Not crazy about the ending, but it was a quick and easy read. Kept me entertained...

One man who becomes two men, Rick and Richard, take 2 paths 13 years before. One man left his sweetheart to persue his acting dreams in NYC. The other married the sweetheart and they built a life with her. Neither man ends up happy with the path they took and wonders "what if". This was an interesting idea and I liked it to the end. Fun summer read.

Writing various movie-reference books, I've seen too many films like this: character who hates their life gets a chance to replace their parallel world counterpart who took a different road. In this case, the protagonist is a)a successful actor, guilty he wasn't back in his home town when his mother and his former best friend died; b)the same man if he gave up his acting dream to marry his childhood sweetheart and never left town. They trade lives before ultimately discovering they were better off where they started out.
Despite being too familiar, I think it was well done. If you aren't as burned out on this sort of thing, you might like it a lot better.

I loved that this book was structured around two characters who have the chance to see how their life would change if different choices were made by swapping lives. I have read Alan Brennert's historical fiction books and am a huge fan of those books. Although this is more of a science fiction work requiring a leap of faith to believe, as always his writing is a pleasure to read and the characters are well developed. Highly recommend this as a fun escape from the world's reality.

I just finished this book and am planning to add my full review later, but for now I just wanted to say a few things. I love the premise of this book. I found it a little slow for about the first third and had a little trouble getting into it. After that, I became absorbed really quickly in the choices each of the main characters started making. That said, I flew through that last half of the book, desperate to know how the whole story would be resolved, and ended up extremely disappointed. The development of characters was wonderful, and I had a really good idea of how Rick and Richard were the same yet different, but Rick was just so unlikeable for me, and I became so attached to Richard that I just couldn't deal with the ending as is. Overall, I enjoyed the process of reading the book and the whole concept. I just was hoping for a different ending.

Terrific book.

Alan Brennert's novel about paths not taken, in which two versions of the same man ('Rick' and 'Richard') swap places. It's very Twilight Zone-ish, with an ending which is more about emotion than and concern for scientific (or even magical) plausibility. I could criticise the book for being predictable; it certainly hits every single expected plot point. Still, it is well-written and the writer has a deft enough touch with human relationships that it is difficult not to get carried along by the narrative and engaged with the characters.

I am very accustomed to reading young adult novels. This was not a young adult novel. This was very adult and I am not entirely comfortable with what I just read.


So what did I think about this book? Well, the premise of this book is that there are two entities, one man, living parallel lives. It is supposed to be a "what-if" scenario. What if you had made a different choice after college and married the woman you loved and gave up your acting career? What if Debra had never aborted Paige? What if Richard lived the life of Rick? Would they destroy each others lives or build them?


At the start, I thought Rick and Richard were assholes, lost in the choices they chose. Then there is static into the alternate lives that they could be living. Then Rick and Richard meet and switch identities while actually being the same person, but with different memories.


I marked this 2/5 stars and not a 1 because I will never re-read this book, but I thought Alan Brennert was a great writer. However, just because you are a good writer does not mean that I will or should read your books. Regardless, this book had a lot of character development (at the end of the book they weren't the same assholes they were before), and it gave me a lot to think about.

Recommended by Aunt Nance 2/13

Once a year I read a sci-fi novel. Alan Brennert is an author that I love - Molokai and Honolulu. This, his first novel, does not resemble those at all. It’s about parallel universes/alternate plains of reality. Richard and Rick share one self until thirteen years ago when one decides to pursue a career on Broadway and the other stays in his hometown to start a family. As in all sci-fi, there’s a suspension of disbelief. The beginning was a little confusing, but once the premise was established, I loved this book. The writing is provocative. I hated Rick and wanted to know every wrong turn he was going to make. On the flip side, Richard made me sigh with relief and feel the love. This a great backlist pick of Brennert’s. I enjoyed it so much and it’s a solid 4.0-4.5 stars.

Recommended by Aunt Nance 2/13

I very much enjoyed both the premise of this book and the actual reading of it. It takes the idea that when we make those pivotal moments in our lives...perhaps the moments that we replay what if over and over and over again...in another reality you actually make that other choice and your life plays out from there. What happens if your two selves from those two separate decisions (but one deciding event) meet. That is what happens in this book.

When I read the blurb, I was actually expecting a time travel book. It was more freaky Friday than time travel, but was utterly captivating to me. (I read the book throughout one long day of travel in the airport and on the plane.). It was interesting to see two lives that ended up so different with both so incomplete. Who I liked one version of Richard and despised the other one, yet wanted both of them to succeed in their journeys. I half expected it to end with the two selves coming back together into one self....but it didn't and I'm glad it didn't.

This book has a lot of mixed reviews, but I found it entertaining and interesting. This is my second book that I've read by this author (and both are on my favorite shelf). I plan to read many more!