Julie McElwain

When brilliant FBI agent Kendra Donovan stumbles back in time and finds herself in a 19th century English castle under threat from a vicious serial killer, she scrambles to solve the case before it takes her life—200 years before she was even born. Beautiful and brilliant, Kendra Donovan is a rising star at the FBI. Yet her path to professional success hits a speed bump during a disastrous raid where half her team is murdered, a mole in the FBI is uncovered and she herself is severely wounded. As soon as she recovers, she goes rogue and travels to England to assassinate the man responsible for the deaths of her teammates. While fleeing from an unexpected assassin herself, Kendra escapes into a stairwell that promises sanctuary but when she stumbles out again, she is in the same place—Aldrich Castle—but in a different time: 1815, to be exact. Mistaken for a lady's maid hired to help with weekend guests, Kendra is forced to quickly adapt to the time period until she can figure out how she got there; and, more importantly, how to get back home. However, after the body of a young girl is found on the extensive grounds of the county estate, she starts to feel there's some purpose to her bizarre circumstances. Stripped of her twenty-first century tools, Kendra must use her wits alone in order to unmask a cunning madman.

A Novel

A Murder in Time

Colleen

4 Stars

A Murder in Time was one of the books my library was promoting for their summer reading program. It is the story of a 21st century FBI profiler who falls back in time to the year 1815 and ends up involved in a murder investigation. I was intrigued by the premise since it combined two things I like a lot: criminal profiling and historical fiction. So I checked it out.

The story is a weird amalgamation of Historical Fiction, Mystery/Thriller, Romance, and SciFi (due to the time travel element). It was hard not to think of Outlander while reading this. The two books do have the same basic outline: woman goes back in time accidentally and uses her skill set to help and to survive while trying to find a way back to her own time period. However, in the details, the two stories are not alike either in writing style or plot. The criminal profiling and serial killer element also give A Murder in Time a different feel than Outlander.

The first few chapters seem more like your standard guy thriller book. It takes a while for the two elements to blend together. The transition to the year 1815 seemed very segmented and choppy at first as if someone smashed two very different books together. It was certainly a risk to merge so many different genres together. But overall, it worked well.

It was not the greatest writing. You will not find any poetic descriptions or moving characters. This is a plot-driven story. Since it was plot-driven, the occasional switches in point of view were not too jarring. I was ok with that; the plot did keep me engaged. And I had no problem reading the whole book in two days. However, there were far too many gimmicky cliffhanger / foreshadowing chapter ends. Some of them insultingly portentous such as "little did she know just how bad things were about to get..." The author should learn that one can build tension and anticipation without blatantly slapping the reader in the face with the knowledge that something big is about to happen. And it made it worse when the terrible thing that was heralded would end up being something minor and anticlimactic. Still, I did like the book overall, but I did consider knocking a star off my rating because of the gimmicky cliffhangers.

The main character, Kendra, was not the most likable character. (I liked Rebecca a lot better and wished she had featured more in the story!). Kendra is the annoying sort of genius who went to Princeton at age fourteen and is apparently gorgeous too boot. She is not a personable character which makes her hard to like. I am always looking for stories that feature female characters with gumption, but Kendra was at times very off-putting. It reminds me that there is a difference between Intelligence and Knowledge. Too bad her definitions of the difference between Revenge and Justice were also skewed. She may be a genius, but she no life skills or street smarts. (The moment when I found out she did not know how to peel a potato was a definitely Face-Palm moment.) And as with people who focus on one thing to the exclusion of all others, she did not develop a well-rounded life. Her single goal in life - to excel at the FBI - left her with no other connections or skills and zero interpersonal skills. The worst part of the book was her trying to interrogate suspects. Her tactless "bad cop" routine would not have been very effective in the 21st century; it was utterly useless in 1815. She absolutely fails at adapting to her surroundings. Instead of ever stopping to think, she browbeats suspects with no forethought or discretion and blathered on about"standard procedure" whenever someone objected. Even though she repeatedly acknowledges that these people have no reference for what her standard procedures are, she keeps expecting and demanding that everyone follow them. So sometimes it was hard to identify or sympathize with her, and I could see how that would be off-putting to some readers.

The research of the historical time seemed fairly accurate. Although at times characters were very caught up with upholding their traditions but at other times completely ignored them. Just like how they question Kendra often about certain words and phrases she uses but let other anachronisms slide by unnoticed. But the story kept my interest the entire time, and it certainly was not bad for a debut novel.

The ending was a little cheesy and rushed. It definitely was left open to build up for the sequel. I probably will read the sequel, but I am not in a huge rush to do so. Which is a good thing since the sequel is not expected to be published until next year. But I am interested to see what direction the next story goes.

RATING FACTORS:
Ease of Reading: 4 Stars
Writing Style: 3 Stars
Characters and Character Development: 3 Stars
Plot Structure and Development: 4 Stars
Level of Captivation: 4 Stars
Originality: 3 Stars

Liz Carpenter

I have such mixed feelings about this one. I ended up checking it out because it was a "Big Read" on Overdrive and the premise sounded pretty interesting despite the fact that I'm usually iffy about time travel stories. 

And on the one hand, once you get past the first two chapters, it's fast-paced and fairly engrossing. The historic characters are well-written, I think the author has a decent grasp on how to present them realistically. (And given the number of historic novels I've consumed in my lifetime, I consider myself an unofficial expert on this matter!) This is shaping up to be a series, and I do want to know where things go next.

But then there's the other hand - AKA, the Things About This Book That Drove Me Nuts:
- I would have to agree with other reviewers who posit that this book could really, really have benefited from a good editor and/or a fact-checker to reign in the author. (And someone really needs to point out to her how to properly use "shall" in a sentence.)
- SO. MANY. POV's! And McElwain often didn't even bother to end a scene before she switched characters. Gave me whiplash. 
- The protagonist. We get it, she's a genius. She's also really abrasive, not terribly likeable, and evidently it never occurs to her to try to fit in to the new time period despite the fact that she spends almost the entire book fretting about people finding out that she's "out of time". And yet - almost everyone she runs across in 1815 decides they *love* her! There's just no accounting for taste.
- There were times when it seemed like the author couldn't figure out how to write herself out of a corner, so she just skipped explanations entirely - made for some gaps in logic that pulled me out of the story.

So all things considered, I liked it, I didn't like it, and I still was engrossed. Thus, three stars because I can't really make up my mind whether to go any lower or higher on that scale.

Michael Reali

Entertaining. Decent mystery plot. 
The part set in the present feels too long and, at times, rather boring.
Some of the passages that involve other languages (i.e. Spanish, French and even British English colloquialisms) are dubious or cringe-worthy, distracting the reader from the story.
How this book came fifth in the list for Best Sci-fi of 2016, I really don't know.

Leelynn Brady

Find this review and more on my blog Sometimes Leelynn Reads.

“Whoever had said that appearances were deceiving was only partially right; they could also be deadly.” 

So I definitely wouldn't have chosen this book on my own, but I am very glad that I did end up reading it, thanks to a buddy read on Goodreads. Thanks Jennifer for choosing this book!

This was a time travel murder-mystery book. Since I did end up reading a time travel book sometime last year that I absolutely didn't like, I was worried about this one. That goes to show that I shouldn't judge a genre by its cover. I really loved the murder mystery aspect of this book, and throughout the entire book, I just wanted to know who the heck the killer was and whether or not Kendra Donovan was going to figure it out.

I was a little confused about the beginning though, thinking that the book spent too much time in the present time, but by the time Kendra was sent away to the past, I understood why it went that way. To give a better background, Kendra Donovan was considered a child prodigy, going to college at only 14 years old and being the youngest person to be accepted into the FBI. It doesn't hurt that she's the product of some crazy experiments that dealt with super smart scientists combining their DNA to create even super smarter children - deemed "Frankenbabies". Everything seems to be going well for Kendra until an FBI mission goes terribly wrong and she almost dies at the hand of a traitor.

After dealing with months of rehabilitation - she did almost die after all - she decides that she's going to take justice into her own hands and finish the mission that she never got to complete on the night she almost died. Everything seems to be going well too, poetic justice and all that, when the plan goes awry and she somehow finds herself... in the past. Kendra must not have watched many time travel movies because it took her an entire day to realize that she was not going crazy and that she was not the victim of some elaborate prank. No, she was really sent to Aldrich Castle in 1819 England, and she had no idea how she was going to go back.

If that wasn't enough, now she had to figure out how to catch a serial killer in a time where the term wasn't even in existence.

That should be fun for an FBI agent, right?

Kendra definitely has her work cut out for her, and without any of the technology she could rely on in the present, she's going to have to prove that her Frankenbaby brain of hers can solve a mystery on her own before any more murders take place.

I really enjoyed the pace of this book, and while the ending was something that I was a little upset with, for the most part, I liked what happened. I'm interested to find out what happens next, and I'm excited that the final book is coming out later on this year. Maybe I can find out how Kendra's time travel journey ends. Hopefully on a good note?

Judy Hudgins

This was a book club group with the library. Couldn't get into it, but was told to wade on through it and then it gets better. But not up, at this time, to wading through many more pages.

Mariya Tuchinskaya 

In some ways this book strikes me as a murder mystery version of Diana Galbadon’s “Outlander” series with the heroine accidentally getting sucked back in time. While the idea of a modern heroine being sent back in time may not be the most original, I think that Julie McElwain created great characters and the plot itself was a very satisfying mystery that kept me guessing till the end. I also enjoyed seeing a modern person’s perspective on 19th century life and having to tackle the issues of class and women’s rights. Reading this book made me even more aware that though some things have changed in our society, many have stayed much the same.

In terms of the characters, there are so many good ones to choose from. There is Kendra Donovan, our heroine, who sticks out like a sore thumb in the 19th century. I couldn’t help laughing as I read her missteps in terms of addressing/speaking to aristocrats or discussing Jane Austen, when the author would have been an unknown figure at the time. At the same time I admired Kendra’s intelligence, her courage and her loyalty to her new found friends. She is someone who is willing to do just about anything to help those in need or those she cares about and I greatly respect that. I also really liked the character of the Duke and Alec, who served as sharp contrasts to many of their contemporaries in terms of their views on the roles and abilities of women. I felt that the Duke became a much needed father figure to Kendra and am curious to see if the relationship will continue in book 2 of the series. And of course, I’d like to see what happens with Kendra and Alec’s budding relationship. Can people from such different times really make it work? And does Kendra actually want to stay in the 19th century?

With regards to the plot, it elicited many emotions ranging from laughter to terror. The serial killer POV chapters in particular were chilling. The mystery itself kept me guessing till the very end, which I consider to be very important in a mystery series.

I don’t usually read a lot of mystery books, but I genuinely enjoyed this one and feel that it was a 5 out of 5 book for me. If you are looking for a murder mystery with a twist then you should consider picking this one up.

For more reviews like this check out my blog at reviewsbym.com

Jeremy Cote

Very good book. I liked Kendra as a character. Engaging and a quick thinker. I was a bit disappointed that the time travel aspect wasn't covered too much, but the juxtaposition of both societies was really great to see. Would recommend.

Francine Corry

Nicky Morgan

When brilliant FBI agent Kendra Donovan stumbles back in time and finds herself in a 19th century English castle under threat from a vicious serial killer, she scrambles to solve the case before it takes her life—200 years before she was even born. Beautiful and brilliant, Kendra Donovan is a rising star at the FBI. Yet her path to professional success hits a speed bump during a disastrous raid where half her team is murdered, a mole in the FBI is uncovered and she herself is severely wounded. As soon as she recovers, she goes rogue and travels to England to assassinate the man responsible for the deaths of her teammates. While fleeing from an unexpected assassin herself, Kendra escapes into a stairwell that promises sanctuary but when she stumbles out again, she is in the same place - Aldrich Castle - but in a different time: 1815, to be exact. Mistaken for a lady's maid hired to help with weekend guests, Kendra is forced to quickly adapt to the time period until she can figure out how she got there; and, more importantly, how to get back home. However, after the body of a young girl is found on the extensive grounds of the county estate, she starts to feel there's some purpose to her bizarre circumstances. Stripped of her twenty-first century tools, Kendra must use her wits alone in order to unmask a cunning madman.

A Murder in Time A Novel

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