Book Review and #BlogTour @Booktamins – For the Lost Time by Heather Blair (4 stars)

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Title: For The Lost Time

Author: Heather Blair

Published: 21^st April 2020

Format: Ebook – 451 pages

“A person should be willing to give up all his tomorrows for one today so that he doesn’t end up wasting all his todays on one tomorrow.”

For The Lost Time by Heather Blair

Hello Hello! How are you?

I’m so happy to be on today’s blog tour stop for the Booktamins tour of this book! I love the tours hosted by the lovely Sandra from Booktamins, she is so sweet and the books she offers are so diverse and unique! I was captivated when I saw this cover in my inbox, and when I read the blurb, I couldn’t say no! Thank you to Booktamins for letting me take part in this tour and for sending me the book in exchange for an honest review. Keep reading for my thoughts on For The Lost Time by Heather Blair!

GOODREADS SYNOPSIS

When Diego Delgado closed his eyes it was 2020. When he awoke, he was one-hundred years in the past.

Thrust into the dawn of the Jazz Age with no money and nowhere to go, Diego encounters a veritable bouquet of acquaintances including a kind-hearted factory owner, a free-spirited flapper, a worldly-wise mystic, and a strong-willed heir named Thomas Greely.

Diego, desperate to return to the future and reunite with his young daughter, must blend in with the roaring twenties lifestyle while searching for answers.

But distractions are all around him, especially Thomas who is both beautiful and charismatic, and Diego must grapple with the reality that even if he succeeds in returning home, half of his heart will stay behind.

Genres: Chick Lit, Contemporary, Historical Fiction, LGBTQIA, New Adult, Romance

MY REVIEW

For The Lost Time is a contemporary male/male romance historical fiction novel written by Heather Blair, in which we follow Diego Delgado navigate the mysterious world of 1920s New York after waking up one morning, 100 years in the past. I was immediately drawn to this book because a) that cover is just beautiful and b) I’m a sucker for time travel romances (yes I’m referring to Outlander, but I’ve also seen a lot of films and read a lot of books, notably Kindred by Octavia Butler, that are really great!) I’ve always loved the idea of time travel, not the scientific type in Back to the Future, but more the mysterious and romantic type like in Outlander or Kindred, so this was sure to be a great book for me.

SETTING

When the book starts, we are directly thrust into the Jazz Age of New York in the 1920s with its charming flappers, dapper dancers, jazzy music and speakeasies. I immediately liked this setting, we get to see a lot about this world through Diego’s eyes and this is made even more fantastical and whimsical because he knows a different New York, his own reality, back in 2020, he remembers buildings that aren’t yet built, the disaster of 9/11, and feels like something is missing from this sprawling city.

I have to admit that I’ve tried to watch the Great Gatsby numerous times, it always starts off great, but I end up falling asleep every single time before the end, people got frustrated and told me how it finished aha. The setting of the start of that film during the party with all the music, singing, flirting, etc, is the same atmosphere in this book and I absolutely loved it.

There are a few chapters set in 2020, but there isn’t a very big emphasis on modern-day New York, and I really appreciated that because the heart of the story was really in 1920.

CHARACTERS

There were a lot of really great characters in this book, like Molly, Kendra, Clementine, Dora, and loads more, but I really want to speak about my favourites and the 3 I consider to be the main characters.

Diego: He is the actual main character and the one who wakes up one morning in 1920s New York, going back in time exactly 100 years. I didn’t really like Diego at the start, I’m not sure it’s a case of like or dislike, but I felt like the story concentrated a lot more on Thomas in the beginning so I didn’t really get to know Diego until later. Around 300 pages in, Diego really starts to shine and I eventually really liked him. We never really know what age he is, or his sexuality for sure, we don’t really know much about him and the story starts a few weeks into his trip into the past, when I suppose I would have preferred to learn a bit more about him beforehand or maybe see his reaction when waking up in the past. In any case, he was really strong-willed, determined and basically a hopeless romantic!

Thomas: I really really loved Thomas right from page 1. He makes it clear that he is adopted and even though he doesn’t say it until about halfway through, you know that he is homosexual and I really liked how you get to know him gradually. He is the life and soul of the party, but deep down he is lost, unloved and sad, and I really liked seeing this real side to him, I felt for him and he just pulled on my heartstrings. Thomas and Diego’s relationship was so sweet and heart-warming, I loved reading about these two so much.

Henry: I also have a special place in my heart for Henry! He is the one who found and helped Diego the first day he woke up in the past and he is more of a father figure to Thomas than his absentee adoptive father ever was. He cares for Thomas and his wellbeing, and also being homosexual and having suffered horrors to “not make him gay”, he tries to look out for him and stop him from getting hurt. He was a really strong part of the book and I loved his relationship with Thomas.

THEMES

Time travel: As I have said before, I really like this theme in books. I never really was a fan of Back to the Future because of all the gadgets and gimmicks, but I love books about this type of more romantic and whimsical time travel. This one was really a beautiful portrayal of time travel and I loved reading about it so much, but I was a bit disappointed to not really have any insight into the time travel itself. One morning Diego wakes up in the past, but we don’t see that happen, we don’t see his life before, only his life in New York a few weeks after his arrival. I would really have liked a bit more about this, maybe his reactions when he got here, or what his life was like before, but I suppose it does add a mysterious atmosphere to the start of the book.

Male/Male Romance: This is my second time reading a male/male romance, and it was really so sweet. I loved reading how their relationship blossomed, how it went from Diego ignoring Thomas to him acknowledging him and giving their love a shot.

Getting back home: Throughout the book, Diego wants to go home to his daughter and his ex-wife, he spends all his time looking up stuff in the library, talking with Madame Olah, a mystic, thinking about his daughter, etc. But as the book goes on, he ends up realising that he is starting to like his life in the past and he has things to live for here, it was really interesting reading his interior conflict over his desires.

MY THOUGHTS AND RATING

Overall, I really loved this book. It was such a sweet story of what would be forbidden love at the time, with the added bonus of time travel. There were a few things that I would have liked, I felt that it was lacking a bit on the time travel front, hence why I gave it 4 stars, but I really did love this one a lot. It was a really nice, fast-paced, well written, beautiful story and I highly recommend it. I’ll definitely be looking out for more books by this author in the future.

Thank you once again to Sandra from Booktamins and Heather for letting me take part in this tour and for sending me the book.

That’s all for now, I hope you enjoyed this review. See you soon, stay safe,

Ellie xx

ABOUT THE AUTHOR – HEATHER BLAIR

Heather Blair is the author of new adult romance novels including “Lucid Dreaming” and “Wide Awake.” She was born and raised in Vermont and has spent much of her adult life in New York and Los Angeles. She currently resides in Connecticut with her two cats.

Heather’s links: Website – Goodreads – Twitter – Facebook – Instagram

If you would like to purchase this book, you can find it here: Amazon UK (affiliate link) – Amazon FR – Amazon US