return to home  
Join   |  Gift   |  Member Login   |  Library Login
BookBrowse Mobile
Follow Us: 
   Reader reviews

Read what people think about The Time Traveler's Wife by Audrey Niffenegger, and write your own review.

The Time Traveler's Wife

The Time Traveler's Wife
by Audrey Niffenegger
Hardcover: Aug 2003,
518 pages.
Paperback: May 2004,
560 pages.

Publication information
First book/First Novel


Author Information
Critics' Opinion:   
Readers' Rating:  
About BookBrowse Rankings
Share: 
Buy This Book
Page 2 of 9 There are currently 51 reviews
for The Time Traveler's Wife
Select your view:
Order Reviews by:
Click Here To Write Your Own Review
Rated 2 of 5 of 5 by Cree
Journey Man was Better
The only thing remotely interesting about this book was the time travel concept. However, the tv show, Journey Man did a much better job tackling the concept than the book. This book goes on and on with over-the-top, unnecessary descriptions of paper and art, seemingly just for the sake of displaying the author's knowledge of the subject. Unfortunately, it did not add anything whatsoever to the story, but was a struggle to get through. Furthermore, Henry and Clare's "love story" was so robotic and hollow in feel. You can't just write about how much people love each other, not back it up with anything other than the "suspense" of waiting to see the other person and then sell it as a real love story. Not to mention that the sexual interactions were very bluntly written, not in a way that a couple in love would describe things. Not worth the time to read, now if only I could go back in time and choose not to read it...

Rated 5 of 5 of 5 by Mary
Rich Love Story for those who love to read!
In my book club we all take turn selecting our monthly pick. So when my friend Mary, selected this as her choice, I think I rolled my eyes. However, after the first few chapters I was sucked into Henry and Clare's very complicated life. This story line is so involved that the reader almost has to read it twice to follow Henry's time traveling. However, the read only need read this book once to feel and understand the power of Henry and Clare's love for each other.

I do not believe I would have selected this book to read on my own. I am grateful to my friend Mary for making all of us in our book club read it.

Rated 5 of 5 of 5 by Kim
Beautiful book
I read this book early last year and still think about it often.

OK, it's not a model of fine literature.
It's also not a well-crafted work of science fiction.

If those are the reasons you're looking at starting this book, never mind, you probably won't like it.

It's a love story (although not a sappy, bodice-ripping Harlequin Romance kind of thing). It a beautiful, involving, original tale that stayed with me for a long time. I thoroughly enjoyed it. It's been one of only two books I've recommended to my reading friends in the last year.

Rated 2 of 5 of 5 by Gail Wood
The Time Traveler's Wife
I found The Time Traveler's Wife, although quite original in concept, to be one of the more boring, contrived, and melodramatic love stories I have read to date. I was bothered by many aspects of this novel---the convenience and ease of their wealth, Clare's excessively blue-blood upbringing (the setting of her childhood home could just as easily have been a southern antebellum plantation, replete with slaves), each character's entry read like a middle school journal, and the dating of each entry, along with giving the various ages of the two lovers at the time, got more and more tedious and confusing as the novel progressed. I do not see what all the fuss is about. I only hope that I can soon forget the names Henry and Clare.

Rated 2 of 5 of 5 by Harrold
Porno Sci Fi
Pornography meets science fiction.

Self-absorbed, self-indulged protagonists slog through their meaningless lives accented only by binges of alcohol, drugs, oral sex, and punk-art.

Hope comes only in knowing that Henry really will die and that Clare (who care nothing for Henry, but only for the fantasy of him during his absences) will live on in loneliness. Ugh!

Well written if the author's desire is for us to wish Henry and Clare a classic No Exit existence. BTW Dasein is seriously misunderstood in this novel. Of course, so is punk, but likely the author is just hoping nobody noticed.

To be fair, the author did not promise us characters that we would like or even care about. She delivers well on that non-promise.

Could have been reduced to a short story with no content loss.

Rated 5 of 5 of 5 by deej
Unforgettable
Some people are literature snobs and will criticize this book. I've heard it - too much petty detail, too much sex, too little development of Gomez or Charisse or Ben.

And I can see that. And I don't effing care.

This is a beautiful book that, if you let it, will affect you so strongly you won't be able to forget it. I like the writing style - its sophisticated without being pretentious. You feel as if you are in Henry or Clare's mind, rather than having it be told to you with censors. The story therefore leaves a lasting, raw impression.

My friends and often comment we "want a Henry". But Henry DeTamble isn't all that fantastic. He is very flawed. What we want is the undeniable, time-leaping connection he has to Clare...so honest and natural and true.

You will fall in love with their love. Its like no other love story you have read. Despite the fantastic plot, it rings completely true. That's the important part of the story. Everything else is just icing on the cake.
«  prev   1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9   next »

Lists of books with similar themes


Read-Alikes


Other books by Audrey Niffenegger
Buy This Book:

Become a Member
Golden Boy
Editor's Choice
  •  May 23 
  •  May 21 
  •  May 20 
And the Mountains Echoed
Khaled Hosseini

And the Mountains Echoed Jacket

Khaled Hosseini has written a new novel about how we love, how we take care of one another, and how the choices we make resonate through generations
Helga's Diary
Helga Weiss

Helga's Diary Jacket

The remarkable diary of a young girl who survived the Holocaust—appearing in English for the first time.
Fever
Mary Beth Keane

Fever Jacket

A bold, mesmerizing novel about the woman known as "Typhoid Mary," the first known healthy carrier of typhoid fever in the burgeoning metropolis of early twentieth century New York.
Click Here
   Most Recent Blog Entries
Movies Based on Books: Summer 2013 (May - August)
Jewish Young Adult Books That Are Not About The Holocaust
Books to Give This Mother's Day
rss  RSS   rss  subscribe
Recent Reader Reviews
Two Lives by Vikram Seth
Two Lives is a memoir written by international best-selling author, Vikram Seth. In this interesting and engaging book, Seth writes about his great... read more
Z: A Novel of Zelda Fitzgerald by Therese Fowler
Z, the novel about the life of Zelda Sayre Fitzgerald is at points charming and; like another reviewer, I kept thinking of the movie, "Midnight... read more
Flight Behavior by Barbara Kingsolver
Although heavy on the scientific details, which slowed down the story for me (OK, I admit, I was one of those liberal arts majors who skipped out on... read more
RSS RSS feed More...  
Most Viewed This Week
1. Wonder
R.J. Palacio
2. A Child Called It
Dave Pelzer
3. The Glass Castle
Jeannette Walls
4. The Notebook
Nicholas Sparks
5. The Boy in the Striped Pajamas
John Boyne
More...
Book Club Recommendations
Why Be Happy When You Could Be Normal?
by Jeanette Winterson
Paperback (Mar/13)
Eleanor & Park
by Rainbow Rowell
Hardback (Feb/13)
The House Girl
by Tara Conklin
Paperback (Oct/13)
The Painted Girls
by Cathy Marie Buchanan
Hardback (Jan/13)
More...
First Impressions
Members read and review books often months before they're published. See what they think in First Impressions!
Golden Boy
by Abigail Tarttelin
4.5 Stars            (May/13)
The Caretaker
by A .X. Ahmad
Four Stars            (May/13)
The Sisterhood
by Helen Bryan
Four Stars            (Apr/13)
The Last Girl
by Jane Casey
Four Stars            (May/13)
More...
  Latest BookBrowse News
Judge rules unused Borders gift cards to be worthless (May 23 2013)
Borders owes nothing to holders of roughly $210.5 million of gift cards that had not been used by the time the bookstore chain shut down, a Manhattan federal... Full Story
rss RSS feed More...
 
BookBrowse Poll
Q: Which of these Summer movies based on books would you like to see? (Info on each movie here)
The Great Gatsby
Epic
Man of Steel
World War Z
The Lone Ranger
The Wolverine
R.I.P.D.
Percy Jackson
Paranoia
The Mortal Instruments
Select Any That Apply
Search: Title or Author
Free Newsletters
The Light Between Oceans

Online Book Club
More about
The Comfort of Lies
Join the discussion!


Win This Book!
On Sal Mal Lane


"Piercingly intelligent and shatter-your-heart profound."

Enter To Win Now!

wordplay
Solve this clue:
"I Y N P O T Solution, Y P O T P"

and be entered
to win....
frame top
New Author
Interviews
Menna van Praag
Erica Brown
Helga Weiss
Kate Morton
frame bottom
HOME Book Submissions | Advertising | Library Subscriptions | Reviewing for BookBrowse | Contact Us