Review: Tempest by Julie Cross

The year is 2009.  Nineteen-year-old Jackson Meyer is a normal guy… he’s in college, has a girlfriend… and he can travel back through time. But it’s not like the movies – nothing changes in the present after his jumps, there’s no space-time continuum issues or broken flux capacitors – it’s just harmless fun.

That is… until the day strangers burst in on Jackson and his girlfriend, Holly, and during a struggle with Jackson, Holly is fatally shot. In his panic, Jackson jumps back two years to 2007, but this is not like his previous time jumps. Now he’s stuck in 2007 and can’t get back to the future.

Desperate to somehow return to 2009 to save Holly but unable to return to his rightful year, Jackson settles into 2007 and learns what he can about his abilities.

But it’s not long before the people who shot Holly in 2009 come looking for Jackson in the past, and these “Enemies of Time” will stop at nothing to recruit this powerful young time-traveler.  Recruit… or kill him.

Piecing together the clues about his father, the Enemies of Time, and himself, Jackson must decide how far he’s willing to go to save Holly… and possibly the entire world.

My Review:

Tempest is a fascinating story of time travel.  The plot is fast-paced and exciting, and the story has great characters that you will love.  The way that the time travel works is interesting because it doesn't actually affect the future most of the time.

POSSIBLE SPOILERS AHEAD

Jackson is the narrating character, and he is a great character.  He is basically an ordinary teenage guy who also happens to be able to time travel.  The whole time travel thing is confusing to him at first, but he works with his friend Adam to figure out how it works.  He also thinks his dad is hiding some kind of secret about what his job is, and Jackson is right about that.  He finds out more information about his dad's job during some time jumps.  Something interesting about his time jumps is that he doesn't become the person he was at that time.  Instead, he is his present-day self landed in a different year.

I loved the relationship between Jackson and his twin sister, Courtney.  Courtney has already died four years before the 2009 time frame of the book actually starts.  Jackson does see several younger Courtneys in different time jumps to years before her death.  He explains to these Courtneys that he is a time traveler, and they believe him.  One of my favorite parts of the book is the card that a younger Jackson wrote to Courtney before her death but never gave to her.  The love for his sister is evident in the card that he wrote.  I thought this part was just so sweet.  Another scene between these two that was sad was when Jackson time traveled back to the day of her death.  He was there with her when she died, unlike the actual day that she died.  When he was younger, he couldn't bring himself to be in the room when Courtney took her last breath.

I liked Jackson's girlfriend, Holly, in both time frames, 2009 and 2007.  In the 2009 timeline, Holly and Jackson meet when they work at a summer camp.  They develop a relationship, and one day, they are together when some men come into their room and shoot Holly.  Jackson jumps back to 2007 in a new timeline, determined to save Holly's life.  He ends up meeting Holly in 2007.  He is still nineteen-year-old Jackson, but he pretends to be a seventeen-year-old, and he meets seventeen-year-old Holly.  I liked the scene where Holly gives her criteria for her perfect guy, and Jackson charms her by meeting the criteria.  I thought that scene was sweet, even though Holly got mad at Jackson afterward.  I thought Holly and Jackson were an adorable couple, and I loved their love for each other.

If you like YA time travel, read this book.

Katie