Tempest by Julie Cross

Title: Tempest
Author: Julie Cross
Release Date: January 17th, 2012
Publisher: St. Martin's Griffin
Pages: 352
Format: Electronic Copy
Acquired: ARC; Netgalley
Interest: Series
Age Group: Young Adult
Rating: 5 Stars

The year is 2009.  Nineteen-year-old Jackson Meyer is a normal guy… he’s in college, has a girlfriend… and he can travel back through time. But it’s not like the movies – nothing changes in the present after his jumps, there’s no space-time continuum issues or broken flux capacitors – it’s just harmless fun.

That is… until the day strangers burst in on Jackson and his girlfriend, Holly, and during a struggle with Jackson, Holly is fatally shot. In his panic, Jackson jumps back two years to 2007, but this is not like his previous time jumps. Now he’s stuck in 2007 and can’t get back to the future.

Desperate to somehow return to 2009 to save Holly but unable to return to his rightful year, Jackson settles into 2007 and learns what he can about his abilities.

But it’s not long before the people who shot Holly in 2009 come looking for Jackson in the past, and these “Enemies of Time” will stop at nothing to recruit this powerful young time-traveler.  Recruit… or kill him.

Piecing together the clues about his father, the Enemies of Time, and himself, Jackson must decide how far he’s willing to go to save Holly… and possibly the entire world.

I will be honest, I was not excited to read this book. I regretted accepting the review, because it just started out so slow for me, and I just kept thinking what an idiot the main character was. The character's just didn't click well for me in the beginning.

But then things got interesting. It took awhile before the plot picked up, and I still kept thinking Jackson was an idiot, but at least a somewhat smarter idiot. I was confused a lot of the time, don't get me wrong. I could never tell in what moment in time Jackson was in, because I kept thinking that something different will happen and it will be revealed that he has a different time line or whatever. It was all a little complicated. And as for Holly, I never thought a character could whine as much as Bella Swan, but then I meet a character like Holly Flynn and that belief is disproved.

So why the fudge did I give this book five stars? Simple, because of the main plot line that surrounded it. The idea of time traveling, genetic engineering and corrupt government agents. It had it all. I feel like the character's could use a lot of work, but I liked the speed of the story, I liked how once the author started the ball rolling she didn't stop. Some authors always bring it back as the novel nears an end, but this author does not stop, and keeps going.

I like the diversity she has in them. There is Holly, the damsel in distressed, Adam, the smart geeky kid, and Jackson, the hero. And there was a lot more, but these main ones are what I noticed most. And I liked how with all this time traveling going on, I would get confused, but the author does a good job on keeping us on track. I just got confused because of all the long period jumps and not to mention all of Jackson's flashbacks makes it sound like it's current time. It's hard to explain.

There are a lot of unanswered questions and I was not happy at all with the ending. I understand why Jackson did what he did, but it still makes me mad at him. It was a little obvious half way into the novel that that was what he was going to do, but its still sad. I feel like the second book will have a lot of explaining, but I did like how the author did give us some answers, so things aren't too confusing.

Besides some character issues, overall a great book.