Customer Reviews

Time Stand Still: A Darren Camponi Novel

5 star:		(9)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(3)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(2)

 

 

I purchased this book as a recommendation after reading two Dan Brown books (Angles and DaVinchi) and hoped I found another fun read with time travel sprinkled in. Not... I found I had to read 50% of the pages before time travel was mentioned and then another 25% back in time, when the main premise and mystery only got tied up in the two page Epiloge. My recomendation is move on by.

I've read plenty of books over the years. Most are entertaining, some thought-provoking, and, others, phenomenal. Time Stand Still is such a novel, mainly because of the way it weaves several different elements into the mystery novel. One dimensional this book is not!

Think of your past, the days you've lost, the ones you can never have again. Time Stand Still tells the story of what could happen if you could get some of those days back. What would you do? Who would you see?

The main character, Darren Camponi, gets a chance to relive his past after being hired to find someone he went to high school with. That someone is working on a time travel machine, and things end up that Darren volunteers to test it. He's sent back in time, a time he thinks is safe. What he doesn't remember is that the time he's gone back to is just days before his grandmother's suspicious death. Now, Darren is caught between the past and the present, and his future is looking pretty grim.

This story weaves in some philosophical points of view, some sci-fi elements, and all the trappings you expect from a mystery. I found myself racing toward the end, only to be upset because the book ended. The plot's tight and the characters are fantastic.

For those of you smart enough to pick this one up, I noticed that the author is continuning the story online at his web site, johnmisak.net. It seems there is another book in the works, and he is posting the story between the two. So far, it's pretty good.

If you like to read, you'll love this book, period.

Over the 320 pages of Time Stand Still, this author kept me in a constant state of wonderment. At every turn, there was something new, something puzzling, and something exciting. This is true mystery fiction, updated for the 21st century. If you like your mysteries thrilling yet realistic, this is the one for you.

What amazed me most was the perfect design of the plot. It moved when it needed to move, and slowed down when the characters needed to show themselves. The balance of characterization and plot is spot on. I felt I got to know the characters, understand their motivations, and sympathize with them when I needed to.

I found out about John Misak's first book through a web site message board, and thought it was excellent. With Time Stand Still, Misak shows that he can take a genre and mold it to his desires. He is in full control from beginning to end. And the ending, well, that was just plain amazing.

If you like mysteries, or, if you like authors like Lawrence Block, Clive Cussler, or Nelson DeMille, do yourself a favor and give John Misak a try. I rarely read new authors, but this one has certainly paid off for me.

Now, why is this book not a bestseller? I predict it will be soon.

"Time Stand Still", by John Misak, puts a creative twist to the familiar time travel theme. It is the tale of Darren Camponi, a New York private investigator who is assigned to locate an old high school classmate, Jason Caufield. Cuafield, assigned as a researcher at an Ohio university, has been accused of stealing intellectual property from the school. Soon Camponi realizes there is much more to the case than a simple matter of locating Caufield, as "government" thugs start popping up and people close to the case begin having mysterious accidents, or worse. The progress of Caufield's research is apparently of keen interest to a number of interested and sinister parties.

Misak's style is easily read, but fails to capture much in setting or emotion. Nor do the rather thinly developed characters inspire much empathy from the reader as they slog through mostly unimaginative dialogue. But the story is lively and fresh enough to overcome the literary obstacles, and does a credible job of holding the readers attention. The time devoted to actual time travel - surprisingly brief given the subject matter - is clever and darkly humorous. The actual method of time travel, while (thankfully) light on the science, is unique and mildly intriguing. It is unfortunate that more time was not spent on the payoff, and less in the setup.

While "Time Stand Still" is lacking in some respects, all things considered, it provides a satisfying passage of time on the beach or in a plane.

Time Stand Still is a fun, easy read. Not very deep or well developed, but fairly entertaining. What was aggravating about the book was the fact that there were numerous errors: misspellings, grammatical mistakes, mix-ups in character names, and even a mix-up in time zones. (No, the latter had nothing to do with time travel!) Mr. Misak should hire an editor!

I bought this book thinking it was a simple mystery. Though it follows that format, I was surprised at how good it was, how it held my interest and kept me guessing constantly.

This is one of those books you spend some time with and really enjoy the time spent. There are constant twists and turns and there are several subplots that really get you involved with the characters. I like books that make you feel like you know the characters. This is one of those books.

The time travel element really just sets the tone for some spectacular things. Darrin Camponi, the main character, actually gets to investigate the death of his grandmother fifteen years ago. This made things so interesting and didn't take away from the suspenseful feel of this novel.

Buy this book if you want to be pleasantly surprised by a new author who obviously knows how to write. I really can't say any more than that.

Oh please! This was a short story expanded badly into a novel. The gist of the story could be told in 30 pages and would be entertaining at that length. The amount of filler was laughable including several paragraphs about the mens room in a bar. Don't waste your money. I'd return it if I could. Hey! Maybe Amazon should allow us to return bad books! OK-just kidding Amazon.

Time Stand Still was OK, but just that, OK. At times it comes across very amateurish with included details that had nothing to do with the story and seem to be have been included strictly as filler. I found the numerous typos very distracting and could have easily been handled by better editing. There is no real hard science here, unless the use of the term "quantum computer" constitutes science. One goes through two-thirds into the book before any time traveling takes place, but the mix of detective work and time travel was an interesting twist.

Private Investigator Darren Camponi is barely hanging on business wise and he could use some decent paying clients. His love life is going down in flames yet again and his mother wants to know why he keeps missing the mandatory Sunday dinner. But all that and other personal problems pale in comparison when he gets himself involved in a missing person's case of strange proportions.

The missing person is Jason Caulfield according to Mike Holmes who runs his own investigative company. Jason may have come home to his parent's house and since Darren is the nearest to Jason's home, Mike is requesting Darren's help in locating Jason and will pass on part of his fee for Darren's help. In a strange coincidence, Darren knew Jason years ago as an often picked upon nerd in High School. Mike claims not to have known this fact and other details of the case just don't sound right to Darren.

But, Mike has never misled him before and that along with the promise of decent money for what should be a simple enough deal, convinces Darren to take the case and assist. The case becomes steadily more difficult and complicated as Darren learns that Mike wasn't telling him everything and that other forces are serious about recovering Jason and his knowledge one way or the other. Apparently, Jason was working on the concept of time travel and may have found a way to make it happen but Jason needs help. As the body count climbs, Darren begins to identify some of the players but with knowledge of them, they also learn of him and retaliation comes in an unexpected ways.

While overall enjoyable, the major problem with this novel is the extremely anticlimactic ending. After working through, at times overwritten dialogue and narration in the 320-page novel, the ending was very disappointing and weak. This ending is not the "bang" ending one would have expected and weakens the overall enjoyment of what had been a fairly interesting, enjoyable novel. Despite that fact, this novel does feature good writing, pacing, interesting ideas and strong character development. It just needs a better ending.

I found this book through the 'Recommend an Item' feature and was hesitant about getting it. I'd never heard of John Misak before. I am happy I took a chance.

Time Stand Still really interested me from the first page, something I find is hard to do these days. The writer seems to know what he is doing by pulling you in and toying with you throughout the novel. The story was excellent and the telling of it even better.

I've read some of the negative views here, and I have to say I don't agree. I guess it all depends on what you are looking to get out of a book. This one is exciting, humorous, and ultimately enjoyable.

I highly recommend this for anyone who takes reading seriously.