Book Description:

Ian Chambers is in trouble and under pressure, guilt ridden and struggling to complete the first draft of his novel.

On a stormy night on a Yorkshire beach, he experiences something so terrifying that he questions his sanity.

In a desperate search for a rational explanation, he risks losing not only reality as he knows it… but his very existence.

My Review:

I really enjoyed TimeSlip, both for the narrative and for the Phil Rowland’s writing style.

This is a book that runs on two timelines that merge and separate throughout the story. In 1943, during a raging storm, a policeman is stabbed to death on Bridlington Beach whilst on a stakeout – fast forward almost eighty years and a writer experiences an attack on his life in the same place. This turns out to be a dreadful flashback – one in which his experience duplicates that of the policeman. Or was it himself in another lifetime? Whatever the truth, he can’t escape the terror that haunts him every day.

The protagonist, Ian Chambers, an author, is a multi-layered character who comes alive in the page – so much so that I became alternately exasperated and sorry for him as he wrestles with both his emotions and his lack of an ability to, “just sit down and write the book he is being paid for, before his agent sacks him”. That and his infidelity tempered my sympathy for him at times.

And he is supported by an excellent cast of minor characters, both from the story in the past, and from the contemporary narrative that adds an interesting complexity to the plot.

The brilliant descriptions of the settings give a good sense of place to the dangerous time during WW2, and of the sometimes frenetic changes of background as the protagonist strives to find answers to his dilemmas in his present life.

TimeSlip is a fascinating and thought provoking psychological  thriller, and I recommend it to any reader who enjoys a book that crosses genres. This is a contemporary story of a man struggling with marital and work problems of his own making , and a preternatural mystery. One that almost costs him everything he holds dear  – including his own life.

About Phil Rowlands

I am a screenwriter, author and producer.

After many years as a ‘safe pair of hands’ actor, mainly in film and television, I moved into the production side as a freelance writer and producer. I’ve written feature films, TV and radio dramas, documentaries and animation series and worked on productions as a script doctor and consultant.

In 2009 I was one of the co-founders of Funky Medics, a production company focussing mainly on innovative health education. Its projects have included heart disease, diabetes, smoking and drug abuse.

Currently, I have four screenplays under option, one for production in 2023, the other three at various stages of draft development.

Siena, my first novel, was revised and republished by new indie publisher Diamond Crime along with my second, Single Cell in April 2021. A new book, TimeSlip, was released in late March 2022

I write in a shed at the bottom of my small garden.

Originally from Pembrokeshire in West Wales, I now live near Cardiff and have British nationality and Canadian citizenship.

Find Phil here:

Twitter: https://twitter.com/PhilRowlands2

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/phil.rowlands.906