for Tiff Wilson.
258 reviews4 followers
August 25, 2020
If you enjoy stories about time travel or the 80’s, then there is a good chance this book is for you. This was a fun read with lots of 80’s nostalgia mixed in. The only things I was slightly bummed about were that the story could of been a bit more beef up to really immerse one in the story and the MC and George’s storyline- just was off a bit, could of flow a bit more better.
Profile Image for Heather.
37 reviews1 follower
August 18, 2020
Such a cute book! I loved all the 80s references! It reminded me of Back to the Future. Loved everything about the story!
Profile Image for D.M. Domosea.
Author 5 books3 followers
October 12, 2020
Perfect for fans of 80s pop culture--especially music--and the Back to the Future franchise. The writing style and plot development were a bit lacking for me, but it's an indulgently fun and quick read, nonetheless.
Displaying 1 - 12 of 12 reviews

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