No True Echo~Gareth P Jones | Review

Title: No True Echo
Author: Gareth P Jones
Genre: Middle Grade Science Fiction
Length: 288 Pages
Release: October 2015
My Rating: 3/5 Stars

I Received a copy of this novel through Netgalley in exchange for an honest review.

Review

I love time travel books and books that mess with time in general, so the idea of this book was immediately appealing to me. Basically Eddie lives in a town everyone finds boring, until a girl shows up that Eddie feels like he knows. And she's doing some pretty odd things. The people who seemed stable and constant in his life are suddenly flighty. And then alternate time lines get involved. Nothing will be the same again. 

This book was a lot of fun to read. I found the idea of the Echo Technology fascinating. The concept of being able to create echoes of your life in different time lines where things are almost, but not quite right. When books mess with time it's just plain interesting. I also really liked the change in perspective that would take place. Some chapters were first person from Eddie and others were third person from the perspective of Officer Liphook. Again, changing perspectives is something I really enjoy. 

The main reason I didn't fall completely in love with this book was the characters. While I really liked them all and think they had potential, I never really felt invested in any of them. With more development into their personalities this could have been a four or five star book. I need strong characterization in general to really enjoy a book and I just felt that somewhat lacking. There was potential, it just wasn't fully reached. 

The explanations about the time travel and Eddie's place on the sidelines was also a bit confusing, particularly later on. Obviously it's difficult to give a great explanation of the technology, since it doesn't exist. But I think this could have been explored and explained with a bit more detail and I would have been able to follow along better. 

While I didn't think this book was fantastic, it was really enjoyable and I would recommend it if you enjoy time travel and middle grade stories. Definitely enjoyable.