Life Turns On A Dime! 11/22/63 - Stephen King Book Review


WARNING: Contains some spoilers!

Life turns on a dime! I love this saying and it is very fitting. It pops up a lot throughout this novel. 

 11/22/63 is a novel about Jake Epping a divorced high school teacher who is one day summoned by Al Templeton the owner of a local diner that he frequents and it is here he discovers that there is a time portal in the pantry that leads to September 9, 1958 at 11.58 am. At first Jake is hesitant but after a short trip to 1958 he is convinced. Jake learns that Al is dying with cancer and wishes Jake to go back in time to change history as he will no longer be able to. Al explains to Jake that he wants him to continue his mission of going back in time to stop the assassination of John F. Kennedy which happened on November 22, 1963. He also explains he can spend any amount of time in the past but when he returns to the present only 2 minutes will have passed. A reset is also possible by returning back.

 Jake decides to test this by going back to try and prevent an alcoholic father from severely injuring his son, one of Jake's current students (Harry Dunning) and murdering Harry's siblings and mother. He spends a few months is the past and finds that the past does not want to be changed. He manages to save everyone but one of Harry's brothers. When he returns to the present he finds out that Harry was killed in Vietnam. Before he has a chance to ask Al any more questions Al commits suicide by taking too many pain killers and Jake takes all of Al's notes and heads back to 1958 to carry out the mission.

 Jake once again saves Harry and this time his whole family by murdering Mr Dunning well before that fateful night and then travels to Texas to wait for Lee Harvey Oswald to return to the United States so that he can watch and wait to see if there is any clue as to whether it was Oswald who pulled the trigger and killed JFK.

 As much as I loved this book I have to admit that it was very long and at times slow paced. I do love how much time and research would have gone into this book. Did you know Kmart used to be known as S. S. Kresge? I didn't. This book will definitely keep you guessing and make you wonder about the past and time travel. I love how it's part love story, part science-fiction, part history. I like the ending which I found out wasn't the original ending that Stephen King intended but it works and it's believable. I'm not big on science fiction but I loved this book and I love the way Stephen King writes. It's one of those easy to read books where once you start you lose track of time and your surroundings. I honestly felt like I was standing there with Jake Epping throughout the whole novel.

 So what would you do if you had the opportunity to go back in time? Would you take it? Would you try to change anything? I personally think everything happens for a reason and wouldn't want to change anything. 'Sometimes the wrong choices take us to the right places' and also 'life turns on a dime.' 

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