Tempest by Julie Cross

The year is 2009.  Nineteen-year-old Jackson Meyer is a normal guy… he’s in college, has a girlfriend… and he can travel back through time. But it’s not like the movies – nothing changes in the present after his jumps, there’s no space-time continuum issues or broken flux capacitors – it’s just harmless fun.
That is… until the day strangers burst in on Jackson and his girlfriend, Holly, and during a struggle with Jackson, Holly is fatally shot. In his panic, Jackson jumps back two years to 2007, but this is not like his previous time jumps. Now he’s stuck in 2007 and can’t get back to the future.
Desperate to somehow return to 2009 to save Holly but unable to return to his rightful year, Jackson settles into 2007 and learns what he can about his abilities.
But it’s not long before the people who shot Holly in 2009 come looking for Jackson in the past, and these “Enemies of Time” will stop at nothing to recruit this powerful young time-traveler.  Recruit… or kill him.
Piecing together the clues about his father, the Enemies of Time, and himself, Jackson must decide how far he’s willing to go to save Holly… and possibly the entire world.

 So it did take me a couple of days to thoroughly get into this book, but trust me: once you get within the first 100 pages, you are hooked! Admittedly, it was a bit confusing at the beginning, especially since Jackson's abilities are just kind of thrown at you with no explaination. But as the novel progresses, you learn more about his background, and I actually think the whole plot is absolutely brilliant! At first, I thought it was just about time travel and teenage relationships, but it's also about learning how to cope with things you can't change and a sort of coming of age. And for once, I actually loved all of the main characters - Jackson is witty, but not enough to be arrogant and irritating - and Holly can be a bit of a drama queen at times, but mostly she is a strong independant girl who actually puts up with a lot from the people around her - which a lot of teenage girls can relate to, I find. Although a boy is the main character, I have to say that I'd actually recommend this book for girls, because even though there is a bit of blood and violence, at the end of the day it is mainly a romance novel. Overall, I really enjoyed this book, and a lot of the time I found myself reading late into the night and going "I will go to bed at the end of this chapter" and then I get to the end of the chapter and there is a massive cliffhanger, so I'm like "Okay, maybe to the next chapter..." and so on. Once you're hooked, you are addicted, and I cannot wait for the sequel to this amazing series.
Rating:4/5