Limited Wish was a blast of a book that brought with it more mind bending paradoxes and adventure very much in the style of Back to the Future.  This series is a whole lot of fun – although I’m not sure fun is the word I’m really looking for or truly says what I want it to – it will suffice for now and maybe I’ll shoot back in time later and revamp this – and nobody will even see this version.  Also, be aware that this review may contain spoilers for One Word Kill so unless ‘current you’ has a way of manipulating time  and jumping back to tell ‘past you’ not to read it – then, well, be warned.  That is all.

We jump forward a little as the story begins and find Nick in a punt, racing from a bunch of hysterical students with blood on their mind.  It seems that Nick has caused offence in some way and is about to pay the price unless he can make his escape.  As it happens, a young woman saves the day and rescues the dude in distress.  Hooray.

Meet Helen.  Nick has that strange feeling of deja vu, he’s sure he’s met Helen a few months earlier in what has come to feel like a haunting event.  Helen is also a student at Cambridge, easy going and easy to like Nick develops an almost immediate crush – but, what about Mia you might very well ask – well, Mia and Nick are no longer dating, too much stress accompanied their pre-destined relationship – but, hold up, I’m getting ahead of myself.

Nick, at the age of 16, finds himself unexpectedly attending Cambridge University, mathematical genius and beater of cancer.  He’s working, alongside an eminent professor to discover the time travel he will need to make use of in later years.  Of course all is not plain sailing.  Apart from getting off to a bad start with a number of the older students who very much resent Nick’s existence let alone his gall in attending their prestigious university, the pressure of finding scientific solutions becomes very real when the sponsors of the project start to use strong arm tactics to keep things on track.  On top of this Nick once again finds himself becoming something of an anomaly, strange things occur around him and he finds himself visited by people from a future yet to come.  But none of these things are as life threatening as the ‘wrinkle in time’ that has affected Nick’s timeline so disastrously and resulted in him having to cope not only with a world determined to see his demise but also facing the news that the cancer he beat has returned with a vengeance.  Things have gone rapidly wrong to say the least.

I’m not going to go further into the plot as this could undoubtedly spoil the surprises in store.  There is no shortage of mind bending twists in Limited Wish.  It really is a book that will make you stop short and think hard.  I love the conundrums created here, it truly is a ‘what came first, the chicken or the egg?’ type of read.  If somebody didn’t come back in time in book one, for example, would time travel even have been thought of as a possibility?  Riddle me this –  the Terminator – travels back in time to assassinate the mother of the rebel leader who is proving such a problem in the future and in doing so leaves behind a peace of technology that is so futuristic that it actually enables that future, which the Terminator comes from, to exist. Yep, it kind of does my head in too but in a good way that, as strange as it may sound, I enjoy.  So many, infinite possibilities that occur not in a lifetime but in a mere instant, all with the possibility to split into different possible futures.

On top of this we have the return of Nick’s friends, or nearly all of them.  They’re starting to lead more separate lives in some ways, and Nick’s departure to University has helped to speed up the rift a little, but they still come together every weekend to share their love of D&Ds.  Mia has a boyfriend and Nick struggles to come to terms with it all, particularly when she starts to bring her new fella to their weekly games sessions.  It’s all part of growing up.

Lawrence has definitely tapped into our love of a certain era with this series. It’s just got such great vibes, its fast paced and is basically a story very well told.  The other thing that is really well done is the voice of the main protagonist.  Nick feels like a 16 year old and even though Lawrence manages to make this seem deceptively easy to achieve I have to applaud it especially the way that the main thrust of the story is all about the difficult choices which he’s presented with – which is a very real issue when you’re in your teens.

In terms of criticisms.  I don’t really have anything to be honest other than the fact that the other characters play something of a lesser role here – but it feels like a natural part of their own growing up.

A second instalment that builds admirably on the foundations laid in the first book and in fact develops in even more twisted ways – I can’t even begin to imagine the ways in which the third book will explore the multiple possibilities that open up when time travel is a possibility.

I received a copy through Netgalley, courtesy of the publisher, for which my thanks.  The above is my own opinion.