Running Behind Time by Jan Turk Petrie is a time travel novel set in 2020 during the Covid era and 1983. While traveling to London for a job interview, Tom inadvertently slips back 38 years as the train enters a tunnel that later he cannot find on the map. As he alights at Paddington Station, he is shocked to discover no mobile phones, his money is unacceptable and the world is quite different. There is no way he can survive in this new environment and frightened and out of time, he rushes to catch the train back home. He meets an aspiring actress named Beth on the return journey and the time slip happens again, only now it’s Beth who is out of sync with her world, catapulted 38 years into the future. Despite their best efforts, the attraction is there, but how can they live in two different time zones?

I chose to read and review Running Behind Time by Jan Turk Petrie for two reasons. I’ve tried a few time travel books before and was curious about this one. I was also interested in the Cotswold setting as I’m familiar with the area. I can’t fault this book. The characters are well-drawn, the dialogue believable, and I enjoyed the descriptions of both time frames. The author included imagery that set the scene, and although the ending was not a great surprise, I was getting nervous as I approached the last few pages, hoping that all would be resolved, which for the most part it was. Beautifully written, well-edited and I thoroughly enjoyed it. A well-deserved 5 stars.

Running Behind Time by Jan Turk Petrie is a time-slip story with a slight difference. Beth Sawyer is an aspiring young actress living in London in the summer of 1982. Just cast as the lead in a new play, albeit a small production, she is excited that her career is finally beginning to get some traction. Deciding to visit her favorite aunt, she heads to the station to catch the train for Cheltenham. Meanwhile, in the summer of 2020, Tom Brooks is living out the lockdown from the Coronavirus pandemic at his mother’s cottage in the countryside rather than his small, lonely flat in Bristol. Furloughed from his job as a travel agent, Tom is bored and frustrated with his inactivity, and when a good mate texts him about a possible job in London, Tom decides to go and check it out. When he arrives for the train, there are very few passengers due to the pandemic and Tom settles back for a quiet ride to the city. Somewhere in a tunnel, whilst Tom is in the toilet, something weird happens and when Tom emerges back into the carriage, it is now chock-a-block full with passengers and none of them are masked. What on earth is happening, Tom wonders. By the time he disembarks at Paddington Station, it is clear the world has shifted somewhat and Tom has ended up back in 1982. How will he regain his own time and what part will Beth play in this unfolding saga?

Running Behind Time is a pleasant, easy-to-read, time travel story that is up-to-date and relevant to today’s social situation. Author Jan Turk Petrie has created two totally relatable characters in Beth and Tom, whose demeanors are perfectly appropriate for their individual time periods. I particularly loved the horror Tom experienced in 1982, with the constant pall of cigarette smoke in his eyes wherever he went and the lack of personal space that prior to the pandemic was the norm but now fills him with fear and dread. Beth’s denial of reality and her panic over the possibility that she had shifted time was wonderfully portrayed and it was so easy for a reader to put themselves in her place and feel the empathy and emotions she was experiencing. The story takes a relatively predictable path, in some ways, but the author does an excellent job of hiding the reality of the situation from the reader until late in the narrative. This is a compelling story and can be read in a single sitting (as I did). For a bit of fantasy and suspension of reality in these tough times, with a story that is topical for today, this is a winner. The potential for time travel has always been a fascinating subject for many and if you are one of those, I know you’ll love this offering. I did and I can highly recommend it.