A Stitch in Time: A heart-warming and page-turning British time travel romance (Time Traveller Book 1)

This is a light-hearted time travel novel, with a somewhat more significant romance element than I would normally choose to read, but the time travel elements were quite well handled. Sarah Yates is a history teacher in Sheffield who one evening is visited by a mysterious handsome stranger, John, who tells her she has been chosen for a task to "stitch" holes in the fabric of time, the stranger being the "needle" who directs her missions. She travels back to Sheffield in 1940, London 1913, Kansas in 1874 and London in 1928. Some of the missions feel more serious than others, though they are mostly quite good fun, and I'm a sucker for almost any time travel story, so this was a pleasant, undemanding read.

This was an entertaining story and I'm pleased to give four stars for it. I wanted to keep turning the page as I followed Sarah through her missions into the past to put right what might go wrong. I was worried about the hero in the story, John. He did seem to have quite a violent temper and I'm always wary of folk who throw objects about in a fit of rage.The author had certainly done her research and her visits to the Blitz of London, the Edwardian era and the Wild Frontier of America were quite touching. I did notice that the author mentioned a mop cap when it's actually a mob-cap, but otherwise I did feel I was there with Sarah.A good time-travel story with plenty of twists and turns.

I’ve been meaning to read a book in the time travel genre for quite some time, so when I came across A Stitch in Time I snapped it up immediately. And it didn’t disappoint. It was all it promised to be – imaginative, fun, and completely captivating.A bit about the story. Thirty-something Sarah Yates, a history schoolteacher who’s been ditched by her husband for her best friend, is stunned when gorgeous stranger, John Needler (a time travel Needle), suddenly turns up on her doorstep claiming that she’s been chosen by ‘the powers that be’ to be a time traveller. Her mission? To save lives. After a bit of coaxing, John convinces her to take on the challenge, and Sarah’s adventures as a Stitch begin. We follow her on her journey through the different eras, from the Sheffield Blitz through to delivering a baby in the Old American West. I warmed to Sarah right away. She’d had a tough time romantically and deserved a bit of happiness and excitement in her life.. And I adored John Needler too, a good, strong, gorgeous man, and guess what? He can cook too! A man after my own heart. But can Stitches and Needles mix? My lips are sealed. I don’t want to spoil it for you.I loved Amanda James’s voice, style and storytelling. She offers us a little bit of everything in this novel – romance, humour, and history. It’s told mainly from Sarah’s viewpoint but we do get into John’s head in a few of the chapters too. The well-researched historical scenes were fascinating, and I was completely blown away by author’s imagination and vision of time travel, especially the jaw dropping moments when Sarah slips from one time zone to the next.All in all, a very relaxing read and a great bit of escapism. Loved it!

The idea is a clever one. Sarah, a history teacher, is a stitcher - someone who can repair things which have gone wrong in the past and make sure that the future continues as it is. She is introduced to her new life by John who is a needle - someone who assists. Fortunately, every situation she is sent back into is one that she is currently teaching and so she knows all about (in amazing detail it transpires). In this book she is thrust into Sheffield during the Blitz, Edwardian London, 1920s London, and with the early settlers in the American West. Her role is to find the person who needs help and to work out what to do to fix it - she takes the place of someone quite like her in the past. (This is all very like the TV programme "Quantum Leap" except that Sarah gets to go home between jumps).I loved the idea and I thought that it was reasonably well thought through - although "the powers that be" who control the process remain mysterious and seem to have a lot of power over memory and circumstances. I thought that Sarah's methods of dealing with issues was more of a problem. She goes in totally unprepared and she doesn't know what she has to do or who to help but she does spend a lot of time being incredibly rude to people, lying and barging her way through their lives to achieve her goal. Of course, what she does is successful but I really didn't like her attitude either in the past or the present - she always seems to be giggling at what people say and being very disrespectful.With a different heroine this might have been a five star book because of the idea behind it but I really couldn't warm to Sarah and thus I didn't really engage.

I recently took an educated guesstimate that this was the book that I'd had on my TBR pile the longest so decided I should get on and read it. It's been on my Kindle for at least 2 years!The book started off really well and I immediately enjoyed the author's humour and Sarah's character. I thought she had a Bridget Jones kind of style to her.I thought it was a clever idea with the Needles and the Stitches and how the author has incorporated phrases about time stemming from the time travel.If I'm being honest I enjoyed the historical parts more and appreciated the research that would have gone into these because they came across as very realistic. I liked Sarah being thrown into the past with her not knowing where or what kind of situation she'd find herself in and how she'd cope and having to remember to not let anything slip about the future...I would have liked more of this.And less of the the scenes in the present! I found her and John's relationship overly schmalzy and somewhat predictable especially the scenes involving Josephina. However, that is just me because I think the majority of readers will enjoy the romantic side of the story. Overall I'm glad I picked it up and enjoyed the read.Do any UK readers remember that TV mini series Lost in Austen? this kind of reminded me of that.