23 Minutes

Twenty-three minutes. That's all she gets when she turns back time. Twenty-three minutes to change an outcome or improve a situation. And she is trying desperately to change the outcome of the bank robbery she witnessed. Zoe's goal is to lessen the loss of life, but each time she "playsback" those twenty-three minutes, te outcome is better, not worse. Though as she walks those minutes over and over, and tries and fails to change something each time to improve the situation, she learns a little something so that by the ninth time she has replayed those minutes, there finally is a change. She as a little help from Daniel, a private investigator who dies in more of the playbacks than not. But Zoe is able to figure out how to approach him show more in each playback so he will help her, and eventually they are able to make enough changes that the outcome is much different than the original twenty-three minutes played out. I love books about time travel - it is so fascinating to me. Thinking about what would happen if we could go back and change one small occurrence, and how that would affect everything after it. Would killing a mosquito really change the course of history? No one knows, because we currently can't test this. This book was pretty good, but it was focused on one event that Zoe was trying to change. I was hoping there would be a broader scope to it, as in she would go back to different places or several different times. But overall, it kept me interested and I wanted to know if she would be able to change the bank robbery, so I kept reading. How would I use this ability, if I had it? Hmmm... show less

Yes, it's a YA Time Travel thriller. But even if you don't like all those motifs, you'll probably enjoy this. Vande Velde is a wonderful writer, no matter the genre or age level she is exploring. Style and story both are thoughtful & fun. I will continue to read everything by the author.

A real page turner with a fascinating conundrum. Very interesting look at time travel. Also a good study on how much control we have over situations. I really enjoyed this.

A little slow to get into it, but I got caught up in it halfway through. Zoe can rewind time -- for 23 minutes only. When she's caught in a bank during a robbery gone horribly wrong, she tries again and again to fix things, but while each rewind changes what happens they don't improve events.

When Zoe witnesses a bank robbery where an innocent bystander is killed, she travels back in time to prevent his death. Zoe can only travel back 23 minutes in time up to ten times for a particular segment of time. However, each playback leads to more and more deaths. Will she be able to prevent anyone from dying?

This is one of my favorite Vivian Vande Velde books.

FROM AMAZON: By both society’s measure and her own, fifteen-year-old Zoe Mahar is pretty much a loser. Then one day she ducks into Spencerport Savings and Loan simply to get out of the rain—and witnesses a bank robbery gone horrifyingly wrong.

The good news is that Zoe has a unique ability: she can play back time and repeat events. But it's not an unlimited deal—she can only jump 23 minutes, and her first playback creates an even more disastrous outcome. Zoe has only ten tries to get it right before this particular 23 minutes becomes irreversible. But in the process of trying to become the heroine she doesn't believe she can be; Zoe will learn about herself—and realize that there is more to who she is than she thought.