Time Gate

by John Jakes

THE FOURTH DIMENSION
had finally been opened up, thanks to the invention of the Time Gate. Now man could journey into the dim past or venture into the far-distant future. But the Time Gate had to be kept a top-secret project, manned only by Tom and Cal Linstrum and a few carefully selected scientists—for in the wrong hands, it could become the most potent weapon yet created. Traveling through time, even one man could alter history enough so that everyone on Earth would simply cease to exist. Of course, it would never happen because only a madman would even try to distort the time stream. The one horrifying day, it did happen. And Tom and Cal found themselves chasing through a rapidly changing panorama of history, trying desperately to capture their enemy before they and their whole world vanished forever...!

Genres: Time Travel, Science Fiction, Fiction

149 pages, Mass Market Paperback

First published January 1, 1972

About the author

John William Jakes, the author of more than a dozen novels, is regarded as one of today’s most distinguished writers of historical fiction. His work includes the highly acclaimed Kent Family Chronicles series and the North and South Trilogy. Jakes’s commitment to historical accuracy and evocative storytelling earned him the title of “the godfather of historical novelists” from the Los Angeles Times and led to a streak of sixteen consecutive New York Times bestsellers. Jakes has received several awards for his work and is a member of the Authors Guild and the PEN American Center. He and his wife, Rachel, live on the west coast of Florida.

Also writes under pseudonyms Jay Scotland, Alan Payne, Rachel Ann Payne, Robert Hart Davis, Darius John Granger, John Lee Gray. Has ghost written as William Ard.

Reviews

[Mark · Rating 1 out of 5]

John Jakes’s novel is a fairly standard time travel tale. Scientists in the near-future have a time-travel device that they use to research the past; the project leaders have to scramble to stop an intern who uses the machine to travel into the past in order to assassinate the president, a man promoting a nuclear disarmament treaty that the intern opposes. There is little character development and few twists or turns, as the plot develops pretty much by-the-numbers, with a little padding added to fill the pages. Apart from how the story reflects contemporary fears of nuclear war, there is little here to really engage fans of the time travel genre, who would be better off spending their reading hours on works more imaginative or substantial than this one.

[Doug Armstrong · Rating 2 out of 5]

Not an awful book, but not very good either. It dealt with time travel too easily to be interesting, which is a shame because the writing and characters were fairly decent. My main problem with the book was that it started out interesting, but as soon as they began time traveling it just turned into a shitty sci-fi TV-show caliber story with all the crazy paradoxes being totally ignored or just given an inept explanation.

Also, for absolutely no reason there's a robot box with eye stalks that is the world's greatest journalist. Seriously, it does absolutely nothing for the plot; it's like the author just needed something to pad the book out to 140 pages. The last half of the book the robot is basically just luggage, I kept expecting it to solve a problem or offer some insight that only a robot could come up with, but the author pretty much forgets it even exists about 20 pages after it's introduced.

Actually, the more I think about it the more I dislike the book. Time travel stories are so stupid unless the author is incredibly good-- a merely competent writer like this guy just isn't up to the task.

[Austin · Rating 3 out of 5]

Time travel is always a fun topic for authors to try and tackle. The book was a fun afternoon read but hardly broke the surface with time travel paradoxes. It was fun for the characters to jump back and forth but when the time came to explain complex scenarios, I felt that Jakes used the cop out method. The characters would "Think about the mind numbing effects of (Spoiler)" and then there would be no more explanation. We cant read the characters minds.
However, this is when rating a book gets hard. As much as I would love deep explanations of themes and events, we just cant get it with older science fiction. A lot of books are around the 150 page mark which is no where near enough range to fully develop an idea. With this in mind, Jakes makes a fun story to follow along with characters who are easy to get to know. I would recommend this book to someone who is well in to science fiction who is looking for something to take up their time while waiting in line at the cold cuts store. Easy to follow along and take breaks from the page to see who just cut in front of you.

[Joshua Miller · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is not the best book you will ever read, but there is a time and a place for books that are just fun, without needing to be anything more. For example, I like to read books like this while exercising (which is when I read this), that can simply be enjoyed in small chunks in order to help pass the time. Not every piece of scifi has to be challenging or contain some paradigm shift to be enjoyable. Every book has its context.

The strongest elements of the book, for me, are the pacing and the scene changes. Nothing lingers anywhere too long, which again fit well with how I read it. If you want something deeper or more in line with hard scifi, this is not for you. But for a technically well-written casual read, this is pretty solid.

[Christine · Rating 4 out of 5]

As I starting reading this book, I wondered if the creators of the 'Quantum Leap' TV series read it. I enjoy all of John Jakes books, and this is no exception, but my mind kept making comparisons between the book and the show. That didn't detract from the enjoyment. In fact I think it made me like the book even more.

[Aaron]

r r