2008 Woodie Awards
Writing Skills Exists In Author's First Novel
Lauren Abruzzo
Issue date: 2/9/05 Section: A&E
Audrey Niffenegger's first novel, The Time Traveler's Wife published by Harvest Books, works on three different levels: as a profoundly realistic character study, as a captivating science fiction tale, and an intensely heart-wrenching love story.
Envision yourself reading a book. You've just reached the climax, and you're turning the page when suddenly you find yourself standing naked in 20-degree weather on the side of an unknown road. You don't know where you are, what time it is, what day it is, let alone what year it is.
Lead character Henry DeTamble, a Chicago librarian on the outside, a punk rocker on the inside, doesn't have to imagine this scene: it's his life.
Henry was born with "chrono displacement," a disorder which causes him at random times to suddenly disappear with no warning and reappear in the past or the future, usually in a time or place of significant importance in his life.
When Henry was 5 years old, his mother was killed in an automobile accident. Henry was in the car, however, with the sudden stress of the crash Henry found himself traveling through time and watching the accident seconds later from the side of the road.
Henry often finds himself comforting his younger self on the side of the road, watching and re-watching his mother's horrific death.
His mother's sudden death, and the fact that Henry survived caused his father to resent him. Which resulted in Henry to be raised by his landlord and be physically and emotionally distant from his father.
Then there is Clare Abshire, an artist who leads a rather normal existence and who also happens to be the love of Henry's life.
Clare is unlike Henry in every way. She comes from a large loving family that has money and she lives her life in sequential order.
In present time Henry meets Clare on Oct. 26, 1991, when he is 28 and she is 20. She approaches him excitedly, exclaiming that she has known him all her life. Henry, on the other hand, has never seen her before.
Envision yourself reading a book. You've just reached the climax, and you're turning the page when suddenly you find yourself standing naked in 20-degree weather on the side of an unknown road. You don't know where you are, what time it is, what day it is, let alone what year it is.
Lead character Henry DeTamble, a Chicago librarian on the outside, a punk rocker on the inside, doesn't have to imagine this scene: it's his life.
Henry was born with "chrono displacement," a disorder which causes him at random times to suddenly disappear with no warning and reappear in the past or the future, usually in a time or place of significant importance in his life.
When Henry was 5 years old, his mother was killed in an automobile accident. Henry was in the car, however, with the sudden stress of the crash Henry found himself traveling through time and watching the accident seconds later from the side of the road.
Henry often finds himself comforting his younger self on the side of the road, watching and re-watching his mother's horrific death.
His mother's sudden death, and the fact that Henry survived caused his father to resent him. Which resulted in Henry to be raised by his landlord and be physically and emotionally distant from his father.
Then there is Clare Abshire, an artist who leads a rather normal existence and who also happens to be the love of Henry's life.
Clare is unlike Henry in every way. She comes from a large loving family that has money and she lives her life in sequential order.
In present time Henry meets Clare on Oct. 26, 1991, when he is 28 and she is 20. She approaches him excitedly, exclaiming that she has known him all her life. Henry, on the other hand, has never seen her before.