01 / 31 / 16 || 3/5 STARS

Rewinding Theo

❝ I just want to say thank you for featuring my book in WIA MONTHLY -5k, it means a lot. :3 Thank you to everyone who has picked up my book and to the ones who were with me from the start! ❞

Congratulations to theketchupchips, also known as Simone, and her story, "Rewinding Theo," for becoming this month's featured story.

Rewinding Theo is a story about twenty-one year old Theodore. After Theo suffers a head injury, he has an unusual problem: every time he falls asleep, he wakes up ten years in the past. In his first two jumps back in time, he accidentally takes his roommate Raina, a bartender named Apollo and an aspiring physicist named Harvey with him.

As Theo's condition worsens, they continue to jump through time, simultaneously trying to find a way to get back to their present time. Yet with a hidden bomb, a missing cousin and the sudden recruit from the FBI in 2014, Theo has to find a way to control his abilities to help others in need before it is too late.

For me, Rewinding Theo is a journey for those who like Time Travel stories involving characters with easygoing personalities. It is not a thoroughly edited story, and seems to be the rough draft, it was an okay read. Although some bits and pieces seem confusing, it makes more sense in the later chapters. For me, I was not immediately hooked into the story. However, as time passed the concept of Theo's injury grew and it was increasingly interesting to read.

▬▬▬▬ END OF NON-SPOILER SECTION ▬▬▬▬

Currently, I have not finished the story, but I will be reviewing everything up to the point I am at.

Rewinding Theo itself is not an extremely complex story. Things happen pretty quickly and for some people it's a good thing. For me, however, it was one of the reasons I was not immediately hooked to the story.  I enjoy stories with a slow build up to the important scenes.

The descriptions for the settings are wonderful. However, if you hadn't read the character descriptions you wouldn't really get a clear picture of what they look like. I would really like it if Simone had described the Raina and Theo in the first chapter, rather than only knowing that Theo has dark hair.

I will not be commenting on the missing editing or whatnot, because I'm really focusing on the plot and the storyline.

I think Simone did a good job with the plot and Theo's injury. Her imagination really shone throughout the pages of Rewinding Theo, especially Theo's constant thing for red that was always between the pages somewhere, because it really lead me to wondering what it was about.

They had the idea that he was time-traveling quite quickly, which seemed a bit odd for me. This was one of the only reasons Rewinding Theo wasn't as realistic as I hoped it would be. It would've been nice they got to know each other a bit more before traveling so much, but as a fast-paced novel, it was alright.

I was quite annoyed with Raina throughout the book. I'm sure she was there to give a little more of casual conversation to the story, but she seemed to be stalling the plot a bit. My favorite character would have to be Theo or Harvey, simply because they seemed to be the only one who was actually confused / terrified as to why they were time-travelling. It made Rewinding Theo a lot more realistic in a sense.

❝ "It's just... time travel. It's so unrealistic but I'm ten years in the past and... It feels wrong." Raina popped out of nowhere and nestled her head between us. Her large hair landed on both of our shoulders as she turned to look at us. ❞ [IV]

Ignoring 'large hair', can I just talk about Raina for a second?

Theo and Apollo are trying to have an actual conversation about time travel and then she just comes up to them, then Theo ends the conversation there. I was looking forward to some Theo X Apollo time. To add on, Raina literally had her head on their shoulders for about ten seconds before running into the convenience store. What was the point of that exactly, Raina? 

I can feel the Raina X Theo vibes and I'm not even done with the story yet. No one comment if Raina and Theo become a thing otherwise I will literally kill you. To be completely honest, he'll probably end up with Apollo anyway.

One of the things that bother me was how Raina and Theo knew each other for such a long span of time, and even though Apollo met Theo the other day, they acted as if they had been best friends too. If I was Apollo and some guy from the bar dragged me ten years into the past, I would not want to be buying chips and flirting with him.

Overall, Rewinding Theo was an easy read and had a nice plot. If a few things were edited and changed I could easily see it becoming a phenomenal story.

Please note that this was my personal opinion and this review was not meant to offend anyone or anything in any way.