First book of 2006: The Time Traveler's Wife

Finished my first book of the year, The Time Traveler's Wife by Audrey Niffenegger. It is a story of a man, Henry, who spontaneously travels through time, and his relationship with his wife, Clare, throughout the course of their lifetimes. She first meets him as a six year old girl (he is in his late thirties, traveling back in time to visit her), while his first encounter with her comes when he is 28 years old. The story begins with Clare getting to know her future husband throughout her childhood as he knows everything that is in store for them, and then the story flips to Henry being the one getting to know Clare while she has already fallen in love with his older self. The story is incredibly compelling, and raises many thought provoking questions. Does she have the free will to fall in love with him, considering he has already told her she is his wife in the future? Would they have fallen in love without the time travel, since when they "first" meet in chronologically correct time, Clare recognizes Henry immediately as her future husband? And is Clare's life of "waiting" the one she was meant to have? Is she able to truly live out her entire life? Is Henry a true lover, or a sociopath? And another interesting question pops up as the story progresses: should one feel jealous when his loved one holds a torch for his older/younger self? This story has many more interesting questions to be answered as Clare and Henry fall in love, live out married life, and deal with the fear of having to deal with all the ramifications his "disease" brings to their lives.

The book is well written and compelling, although it gets a bit slow in the middle, and I found the climactic event she was building up to a bit predictable. However, it was definitely worth my time.