Favorite Time Travel Novels

[Spade]

I'm looking for some new time travel to read. Half of my favorite books involve time travel:

• 11/22/63 by Stephen King
• Life After Life by Kate Atkinson
• Exultant by Stephen Baxter
• Replay by Ken Grimwood
• Doomsday Book by Connie Willis
• The Time Traveler's Wife by Audrey Niffenegger

I also enjoyed:

• Timeline by Michael Crichton
• The Accidental Time Machine by Joe Haldeman
• Time Travelers Never Die by Jack McDevitt
• Redshirts by John Scalzi
• The Time Machine by H.G. Wells

I wanted to get some more recommendations to add to this list of books that I want to read:

• Rewinder by Brett Battles
• The First Fifteen Lives of Harry August by Claire North
• Time and Again by Jack Finney
• Somewhere in Time by Richard Matheson
• The House on the Strand by Daphne du Maurier
• The Man Who Folded Himself by David Gerrold

 

[TheDustyZebra]

To Say Nothing of the Dog is another good Connie Willis.

 

[2DaveWixon]

The first time travel novel I ever read was The End of Eternity by Isaac Asimov -- as the first, of course it stretched my mind more than could any that followed...so maybe I'm overrating it in my mind, but I still recommend it.
Another, one of the best: Clifford D. Simak's Time and Again.

 

[Rodders]

Lightning by Dean Koontz was very good.

 

[Randy M.]

Well, your to-read includes 3 books in my TBR and one that I've been debating about picking up. My TBR also includes Ken Grimwood's Replay, often mentioned as great. One of these days I'll get to it.

Just an FYI: If you're not short story averse, a massive time travel anthology was published just a few years ago: The Time-Traveler's Almanac ed. by Jeff and Ann Vandermeer.


Randy M.

 

[Caliban]

Blackout/All Clear by Connie Wills is good if you read and enjoyed her other Oxford Time Travel series.

 

[Frost Giant]

One from my youth that I remember liking was Piers Anthony's Castle Roogna.
Another one I've likely brought up before on the forum is Larry Niven's Flight of the Horse.

 

[Vertigo]

I would second the recommendation of Asimov's The End of Eternity. Definitely mind bending!
Another good one that is more contemporary would be Neal Asher's The Cowl; not my favourite Asher but very good all the same.

 

[johnnyjet]

Two more classics:

The Big Time - Fritz Leiber
Time Storm - Gordon R. Dickson

 

[Vince W]

Timescape by Gregory Benford.

 

[Vertigo]

I would second the recommendation of Asimov's The End of Eternity. Definitely mind bending!
Another good one that is more contemporary would be Neal Asher's The Cowl; not my favourite Asher but very good all the same.

Whoops I just noticed it's not The Cowl but just Cowl.

 

[Rodders]

Good choice. I struggled with Cowl at first, but it does turn into a really interesting book.

Stephen Baxter's Time Ships was also pretty cool.

 

[Vertigo]

Yes I struggled a little at first but one that's definitely worth persevering with!

 

[Extollager]

Wilson Tucker's The Year of the Quiet Sun, which I reread every few years.

 

[hitmouse]

Agree with the Connie Willis book and with the sequel where a historian goes back to the time of the Black Death.

Personally I like the whimsy of the Dancers at the End of Time books by Michael Moorcock.

The Book Of the New Sun by Gene Wolfe and the Urth of the New Sun rely very heavily on time travel, though this is not obvious until the later part of the series.

 

[Bick]

The first time travel novel I ever read was The End of Eternity by Isaac Asimov -- as the first, of course it stretched my mind more than could any that followed...so maybe I'm overrating it in my mind, but I still recommend it.
Another, one of the best: Clifford D. Simak's Time and Again.

Indeed. I love the Asimov.
Also from Simak, time travel has a more minor role in Cemetery World and Time is The Simplest Thing. Both are terrific. Also enjoyed, but not really time-travel (sort of though): Tau Zero by Poul Anderson.
What about the Julian May tetrology, The Saga of the Exiles - the characters go back approx. 7 million years to the Earth's Pliocene epoch. I really liked those books in my youth.
I notice the OP mentioned Timeline by Crichton. I've read that but I'd forgotten all about it - you're right, it was fun.

 

[2DaveWixon]

Indeed. I love the Asimov.
Also from Simak, time travel has a more minor role in Cemetery World and Time is The Simplest Thing. Both are terrific. Also enjoyed, but not really time-travel (sort of though): Tau Zero by Poul Anderson.
What about the Julian May tetrology, The Saga of the Exiles - the characters go back approx. 7 million years to the Earth's Pliocene epoch. I really liked those books in my youth.
I notice the OP mentioned Timeline by Crichton. I've read that but I'd forgotten all about it - you're right, it was fun.

I blush that I forgot to mention Tau Zero.
(Few SF stories took time travel farther than that one.)

 

[Vertigo]

I blush that I forgot to mention Tau Zero.
(Few SF stories took time travel farther than that one.)

Ah but as Bick says that's not really time travel it's just relativity taken to the extreme.

 

[Rodders]

Relativity. Would the Forever Wars count? Not quite a time travel story, but there are elements that could ber considered so.

 

[Spade]

Relativity. Would the Forever Wars count? Not quite a time travel story, but there are elements that could ber considered so.

I love Forever War. That's a pretty realistic take on time travel. I had forgotten about that.