Wednesday, December 21, 2016

Review: The Unusual Second Life of Thomas Weaver by Shawn Inmon


Genre: Science Fiction/Time Travel

Description:

A second chance to make it right; a second chance to screw it up again.
Tragedy is the name of the game for fifty-five-year-old Thomas. At least that's what he tells himself as he washes down the handful of little white sleeping pills stolen from his mother. Lying back on his bed, he waits for the reaper to take away the despair. Instead he is transported to a different kind of hell--puberty. Thomas wakes in his childhood bedroom, with his teenage body, and all his memories intact. With a new lease on life he has a chance to do it all right. He will save his brother, change the course of history, find love, and stop a horrific killer. That is, if he can overcome being a pathetic screw-up.”

Author:

Former DJ, business consultant, and real estate agent, Shawn Inmon is now a fulltime author. A regular contributor at Indies Unlimited, Inmon can't seem to decide whether to write fiction (Rock'n Roll Heaven), or non-fiction (his current work-in-progress is based on a trip he took a few months ago, partially chronicled at his ALap Around America website). Then there are his first two books that were novels based on truth or fictionalized memoirs or … I don't know what to call them, but they were somewhere in the middle.

Appraisal:

One reason I always seem to like Shawn Inmon's books is that we're around the same age and overly obsessed with music. So his books have references like the character in this book saying “Oh, and Pablo Cruise sucks. Ten years from now, no one will know who they are,” and I agree and laugh. More importantly, I get the reference. Many of you won't. If your high school years were sometime in the 70s and you haven't read all of Inmon's books, you should.

If high school was before or (even more so) after the 70s there are still plenty of universal and timeless themes in all of Inmon's books. The Unusual Second Life of Thomas Weaver possibly more so than any other. We've all made decisions in our life that we wonder about. Was that a good decision? What would have happened if I'd done this instead? If I'd have known this was going to happen, I wouldn't have done that.

The basis of this story is a different twist on time travel when the protagonist who has been haunted by a big mistake in high school finds himself transported back to before that mistake. He's not only back in time, but he looks like he did back then. The only difference is that he knows what's coming. Unless he can change that. It's a great premise. I found myself pulling for Thomas, wondering what he should do, and hoping he'd figure it out. That's at least part of what you'd hope for in a story like this. And really that's enough. However, if it sparks a little introspection, if you start wondering what you'd do differently if you were transported back in time, even better. (If you wake up tomorrow and find out that I've become a major shareholder in Amazon, that means my plan worked.)

Buy now from:    Amazon US    Amazon UK

FYI:

A small amount of adult language.

Format/Typo Issues:

No significant issues.

Rating: ***** Five Stars

Reviewed by: BigAl

Approximate word count: 75-80,000 words

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