The American author and psychic Ray Stanford, whose books include ‘Fatima Prophecy’ and ‘What Your Aura Tells You’, claimed that in the 1970s he was driving himself and his wife to a meeting in Austin Texas with Uri Geller. They were stuck in traffic and wished they were closer, a couple of minutes later they suddenly found themselves and their car 60km further up the road. Stanford also tells of a prior story where while out riding he saw low hanging bough of a tree and with his horse galloping at speed and realising that he wouldn’t be able to stop, he was going to be seriously hurt. Next thing, he found himself standing upright a short distance from his horse. He was unable to deduce how he got where he was. These are more on the side of examples of teleportation, than time slips, but in both cases, Stanford seems to move forward in time and distance. Similarly British paranormal authors John and Anne Spencer in their numerous books on the supernatural, catalogue examples of various people walking around towns and villages in the UK, Europe and seeing buildings and people from another period in time.  Two eyewitnesses who claim they were in the Palace of Versailles, France. when they started seeing people in period dress and parts of the building that had long since been renovated. This month’s third book review features time slips in its central plot, the book is Recursion by David J. Harrison and published by The Book Guild ( www.bookguild.co.uk ) on 28^th October.

When high-flying London based artist Huraki Kensagi goes through a breakdown following the ending his marriage. His agent recommends he spends time at a remote cottage in the north of England, to getaway from it all and get his career back on track. On arrival in the little village of Barrowthwaite, he runs into Frank a local shopkeeper, who talks in the third person, while his landlord is a mysterious chap called “The Captain”. The town has no mobile coverage and the weather changes abruptly every quarter of an hour or so. When his estranged wife Jane also arrives in the village a couple of hours after his arrival, she sees Huraki having sex with Maggie the caretaker of the cottage. When she realises, he’s actually ok, and confronts him shortly afterwards, she tells him no one has heard from him in three months and his agent has been trying to reach him. But then Jane uses the only working phone in the village at “The Captain’s” house to call her employers, to say she is returning to London the next day. But is surprised to be told she has been let go, as she hasn’t been heard from in six months! When she only left London 24 hours ago! The couple soon realise they the central focus of a malignant entity who has been interfering in their lives from the very beginning. Can they escape the Lake District and the alien dangers that lie beneath it with their sanity and lives intact?

This book is an engrossing tale of murder, mystery, and extra-terrestrial encounters. With the supernatural element thrown in for good measure. I found it enjoyable, but there’s a lot of similarities to the likes of large and small screen productions such as Cocoon, The American Werewolf in London, Close Encounters of the Third kind, as well as Groundhog Day and some of the eeriest episodes of Tales Of The Unexpected.

Harrison’s story telling is good, his characterisations are shudder inducing, especially the when the entities speak in the third person. The references to gang culture are an interesting one and it’s always good to see how the uber confident underworld foot soldiers, deal with the unexplainable.  

This is English author David J. Harrison’s ( www.davidjharrisonauthor.com )debut novel. Harrison was read The Lord Of The Rings as a sleeping child, while also being brought up on a diet of classic science fiction and fantasy, including the works of Robert E. Howard, Lin Carter and L. Sprague de Camp. His day job is in Biotechnology, specifically in medical devices and contributed to several new medicines. He currently lives in Cambridge.

So, if you like your books with a heady mixture of science fiction, murder mystery and the paranormal. This new author into the genre should be well worth a read. I enjoyed my introduction to Harrison and his ability keep me turning the pages.

So, head down to your local book shop, pretty sharpish, and snap up a copy. But try not to run into yourself on the way back.  

Reviewed by: Adrian Murphy

This book review is part of a Random Things Blog Tour, to see what the other reviewers thought, visit their blogs listed below. Then if you get a copy, comeback and tell us what you thought. We’d really appreciate the feedback.