David Ciferri

I won this book in a Goodreads first reads giveaway, and I always hate to give a bad review because I probably couldn't write a book at all, much less a good one. However, Goodreads encourages reviews on giveaway books, so here it is.
I'll just be honest, I wasn't expecting much from this book, and it didn't deliver much. It tried to deal with such controversial issues *sarcasm* such as racism, and bullying, and the message I seemed to get out of it was: Bullying is bad, but most kids do it, so whatever.
Also, the motivations, emotions, and characters were extremely simplistic and one-dimensional, and there was some character contradiction. Brandon confesses that he has always wanted to see what life used to be like when his aunt was younger, yet despite this enthusiasm, he has never obtained one iota of information regarding this time period, on top of the fact that everyone/thing he sees is "stupid" or "dorky", and for a bit more contradiction, when he gets back home, all he wants to do is go back to this dorky stupidity.
Now for the most-used sentences in the book: "Brandon smirked." "Sarah smoothed her hand over his [Brandon's] cheek." "Aaaarrgh" ~ Brandon every time there's a mention of The Beverly Hillbillies "Sarah smoothed down Brandon's hair."
Also, Brandon has only three emotions: Angry, Disdainful, and "deciding it's time to relate to people instead of yelling at them." When he's disdainful he makes fun of everything that exists in the sixties, and when he's angry he either has violent impulses, or he storms away and storms back.
Basically, if you don't mind badly done cliche characters, predictable storylines, and repetitive dialogue/scenes, you might like this book. After all, the premise is interesting, and there plenty of popular books of equal or worse quality out there *cough* Twilight *cough*.... But otherwise I wouldn't recommend it.
(Wow, I feel like this is kind of brutal. I would just like to issue a formal apology to David Ciferri, for ripping apart and abusing his novel.... O.o)… (mere)

I think the (hypothetical) sequel will be better. This book and I both struggled a little bit at the beginning and at some awkward moments, but the ending was fun and satisfying.* The characters got more interesting & complex, and the exploration of the mechanics of Time Travel was covered more thoroughly. I have to be honest, near the beginning I was concerned there was going to be too much simple adventure and not enough real thought about the different worlds of the two time periods, but by the end I decided to give the book 3.5 stars.

I can't round up because I have one more concern. Is this book about young teens meant to be read by kids their age group? It seems longish for them. It also seems to be presented as if it's for adults, from a more adult pov. But I don't think it's necessarily going to appeal to adults, either. (I entered the giveway because it's Time Travel.)

*Except for the suggestion that there might be a sequel.… (mere)

I loved the concept of this book, but must say that I was a bit disappointed. The story itself is really fantastic - and I think Ciferri is an author to watch. I found the character development and some of their traits to be a bit hard to swallow.

Here by Mistake is about a trio of young teenagers who are accidently catapulted back in time. I wanted to like the kids - to emphasize with them. However, I found it really hard to like Brandon at all - he was forever treating his friends poorly and then apologizing for it. I couldn't understand why the rest of the group didn't just leave him behind.

I also struggled with some of the writing. For example one sentence I highlighted was 'Then Sarah turned around with her unmistakable look, which Brandon did not mistake.' It’s a bit redundant.

Despite my criticisms, I did enjoy this book and I will be reading whatever Ciferri writes next. His idea for a story was fantastic, and I think everything else will just get better.

I received this book somewhere for free (I can't remember where) for a review.
… (mere)

I devoured this book in every spare moment I had! This book is about three teenagers (Brandon, Sarah, and Stephen) that find a roman wall ornament, commonly referred to as a niche, in a basement and when they deciphered the latin that was printed on it they discover that they may have stumbled upon something amazing. Brandon decided to speak his dream of going to New Orleans, Louisiana by placing a picture from his aunt on the niche and it comes to life! As they explore what is happening to the niche Brandon gets sucked into it and the other two follow; all of a sudden they are no longer in 2005 but 1965 the year in which the photo was taken. The question is how do they get back?

Deception lead them to the discovery of the niche but honesty and gut instinct helped them get the help they needed to get back to their time.This novel does many things right: there is adventure, humor, well developed characters, and the story is intriguing and easy to follow. The author was detailed in the distinctive differences 40 years can make when it comes to laws, culture, prices, and technology. I loved the reactions that their mentor Quint had to some of the things the kids told him.

This was a really interesting time-travel novel because it explores how time lines might be mixed up from just one small side-step by the travelers and Brandon, Sarah, and Stephen learn this at the end of the book.

(cross posted on GoodReads)

I would really like to see another book [with more of Brandon's adventures into the past because the last bit has me really intrigued!… (mere)