My book this week starts in a rather unusual way. The main character has a heart attack and dies. So if you think about it, you really know how his story will end from the beginning. But Ken Grimwood's Replay twists the understood meaning of time and plays with the notion that you can change everything about your life, but there is only one time of death.
43 year old Jeff Winston dies and wakes up as his 18 year old self. He has all the knowledge of his life as he lived it, but he is indeed a teen. Stumbling along for years, he dies again at age 43. And comes back to the same age as before, only it's a few hours later. Continuing the cycle over and over again, he does consistently and drastically change his life, although the changes never carry through from one replay to the next, and it's increasingly later each time he comes back (first a day, a few days, a week, months, and so on). Jeff also meets another "replayer" with whom he forms a relationship, but shifts in time make meeting and remembering each other difficult. They always wonder if the current replay will be their last. Replay won the 1988 World Fantasy Award for Best Novel.
For another interesting look at time, watch Groundhog Day with Bill Murray. A man must live the same day over and over, remembering everything. Is this a nightmare, or an opportunity? Check out the DVD at KCPL.
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