THIS TIME AROUND

by

Kimberly Packard

Time Travel Romance / Contemporary Women’s Fiction / Romantic Comedy

Publisher: Abalos Publishing

Date of Publication: June 11, 2024

Number of Pages: 286 pages

Scroll down for Giveaway!

Synopsis

Most of us would jump at a chance for a do-over of our teenage years…but what if our worst mistakes lead to our happily-ever-after?

Josie Gardner’s life revolves around her amazing children and her career. But, when her husband threatens to take her kids in their divorce, and the business she’s put most of her passion, time, and money into the building is at risk of failing, a panic attack shatters her grip on reality… and the present.

Josie wakes up in her teenage bedroom, thirty years in the past. She’s forced to relive her emotionally devastating senior year of high school — the year she cut her father out of her life, caused one of her best friends to sever ties, and turned away the boy she loved.

Determined to get back to her children in her own time, Josie tries to fix the mistakes she made in the hope that righting wrongs will send her back to the present. But when tempted by her high school crush, Josie faces the real possibility of losing her future for good.

Would you take a second chance for love…even if it meant losing everything?

Amazon | B&N | Bookshop | Apple

Review

This novel may be light-hearted, but it has a tale to tell.

I think we have all been there, wishing we had done things a little differently in our youth. Maybe nothing extravagant, but something like studying a little more, being kind to classmates, loving your family, and so forth. Josie gets that opportunity against her will, not by choice, and realizes that maybe this is her chance to make things a little better for the future. If she changes things too much, that butterfly effect we hear about could come with a cost.

I really liked Josie’s character. She has been dealt a few blows recently, but nothing that she cannot overcome. However, fate has decided to throw her back in time thirty years to relive her senior year of high school. She has always wondered about the one that got away, Daniel. Was he her true love? Could she reconnect with him? But how would that impact her present? And she is really a 47-year-old woman in a 17-year-old body; she has the wisdom to make wiser choices. But will she?

There is so much more to this story than just redoing a year of her life; there are choices to be made, memories to relish, friendships to save, and deciding what she wants her life to be in the future. I appreciated her reaching out to classmates she might not have befriended in her original past, witty dialogue with her parents and her friends, and discovering who she is deep down.

All of these blend together for this fantastic tale that made me think about what I would change if I were put in this situation. I might find myself on some of the same paths as Josie, or maybe I would leave most things alone. You never know until you have that opportunity to change your life with one small change.

I am excited that the author believes that Josie’s best friend, Em, needs her own book. Perhaps then we will learn a little more about what happened to Josie when she made it back to the current day.

We say pick up this book and read it! You’ll thank me later. We give it 5 paws up.

About the Author

Kimberly Packard is an award-winning author of women’s fiction.

When she isn’t writing, she can be found planning her next trip, asking her dog what’s in his mouth, or curled up with a book. She resides in Texas with her husband Colby, a clever cat named Oliver, and a precocious black lab named Tully.

Her debut novel, Phoenix, was awarded as Best General Fiction of 2013 by the Texas Association of Authors. She is also the author of a Christmas novella, The Crazy Yates, and the sequels to Phoenix, Pardon Falls, and Prospera Pass, and her stand-alone titles Vortex, Dire’s Club, and This Time Around. She was honored as one of the Top 10 Haute Young Authors by Southern Methodist University in 2019. Vortex was the 2019 winner of the Pencraft Award in Women’s Fiction, and Dire’s Club was awarded the 2021 General Fiction of the Year by the North Texas Book Festival.

Website | Amazon | Instagram | Facebook

X (Twitter)| Goodreads | Bookbub | Newsletter

Visit the Lone Star Literary Life Tour Page

For direct links to each post on this tour, updated daily, 

or visit the blogs directly:

blog tour services provided by