Here are 91 books that Somewhere in Time fans have personally recommended if you like
Somewhere in Time.
Shepherd is a community of 12,000+ authors and super readers sharing their favorite books with the world.
I have been interested in time travel since childhood, although I personally do not think human beings will ever move forward or backward in time. But the notion and its paradoxes make a great subject for the imagination, which is the meat of speculative fiction. In writing about time travel, I had to deal with the “grandfather paradox,” where something the character does in the past changes his own future—the core of Ray Bradbury’s short story “The Sound of Thunder.” My excuse, used in The Children of Possibility, is that great upheavals like war and civilizational collapse erase small changes like stepping on a butterfly. But, you know, it’s all speculative.
Tim Powers is one of my favorite science fiction authors, and The Anubis Gates is probably his best book. As always with Powers, it follows a couple of themes besides time travel, including an Egyptian curse and a malicious puppeteer. The travel mechanism takes into account changes in the landscape since the target time. I particularly enjoyed the use of The Beatles’ "Yesterday" as an out-of-time signaling device.
Brendan Doyle is a twentieth-century English professor who travels back to 1810 London to attend a lecture given by English romantic poet Samuel Taylor Coleridge. This is a London filled with deformed clowns, organised beggar societies, insane homunculi and magic.
When he is kidnapped by gypsies and consequently misses his return trip to 1983, the mild-mannered Doyle is forced to become a street-smart con man, escape artist, and swordsman in order to survive in the dark and treacherous London underworld. He defies bullets, black magic, murderous beggars, freezing waters, imprisonment in mutant-infested dungeons, poisoning, and even a plunge back to…
The stars aligned to ignite my passion for magic-realism romance after a few things had happened. 1) I got heavily into the idea of the multiverse and alternate realities in high school, having been inspired by my physics teacher. 2) I read and fell in love with The Time Traveler’s Wife (see list!). 3) I binge-watched the incredible sci-fi show Fringe, which deals with parallel universes and time jumps. 4) I decided to write my first multiverse romance, inspired by all the above factors and more besides. Since then, I’ve focused most of my reading on romantic novels, with those that share a magic realism twist being auto-reads—of course!
While not perhaps a “romance” novel in the established-formula sense, this book is achingly romantic. This epic story truly focuses on the gradual development of the two protagonists’ relationship and how time travel both created and challenged their love. This book ignited my passion for magic-realism romantic novels and remains one of my top books of all time.
I adore the contrast of romantic love between two seemingly destined souls and the brutality of some events caused by Henry’s uncontrolled time travel. There’s also the tricky angle of the age gap (only sometimes, depending on where Henry and Clare are in their lives, but it is occasionally extreme), which the author doesn’t shy away from. And I confess this is probably the book that made me sob the most!
Now a series on HBO starring Rose Leslie and Theo James!
The iconic time travel love story and mega-bestselling first novel from Audrey Niffenegger is "a soaring celebration of the victory of love over time" (Chicago Tribune).
Henry DeTamble is a dashing, adventurous librarian who is at the mercy of his random time time-traveling abilities. Clare Abshire is an artist whose life moves through a natural sequential course. This is the celebrated and timeless tale of their love. Henry and Clare's passionate affair is built and endures across a sea of time and captures them in an impossibly romantic trap…
I have been writing for almost all of my adult life. In my previous role as a school administrator, I published more than a dozen articles for professional journals. Then, a few articles began appearing in popular magazines, both followed by speaking engagements across the country. When I retired from public school service, I took the leap to the novel. Fools and Children and Ticket to Oregon are the result.
I read this book before King became a household name. It was his first big hit and set off a career unmatched in the horror genre. Read as a referral from a friend, I was immediately struck by his uncanny ability to detail a scene.
While not particularly a fan of horror stories, I certainly have read at least eight more King books. I believe him to the master of his ilk.
#1 BESTSELLER • Ben Mears has returned to Jerusalem’s Lot in hopes that exploring the history of the Marsten House, an old mansion long the subject of rumor and speculation, will help him cast out his personal devils and provide inspiration for his new book.
But when two young boys venture into the woods, and only one returns alive, Mears begins to realize that something sinister is at work.
In fact, his hometown is under siege from forces of darkness far beyond his imagination. And only he, with a small group of allies, can hope to contain the evil that…
Burne’s been hiding out in the forest since deserting the King’s Guard. Each time he tries to return to the village, he begins to panic. And then one day, he encounters a handsome stranger picking flowers and hides behind a tree instead of talking.
I am an esoteric storyteller. One day a technician was installing our internet. When he found out we were from New Orleans, he told us a story about when he visited there and saw a ghost. To hear him, there was no doubt about his truthfulness, how it scared him and convinced him never to return to that city again. Here was an ordinary guy whose life view was turned upside down by the paranormal. I write about such things—urban fantasies. I include esoteric books as well as accounts of such experiences in my reading. For me, I believe there is much more to this world than meets the eye.
Though this book is divided into different perspectives, the main character is a writer, someone filled with imagination, who often questions his sanity and is being haunted. As a matter of fact, most of the characters in Peter Straub’s book are. But what exactly they are being haunted by becomes the question.
I love Straub’s portrait of the town of Milburn through the eyes of his guilt-ridden protagonists, The Chowder Club, who torture their guilty consciences by telling each other ghost stories. The way Straub time jumps around in this book is dizzying but truly gorgeous. Right at the prologue, I was pulled in as the haunting mystery unfolded, and the question hangs in the air: who and what is the real villain?
#1 New York Times bestselling author Peter Straub’s classic tale of horror, secrets, and the dangerous ghosts of the past...
What was the worst thing you’ve ever done?
In the sleepy town of Milburn, New York, four old men gather to tell each other stories—some true, some made-up, all of them frightening. A simple pastime to divert themselves from their quiet lives.
But one story is coming back to haunt them and their small town. A tale of something they did long ago. A wicked mistake. A horrifying accident. And they are about to learn that no one can bury…
I have been interested in time travel since childhood, although I personally do not think human beings will ever move forward or backward in time. But the notion and its paradoxes make a great subject for the imagination, which is the meat of speculative fiction. In writing about time travel, I had to deal with the “grandfather paradox,” where something the character does in the past changes his own future—the core of Ray Bradbury’s short story “The Sound of Thunder.” My excuse, used in The Children of Possibility, is that great upheavals like war and civilizational collapse erase small changes like stepping on a butterfly. But, you know, it’s all speculative.
Heinlein is a master of science fiction. This book is only incidentally—but also irrevocably—about time travel. The life of Lazarus Long, who appears in other works by Heinlein, inspired me to write about longevity in my two-volume novel. Heinlein’s story of adorable Dora will bring tears to your eyes, and it shows how immortality can be a curse if you dare to love someone. Heinlein shares a lot of common sense, too, in the incorporated Notebooks of Lazarus Long.
The capstone and crowning achievement of the Future History series, from the New York Times bestselling Grand Master of Science Fiction...
Time Enough for Love follows Lazarus Long through a vast and magnificent timescape of centuries and worlds. Heinlein's longest and most ambitious work, it is the story of a man so in love with Life that he refused to stop living it; and so in love with Time that he became his own ancestor.
I have been interested in time travel since childhood, although I personally do not think human beings will ever move forward or backward in time. But the notion and its paradoxes make a great subject for the imagination, which is the meat of speculative fiction. In writing about time travel, I had to deal with the “grandfather paradox,” where something the character does in the past changes his own future—the core of Ray Bradbury’s short story “The Sound of Thunder.” My excuse, used in The Children of Possibility, is that great upheavals like war and civilizational collapse erase small changes like stepping on a butterfly. But, you know, it’s all speculative.
This three-volume series is not actually about traveling in time. The main characters survive being torpedoed in World War I, are taken aboard the German submarine, and travel to an unknown continent in the South Atlantic where dinosaurs, missing-link humans, and other oddities survive. I mention this book here because I read it as a teenager, long before H.G. Wells’sThe Time Machine,and it gave me a taste for putting modern humans into an earlier time frame—and that is the basis of at least half the time-travel stories.
The Land That Time Forgot opens with the discovery near Greenland of a floating thermos flask containing a manuscript by castaway Tyler Bowen, Jr. The document recounts a series of adventures that starts with a sea battle against a German U-boat and ends on a mysterious island populated by hostile prehistoric animals and people.
The second part of the book, “The People That Time Forgot,” continues the story with the tale of Tom Billings, who has been sent on a mission to rescue Bowen after his manuscript was discovered. He flies solo over the mountainous cliffs that encircle the island…
Stormwalker Series Connections In Time Bain's Story Book 1
By
S.G. Boudreaux,
Finding Family, Discovery, Destiny. This is what nineteen-year-old Bain Brinley is searching for.
In his homeland, far in the mountains, he stepped into what he could only describe as a time-portal and landed in a strange land known as Egypt. Then he falls through another portal during a storm, only…
I am an esoteric storyteller. One day a technician was installing our internet. When he found out we were from New Orleans, he told us a story about when he visited there and saw a ghost. To hear him, there was no doubt about his truthfulness, how it scared him and convinced him never to return to that city again. Here was an ordinary guy whose life view was turned upside down by the paranormal. I write about such things—urban fantasies. I include esoteric books as well as accounts of such experiences in my reading. For me, I believe there is much more to this world than meets the eye.
I’ve always thought the primary component that drives the perfect paranormal romance is great characters, and I think Nora Roberts kills it in this book. I love the two main characters, Sebastian Donovan, a powerful psychic coming from a family line of similarly gifted individuals, and his nemesis, love interest, private detective Mary Ellen Sutherland. In the grand tradition of hard-boiled detective types, she is skeptical and wants no part of his abilities, until she does.
I love the way Roberts slowly peels away layers of these characters to reveal sensitivities as they find themselves forced to work together to find a kidnapped child. And ultimately, they’re able to teach each other and evolve which I really love about this book.
Nora Roberts is a publishing phenomenon; this New York Times bestselling author of over 200 novels has more than 450 million of her books in print worldwide.
Praise for Nora Roberts
'The most successful novelist on Planet Earth' - Washington Post
'A storyteller of immeasurable diversity and talent' - Publisher's Weekly
I am an esoteric storyteller. One day a technician was installing our internet. When he found out we were from New Orleans, he told us a story about when he visited there and saw a ghost. To hear him, there was no doubt about his truthfulness, how it scared him and convinced him never to return to that city again. Here was an ordinary guy whose life view was turned upside down by the paranormal. I write about such things—urban fantasies. I include esoteric books as well as accounts of such experiences in my reading. For me, I believe there is much more to this world than meets the eye.
This is the only nonfiction book on my list, but this memoir by Shirley MacLaine certainly fits the theme. No one is more of a skeptic than MacLaine about the metaphysical world until she is literally dragged into it via a profound and compelling love affair that drives her to explore the possibilities of past life connections.
I found this book fascinating and loved her accessible style of writing. She is an explorer on a scary new terrain where one discovery links to the next and then to the next. MacLaine stuffs her book full of philosophy and questioning and experiences that left me feeling like I had taken this incredible journey right beside her.
MORE THAN 3 MILLION COPIES IN PRINT • “A stunningly honest, engrossing account . . . Shirley MacLaine’s discovery of a new sense of purpose, joy, energy, and love will touch and astonish you.”—Literary Guild Magazine
An outspoken thinker, a celebrated actress, a truly independent woman, Shirley MacLaine takes us on an intimate yet powerful journey into her personal life and inner self.
An intense, clandestine love affair with a prominent politician sparks Shirley’s quest of self-discovery. From Stockholm to Hawaii to the mountain vastness of Peru, from disbelief to radiant affirmation, she at last discovers the roots of her…
Growing up, books weren’t just something I read—they were portals to futures filled with wonder, adventure, and possibility. There was something captivating about science fiction in particular: it was more than just space battles and shiny gadgets. It was about what the future could be—our potential, our challenges, and how we might navigate the unknown. Looking back, a few books and authors had a lasting impact on me, not just as a reader but as a writer. I’ll walk you through five that really stood out and shaped the way I see the world and, ultimately, likely inspired my series.
I love this book for the way it introduces you to the concept of time as both a journey and a prison. I first read it long before it was required reading in school, and I couldn’t get enough of it. Wells’ vision of the far future captivated me—his portrayal of a decaying world where humanity has split into two very different species made me think about the consequences of societal division.
The story left me pondering what our world might become if we fail to learn from our mistakes. I was not a fan of any of the movies in the last 50 years as they did nothing for the wonder that the novel painted in my mind. The haunting future of Wells’ storytelling is that it isn’t just about traveling through time—it’s about confronting the inevitability of change and decay.
A brilliant scientist constructs a machine, which, with the pull of a lever, propels him to the year AD 802,701.
Part of the Macmillan Collector's Library; a series of stunning, clothbound, pocket-sized classics with gold foiled edges and ribbon markers. These beautiful books make perfect gifts or a treat for any book lover. This edition of The Time Machine features an introduction by Dr Mark Bould.
The Time Traveller finds himself in a verdant, seemingly idyllic landscape where he is greeted by the diminutive Eloi people. The Eloi are beautiful but weak and indolent, and the explorer is perplexed by…
The dragons of Yuro have been hunted to extinction.
On a small, isolated island, in a reclusive forest, lives bandit leader Marani and her brother Jacks. With their outlaw band, they rob the rich to feed themselves, raiding carriages and dodging the occasional vindictive pegasus. Thanks to Marani’s mysterious invulnerability,…
As a child, I lived in a small valley sheltered from the night city lights. I could see the stars, and from that time, that is where my imagination dwelled. As a teenager, I read several of the books I have listed here, and from that point, I was inspired to read more and also to write myself. I sincerely believe that despite our current problems, humanity will outlive its troubled childhood and reach for the stars. We are destined for the stars, and only in the works of science fiction writers is that future explored. The books below helped me to become a successful author in my own right.
My all-time favorite time travel book, this story tells of a young student’s journey into the past for a university project. Things go awry, and she arrives at the wrong time, squarely in the path of the Black Death.
As a history buff, I loved the historical perspective of the story imposed against modern university life, as the story tells of the gradual demise of a small English village and the university's attempts to get the student back.
I found the story most realistic, and the sheer urgency of the main character’s dire situation kept me fully engrossed to the last pages, where she is finally rescued. I recommend it to lovers of time travel stories and history buffs.
"Ambitious, finely detailed and compulsively readable" - Locus
"It is a book that feels fundamentally true; it is a book to live in" - Washington Post
For Kivrin Engle, preparing an on-site study of one of the deadliest eras in humanity's history was as simple as receiving inoculations against the diseases of the fourteenth century and inventing a bullet-proof backstory. For her instructors in the twenty-first century, it meant painstaking calculations and careful monitoring of the rendezvous location where Kivrin would be received.
