Cindy's One-Minute Book Review: "Time Lottery"

Time Lottery,by Nancy Moser

Alexander MacMillan...successful Hollywood image maker who happens to be a born-again believer...is still reeling from the senseless killing of his beloved wife, when he gets a job offer he can't refuse: publicist for a scientific corporation that has found a way to go back in time. The bait: after a national lottery in which three people will get to return to a time in their personal histories,Mac will get his own chance to do so...a chance to prevent his wife's murder.

"Time Lottery," by Nancy Moser (Promise Press,2002) explores the idea of time travel with a spiritual and scriptural twist.

The three people the lottery falls to are very different. Dr. Cheryl Nickolby is a beautiful,successful surgeon who has spent most of her life trying to exercise her control over men through a near-promiscuous lifestyle. Pheobe Thurgood is the unhappy,unfulfilled wife of a wealthy but unscrupulous businessman. Roosevelt Hazen is an elderly former preacher who has somehow ended up homeless and on the streets.

Hazen never gets his chance,though. A homeless lifelong con-artist named Leon Burke sees his opportunity to impersonate Hazen and seizes it through nefarious means.

The three lottery winners will get to go back to a specific point in their lives...an "alternate reality" that scientists believe is actually existing out there somewhere,parallell to our own "real" lives. Alexander MacMillan explains the Time Lottery experience in his role as publicist for the Time Travel Corporation: "...after exploring the way their life could have been for one week,they will be given the ultimate choice. During one hour of total clarity,they will be able to assess both alternatives: the way their life played out the first time,and the way it played out through the miracle of the Time Lottery. They will get to choose betwen staying in the past--continuing their life with the consequences of their new choice--or returning to their place in the present with a life made richer from the experience."

Cheryl goes back to her senior year in high school, determined to forge a "committed" relationship with the high school basketball star she used to admire from afar. Phoebe heads back to 1969,when her cad of a husband,Colin,first became her boss. Leon find himself back in the early 60's, when he first met a young,dedicated preacher named...Roosevelt Hazen.

What will they do differently? What spiritual lessons will they learn? Will they choose to stay in the past,or come back to the present,armed with new knowledge that will help them change their present lives for the better? And will Mac go back in time to try to stop his wife's murder?

Few books can really be characterized as "page-turners," but I found this one was. I've always been fascinated with time travel,and author Nancy Moser's handling of the subject causes it to come off as believable rather than far-fetched. The idea of being able to go back in one's own past and possibly right some wrongs is also a compelling one.

The story moves along effortlessly with the help of Moser's crisp,clean writing style and characters that spring to life on the page. Scenes switch frequently among the storylines,never giving the reader a chance to get bored.

As always in her books,Moser includes plenty of scripture and scriptural applications without being preachy or schmaltzy. The three Time Lottery winners are each faced with their need for Jesus Christ,whatever their "reality." And that's something we will all have to face....now or later.

[ December 19, 2002, 10:49 AM: Message edited by: Cindy ]