Timeshares [Mass Market Paperback]

Time travel has been invented, and somehow it's in the hands of someone who wants to turn it into a means of history tourism. Of course, there are problems with that. Such as, nearly everyone who goes back in time is going to have an ulterior motive. How could they really expect people not to interfere? In theory it's impossible to alter the past, and any changes that are introduced fix themselves back to the way things were. But naturally, theory and practice don't always line up perfectly...

Stories touch on the Mona Lisa, the Titanic, da Vinci, missing tribes of Native Americans, the Garden of Eden, saving dead relatives, fixing one's own past life, and of course, dropping in on the life of Jesus himself. Meanwhile, the different stories dance in and out of each other's spheres of influence, largely adding to each other by touching on similar subjects or spending time with one or two of the same people.

That gets undermined a bit by some of the differences. In some stories Timeshares is a slick, corporate affair. In others it seems to be represented by dingy little offices. In some there are security officers or police who try to keep people from messing with the past; in others folks are allowed to try what they want. In some stories the past really is inflexible, while in others, not so much. To counter this, however, I admit that one of the later stories, Michael Stackpole's By Our Actions, seems to present a sort of answer to these inconsistencies that very nearly ties things together.

Naturally, this being an anthology, and on a topic that begs such a wide variety of approaches, you're invariably going to find one or two stories that don't thrill you quite as much as others. The overall quality is quite high, however.

[NOTE: review book provided by Penguin Group]

The idea of time travel is possibly one of the first fantasies of all time. This anthology goes a step further and has the writers basing their stories on one company providing time travel to the public. But that is where the consistency ends. Each story has you nodding your head and thinking, "Yes, that's the way it would be" until you read the next. Imaginative, engaging and well-written, an excellent read for all.

I'm halfway through this book and I am enjoying it a lot. I agree it would make a great tv series something on the order of fantasy island maybe. Some of the stories are ok, others grab you and leave you all misty eyed at the end which is hard to do in a short story format. Well worth the money. I particularly like Kelly Swail's short story.