R&R Challenge Review #2 - TRAVELERS by Meradeth Houston

**My Review Style Disclaimer (very official, I know...)
I do not do a 1-5 star rating system with my reviews. Honestly, whether a book is "good" or not completely depends on the reader. A book that I rate 5-stars may end up being a 2-star book for you and vice versa. So really, what's the point of that anyway? In the end, I feel like ratings end up hurting people's feelings, so my reviews will just be my reaction to the book after reading it...

I'm not the best at recaps...I kind of figure the author went through the trouble of summarizing the book the best he or she can with the back cover blurb, so why try and re-word it? That being said, here is what the book is about:

Sienna Crenshaw knows the rules: 1) no time traveling beyond your natural lifetime, 2) no screwing with death, and 3) no changing the past. Ever. Sienna doesn’t love being stuck in the present, but she’s not the type to to break the rules. That is, she wasn’t the type until her best friend broke every one of those rules to keep Henry, her twin brother and Sienna’s ex-boyfriend, alive.

Suddenly, Sienna is caught in an unfamiliar reality. The upside? Henry is still alive. The downside? Sienna’s old life, including the people in it, has been erased. Now, Sienna and Henry must untangle the giant knot in time, or her parents and all the rest of the Travelers, will be lost forever. One problem: the only way to be successful is for Henry to die...

AMAZON | BARNES & NOBLE | GOODREADS | WEBSITE

My Review

Time travel boggles my mind. It's one of those things that makes me feel dizzy the moment I start thinking about it and all the sciency rules and what-ifs, yet I still feel incredibly intrigued by the idea. I just watched INTERSTELLAR, and it kind of blew my mind, so it was fun to read a time travel book after watching that.

TRAVELERS introduces an interesting concept. If you were to travel to a different dimension (or timeline) would you feel like an imposter taking over a life with a past that didn't belong to you? People would expect you to be the "other you" but the "real you" may not have the same memories etc.

The main character in TRAVELERS experiences this, and I have to admit, I had never even considered that kind of a dilemma when thinking about time travel. It made for an interesting conflict.

TRAVELERS proposes yet another interesting theoretical question: Does eliminating someone's existence save them from tragedy? Or in other words, is it better to exist and experience great tragedy or pain than to not exist at all?

Don't get me wrong, this is a YA book. The main character is very much a teenager, but the idea is quite complex. Meradeth Houston did a great job developing a storyline with a heart-wrenching conflict.