Wrong Place Wrong Time
Page turning
Clever
Thrilling

Wrong Place Wrong Time A Novel

From UK bestselling author Gillian McAllister comes an astonishing, compulsively twisty psychological thriller about a mother who witnesses her teenage son stab a man and then seizes on an unconventional way to try to save him, deemed “perfection, every word, every moment” by Lisa Jewell. Can you stop a murder after it’s already happened? Late October. After midnight. You’re waiting up for your seventeen-year-old son. He’s late. As you watch from the window, he emerges, and you realize he isn’t alone: he’s walking toward a man, and he’s armed. You can’t believe it when you see him do it: your funny, happy teenage son, he kills a stranger, right there on the street outside your house. You don’t know who. You don’t know why. You only know your son is now in custody. His future shattered. That night you fall asleep in despair. All is lost. Until you wake . . . . . . and it is yesterday. And then you wake again . . . . . . and it is the day before yesterday. Every morning you wake up a day earlier, another day before the murder. With another chance to stop it. Somewhere in the past lies an answer. The trigger for this crime—and you don’t have a choice but to find it . . .
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Reviews

Photo of surtified™
surtified™@heartrender081
4 stars
Mar 23, 2025

I don't tend to read alot of thrillers, but when I saw this one in the library, the idea of it seemed so interesting, because I'm a big fan of the time loop cliche, but in a thriller? It's unheard of to me. It took a little longer to read and digest, but that's purely because the book carries over a span of nearly 800 days, which is insanity.

Jen was such a great character to base this around, because she was such an unsuspecting but also unreliable mother and wife. This book was so confusing to follow, but each time the chapter ended on some crazy connection, my mouth genuinely dropped in shock. The dual time lines were confusing and messy but absolute genius; this book was a fever dream. How can anyone come up with such a plot line by themselves?

Photo of Chloé Dupèré
Chloé Dupèré@chloedupere
5 stars
Mar 8, 2025

Everytime I thought I had guessed what was happening, I was throw for a loop. Also they do the thing where they say the title of the book and everything clicks into place, love when that happens.

Photo of Naomi P
Naomi P@bloowind
4.5 stars
Nov 3, 2024

At first, I was as confused as Jen with what was happening. The story is not the typical time travel story where the main character is just dumped in random periods in the timeline. Every moment she moves back in time is a significant period in the story. And when the information was slowly being revealed and the dots started to connect, it became thrilling for me.

This review contains a spoiler
+6
Photo of Danielle Rose
Danielle Rose@dancaban
4 stars
Aug 15, 2024

My first mystery! It had a lot of fun twists - very easy to read! Loved the anecdotes on family and being present.

+2
Photo of frdose
frdose@frdose
5 stars
May 20, 2024

4.5

Photo of Des
Des@mechaderay
2 stars
Apr 26, 2024

There was so much going on in this without much an explanation that I thought about DNF for most of the middle. Towards the end it really picked up and was interesting, but then left so many things unanswered. The concept was a good twist on Groundhog Day, but it fell flat.

+1
Photo of kayla
kayla @mooslibrary
1 star
Feb 25, 2024

put me in a month (almost two) long reading slump.

Photo of Ali Angco
Ali Angco@aliangco
3.5 stars
Feb 3, 2024

Easy mystery about a marriage and family. I enjoyed the plot rather than a read about writing style.

+3
Photo of Lauren Piper
Lauren Piper@laurenpip
5 stars
Jan 1, 2024

Great read. Super compelling and kept me guessing through most of the story

+4
Photo of Vicky
Vicky@vickster4585
3.5 stars
Nov 30, 2023

I picked this at random in an airport and it was a cool concept! I do love twists and turns and i didn’t call any of them which is rare but it was enjoyable!

Photo of Megan BV
Megan BV@megplantparm
3.5 stars
Nov 5, 2023

This was an enjoyable read. The middle did seem to drag a bit for especially once things started being revealed but still a fun and unique mystery.

Photo of Jodie Reads
Jodie Reads@jodie2812
5 stars
Oct 31, 2023

Such a fascinating concept! I loved how it was written and it kept me interesting the entire way through!

+1
Photo of Shidehdeishidi
Shidehdeishidi@shideh
3 stars
Sep 24, 2023

A very attractive story full of surprises so much that you can't put the book down

Photo of den
den@biblee
4 stars
Aug 25, 2023

such a page turner!! need a moment to REALLY think about the last few pages brb

Photo of Lauren Dale
Lauren Dale@ljdale
4 stars
Jul 16, 2023

This was actually a good book. It was a little confusing to begin with but once you got into it, it was actually hard to put down. The time travel to solve a crime was so intriguing

+3
Photo of Yega
Yega@yega
5 stars
Jul 11, 2023

A perfect time traveling story. I loved how the twists came out of nowhere and surprised me.

I've found the story perfectly paced and it kept me thinking about it even when I was not reading it. I enjoyed it very much.

+4
Photo of Barbara Williford
Barbara Williford@barbarawilliford
3.5 stars
Jun 21, 2023

Jen has a happy marriage to the love of her life, a wonderful son who she’s adores and is enjoying life until she isn’t. She witnesses who smart, witty and fun loving son commit a murder right before her eyes. To make matters worse, she keeps waking up in the past (days, weeks and years in the past). Can she undo the threads of the past to stop her son from spending life in prison? Twist and turns in the book reveal that her perfect life isn’t what it seems and there are mounds of secrets that have lead them to this point in the future.

Trigger warning: some violence and graphic language.

+1
Photo of Victoria
Victoria@ptoridactyl
5 stars
May 1, 2023

The layers just kept coming, and I happily ate them up! When I tell you the bombs were so perfectly placed that I was not expecting them and had to pause so my brain could wrap around it. My linrary has it on a 3 week loan with no renewals because of its popularity, so I paused the book I was reading to read this. And I read this book in a little over a day because I was so pulled into it. I just had to keep reading and figure out what was happening.

Photo of Kaitlyn Wendler
Kaitlyn Wendler@kaitlynwendler
4.5 stars
Apr 4, 2023

Oookay. This book kept me guessing and engaged until the very end! There is a time travel element that could have been hoaxy, but wasn’t. The ending arrived a bit abruptly, however overall really enjoyed

+2
Photo of Roberta
Roberta@robysbujo
5 stars
Mar 31, 2023

When I read the plot of this book I was intrigued because I’ve never read a thriller with time travel elements to it. I wasn’t even sure I was going to like it but as soon as I picked it up I was immersed in the story and I couldn’t stop thinking about it even when I wasn’t reading.

Good book, good story, good writing, good characters and even a few twists and turns I wasn’t expecting. Very positive reading experience, I highly recommend this!

+3
Photo of Rebecca McCombe
Rebecca McCombe@beckiscool
4 stars
Mar 12, 2023

Solid time travelling thriller. I found some of the cop/Ryan chat quite a slog at time but thought Jen was a great character, really cool and relatable. I even got a little bit teary in then end.

Photo of Aims
Aims@aimz
3.5 stars
Mar 2, 2023

I actually loved this, but the 3.5 stars is because it was sooooooooooo slow in the middle. I really had to push on through. The ending more than makes up for it.

+3
Photo of Gabbi Miller
Gabbi Miller@gabbi
4 stars
Feb 21, 2023

This book was super interesting! It starts out with a murder and every morning the main character wakes up on a day in her past life to figure out what led up to the murder and how to stop it. Learning everything in reverse chronological order was an interesting take that kept me hooked!!

Photo of Lily Balderston
Lily Balderston@lilyb
4 stars
Feb 10, 2023

Wow. This took me a WHILE to get into. I picked it up like three times and almost considered DNFing it but I decided to check the reviews and they had similar experiences and ended up loving it. really really happy I stuck with it because this book ended up being fantastic. :)

Highlights

Photo of Lauren Piper
Lauren Piper@laurenpip

Really liked the storytelling

Photo of Melanie Harvie
Melanie Harvie@ladybrock

Avoiding pain is priceless to some.

299

Photo of Melanie Harvie
Melanie Harvie@ladybrock

How sinister it is to relive your life backward. To see things you hadn't at the time. To realize the horrible significance of events you had no idea were playing out around you.

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