A little repetitive at times. I had a hard time connecting with Alex. I got pretty bored about 40% of the way in.

Shades of The Time Travelers Wife, wherein the protagonist lives atemporally. After an incident involving brain trauma, Alex Dean lives his life out of order, waking each day, not knowing where and when he is. Sometimes he wakes in his carefree and careless twenties, other times he's forty and weighed down by the choices he's not even aware  he's made. This novel's big questions: Can a change in perspective have profound effects on the trajectory of a person's life? What does it mean to push against the weight of your own history? What exactly do we have agency over? While this book started slowly for me, I downed the latter 3/4 of it in one day. An aside: I found it an interesting complement to the recent "One Day" series on Netflix.

[Thanks to Harlequin Trade Publishing and NetGalley for an opportunity to read an advanced reader copy and share my opinion of this book.]

Reading the prologue and chapter 1, I wasn't sure this was going to be for me. However, as soon as the first year change happened I was hooked. I really enjoyed this book. Seeing Alex discover what his life turns out to be and the emotional reaction he has to it, all the effort put towards changing it little by little. This book really really makes you think about the impact your decisions have on you future, even the smallest thing can have a large impact.

I was initially excited to be asked to read and review this book but I did not like. I thought this copied many of the lessons and plot from The Time Traveler's Wife, which is one of my favorite novels. The Time Traveler's Wife had many characters a reader felt a sense of love, empathy and compassion for, this book not so much.

The writing focused too much on the time travel aspect and not enough on the actual plot of the story. Pus I did not like Alex as a character. I felt sorry for Holly but she was irritating. Sorry, just my opinion.

Disappointed. Cannot recommend. At least the cover is nice. LOL!

Thanks to Netgalley, James Goodhand and Harlequin Trade Publishing Mira for an ARC in exchange for an honest review.

Available: 3/19/2024

I love time travel books, and I was very excited to learn about The Day Tripper. While it started slowly and the writing style made it hard to keep track of who was talking at times, I got used to it and stopped noticing it once I was fully absorbed in the book.

The more I read, the more I enjoyed it. Alex Dean has his whole life in front of him at age 20: the girl of his dreams and a place at Cambridge. A fight with a childhood enemy at the end of a perfect day destroys it all. Alex wakes up in the future, and every day he wakes up at another date. As Alex tries to figure out what happened to him, he meets a man who has some answers -- but the man isn't giving up all the details right away! We get to watch Alex make mistakes and learn how to push his way out of making the same mistakes again as he realizes his actions in his out-of-order life have rippling effects. Alex grows as a person, and he learns about himself and why he makes the choices he does. The end is mostly satisfying, though there are still some answers left open that left me thinking about this book days after I finished. I recommend it to anyone who enjoys time travel books like I do.

Thank you to NetGalley and Harlequin Trade Publishing for the opportunity to review this book. I left reviews on Goodreads and StoryGraph on Feb 12, 2024.

I didn't love this book. I thought the plot was imaginative, the writing style wasn't for me. It doesn’t mean it isn’t for you.

The Day Tripper follows Alex, a man who finds himself waking up each day in a different point of his life, out of chronological order. On one morning, he wakes up hungover in an unfamiliar room, looking in the mirror to see himself at 36 years old. And so begins his chaotic journey moving nonlinearly through time.

Unfortunately, I had a difficult time connecting with or enjoying the protagonist Alex. He is portrayed as a desperate man with issues - constantly broke, dirty, and struggling with alcoholism. He never seemed particularly appealing or fun to spend time with.

As the story progressed, I did feel it gained some momentum moving towards the conclusion. However, the explanation eventually given for Alex's time-traveling abilities, like in The Time Traveler's Wife, felt offensively dumb and unnecessary. It would have been better left unexplained, allowing it to remain more of a leap of faith or mystery.

Overall, while the concept of moving through one's life out of order shows promise, Alex as the protagonist made it a struggle for me to fully engage with or enjoy this book.

I received and ARC copy of this novel in exchange for honest review from NetGalley.
Contains minor spoilers:
Much high hopes here, but quickly found the premise a but tired, even harking back to “It’s a Wonderful Life” , the romance “In Five Years,” and even the stage show of “Mame:”
Live for today!

I unfortunately found Alex unsympathetic (maybe its my age), and the characters were all kinda one-dimensional. The first 3/4 were very slow going, ending felt rushed, like this was going to be a film script. Did nit buy into the rationale for the time jump fir Alex, but even though it was unsatisfying to me, I really appreciated that there was one!

Ultimately not for me, was hoping for mire. disappointing snd slow going…. With today’s audiences expecting constant action (and i am NOT one of those in my reading adventures), I will be surprised if this novel sells well. Unfortunately cannot recommend this book…thanks fir the reading opportunity.

This book was so unremarkable that I actually forgot that I had already read it. Interesting premise but not an exciting read.

Thanks to Netgalley and the publisher for providing me an eARC in exchange for an honest review.

The Day Tripper sounded like a story that would be in my wheelhouse of stories that I enjoy. Using some of the same conventions as a Time Traveler's Wife, How to Be Remembered, and even shades of The Midnight Library and dare I say A Christmas Carol, it all boils down to the idea of how you want to live your life and the decisions you make today have lasting impacts for the rest of your life.

This story for me fell a little flat (which seeing others reviews, I'm a smidge in the minority). However, I couldn't quite get on board with this one. I found Alex the main character a little on dimensional and the explanation for why he was experiencing his life out of order on the flimsy side (granted, at least this story had an explanation, looking at you, How to Be Remembered....). I found myself skimming through chunks of it after the first 40% of the story just because there honestly isn't a ton that happens other than what you would expect: man sees future, man gets scared, man changes.

If you're looking for a quick read that has a lot of what you come to expect from these types of stories, then have at it, but if you're looking for more substance than I recommend holding out for something else.

Thank you NetGalley for sharing this title. Wow. Such a hopeful story showing how every decision changes the outcome in your life. I cheered for the hero as time went on. A favorite line close to the end said we create our problems by beating ourselves up. It is and isn't time travel. Maybe more Christmas Carol. Loved it.

The premise for this novel is very unique, and initially I could appreciate what I felt like the MC was trying to accomplish. However, the author took way too long to get to the point. It's just not for me the way I hoped it was.

My initial level of excitement to read this book was high! The premise is interesting, and I have enjoyed other books with a similar idea.
The 2nd half of the book moved along much more quickly than the beginning, and Alex became more likeable as a character.
Overall, I felt there were a lot of difficult life circumstances mentioned, but not explored, and it left the whole book with a bit of a surface-level feeling. Alex spends a lot of time feeling really sorry for himself, and not doing much to improve his situation, and then the potential causes/contributing factors of his situation go unexplored. It's frustrating to see him chase Holly in a borderline-creepy way, trying to force a relationship to work between them. It was tempting to give up on the book because I found Alex so unlikeable.
I think some readers might find the ending really satisfying, and while I found the tone of the second half of the book much more hopeful than the first half, I didn't like the way the story ended. That's down to personal preference, but I didn't find that Alex grew as much as a character as I would have liked to have seen.
Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for this ARC in exchange for my honest review!

Thanks to NetGalley for this advance reader copy in exchange for a fair review.
This time-traveling investigation into the life of one drunk busker in London reminded me of Its a Wonderful Life. Every day that Alex Dean wakes up, he is at a different point in his life, seeing where his choices in his youth affect himself, his friends, his family and his girlfriend in later years. Its not quite 'I wish I was never born" but more like 'whoa, that's not what I want my future to look like - can I change that?'
I took me way longer than it should have to get into the book. I liked the beginning but then I was questioning my own life choices for a good chunk of the middle. I did like last third of the book though so it came back around for me.
From an American standpoint, there are expressions, turns of phrase, and sights that many might not get, and it could be part of the reason the book slowed for me.
The premise is fun and very interesting, but I wasn't moved until quite into it.
3* for liking it but not much more.

Alex Dean suffers a major trauma (physically, mentally, and emotionally), and suddenly he is "day tripping", that is to say he wakes up in a different day of his life every day our of order. Sometimes he is far in the future, and can see what has happened in his life, he's not too happy with some (a lot) of his choices and actions... so lucky for him, sometimes he wakes up in earlier stages of his life, and he gets the chance to change some of those poor life choices.
It's a really interesting idea, and I was interested to see where Alex would end up. I will just say, the ending isn't quite the one I would was expecting, but the author did a good job of tying it all up and giving a decent ending to Alex's story.
As for a rating, that is hard to say... there were honestly really good, well written parts to this book, then there were some that sure needed a major re-write. It was kind of all over the place as far as writing skill. I feel like the worst of it was nearer the beginning, so if you can get through that then it gets better.
I loved the idea of the story, and I really like the lessons in this story, so that really helped boost my score.
A decent, solid three.

How do the decisions we make affect our daily lives? What do we have control over, and what is simply out of our hands?
The Day Tripper is the story of Alex Dean, a 20-year old budding musician, in love with his girlfriend Holly and recently accepted to Cambridge. The future looks bright for Alex, until he runs into Blake Benfield, a nemesis from the past who still has beef with Alex. Blake gets the better of Alex, leaving him to nearly drown in the Thames river.
Upon awakening, Alex discovers it is 15 years later, and he has no recollection of anything that has happened since his skirmish with Blake. His life is not nearly what he had hoped, or expected.
As Alex wakes each day to a random new time in his life, he begins to discover the power of cause and effect. With the help of Dr. Paul Defrates, a teacher that he has befriended, he realizes that good decisions beget good decisions, and maybe it’s never too late to change your future, or your past.
I really, really enjoyed this book. My unfamiliarity with British slang slowed me down a bit, and reading the book in far too small of a font size slowed me down much more (my fault), but the writing and subject material were on point. This book made me laugh, and it made me cry. The author approached the subjects of addiction, bullying, sexual abuse, trauma and grief very well in my opinion, and even managed to convey some of Einstein’s concepts on time without sounding overly scientific and breaking the mood of the story. I will definitely be re-reading this in the future, and I definitely recommend it to…well, pretty much everyone!
I would like to thank Harlequin Trade Publishing, NetGalley, and the author (James Goodhand) for the ARC of this book, in exchange for my honest review. This one was definitely a pleasure!

One of the dangers of writing books that play with time is that the story almost always becomes subservient to the concept, which rarely results in a good novel.

Such is a lot of the problem in The Day Tripper, which is so fixated on bending time that it sacrifices plot to the cause. I don’t mind fantasy novels that see characters traveling straight back or forward in time to participate in or alter an event, but that’s not what’s happening in this book, which is far more concerned with the manipulation of time than the events encountered.

The other major issue with this book is that it’s tragedy porn, which I find dull and manipulative. I was bored while reading for most of the story, endlessly waiting for something intriguing to happen and instead encountering nothing but story at cost of concept and a lot of wallowing in a depressing sequence of tragic events.

The writing itself is fine if a bit flat, and I always appreciate an author who tries to put a new spin on an old concept. This just wasn’t a successful attempt to do so.

I have always been intrigued by time travel books and The Day Tripper by James Goodhand did not disappoint.

Alex Dean is 20 about to start college and in love with his girlfriend Holly when an accident changes everything. Each day Alex wakes up to a different part of his life. Alex has to figure out each day how things ended up the way they did. After meeting up with a teacher or could be called a guide and decides to see if things can be changed.
Alex as a character frustrated me so much but it was good that he was not the type that constantly feel bad for.
The changes and the back and forth in time was handled well and the author did a great job at reminding us of what this “time” was like before so we didn’t have to try to keep track.
The ending in a way is unresolved but I also think that it would be how it is for Alex so then it was right.
Huge thanks to NetGalley, Harlequin Trade Publishing and a James Goodhand for a eARC in exchange for my honest review.

This book was absolutely incredible! The premise of a man who wakes up after an accident on a different date in the future and then each day continues to wake up in the past or future was so clever. The author has really outdone himself with the uniqueness of this book in the time travel genre. I loved this book from start to finish and let out a happy sigh when reading the last sentence.

The Day Tripper was too trippy for me, and I spent most of the book irritated by Alex, the protagonist of the story. In the prime of his life Alex is doing well and is madly in love. But a chance encounter with someone from his past leads to severe brain trauma, and a disorienting world for both Alex and the reader, where he ends up in a different day, in a different year each time he wakes up in the morning. No matter which day and time he wakes up in, the world has not been kind to Alex, and he has not been particularly kind to himself or the people around him. An encounter in one of his days leads him to the lesson that the decisions he makes as he lives one day at a time out of time could potentially change his life for the better, but this is a concept he doesn't latch on to right away, which as a reader made me want to bang my head against the wall. He finally starts taking baby steps that have an effect on his life, and it is gratifying to see that learning to be at peace with himself when people he's been close to in his life have treat him poorly is just as important to improving his circumstances as the actions he takes to help other people around him, like Jazz and his grandfather. I feel like Alex (and the story) spend too much time chasing Holly around, the woman he's in love with when his brain goes out of whack. It seems like what he discovers about himself and what he does for others has a bigger impact on whether he has a life with her than purely him trying to force their relationship to work. The ending also left me feeling like the story was unresolved. Too some readers it could feel fulfilling, but I was left feeling like part of the story was still left to tell. A complimentary copy of this book was provided by the publisher. All thoughts and opinions are my own.