Yesterday is History
Author: Kosoko Jackson
Publisher: Sourcebooks Fire
A romantic, heart-felt, and whimsical novel about letting go of the past, figuring out what you want in your future, and staying in the moment before it passes you by.
Weeks ago, Andre Cobb received a much-needed liver transplant.
He's ready for his life to finally begin, until one night, when he passes out and wakes up somewhere totally unexpected...in 1969, where he connects with a magnetic boy named Michael.
And then, just as suddenly as he arrived, he slips back to present-day Boston, where the family of his donor is waiting to explain that his new liver came with a side effect—the ability to time travel. And they've tasked their youngest son, Blake, with teaching Andre how to use his unexpected new gift.
Andre splits his time bouncing between the past and future. Between Michael and Blake. Michael is everything Andre wishes he could be, and Blake, still reeling from the death of his brother, Andre's donor, keeps him at arm's length despite their obvious attraction to each other.
Torn between two boys, one in the past and one in the present, Andre has to figure out where he belongs—and more importantly who he wants to be—before the consequences of jumping in time catch up to him and change his future for good.
This is not your average romance. Nor is it your average time-travel tale. I mean, torn between two lovers who exist in different eras? While trying to navigate the rules and discombobulation of bouncing between decades? Never mind the normal challenges of school, parental curfews, first dates, rebelling against your parents’ career hopes for you, and adapting to life after a liver transplant.
There’s humor, although it’s not a primarily funny read:
“You’re annoying, you know that?”
“It’s a gift, really.”
And there’s good writing:
Boys are tricky beasts. Their words are like weasels that can wriggle their way into the smallest cracks of another person’s armor. When I came out as gay, my mother told me to watch out for them, for the way they can wrap you and strangle what makes you special.
The time-travel aspect offers historical perspective:
The history of society’s treatment of gay people isn’t something obscure. It sucked. That’s how it can be summarized. My time, the twenty-first century, is the best time to be gay so far.
And there’s lots and lots of emotion-laden dialogue:
“I’ve failed at being his mother, haven’t I?”
I shrug. “That’s the good thing about being a time traveler, isn’t it? We get do-overs.”
What this book is not is a heavy treatise on being Black or gay. They are almost non-issues in this novel. It’s seven parts romance and three parts time-travel, entertaining but not in a laugh-out-loud way. It’s built largely on dialogue and the characters’ rather intense emotional ups and downs. The protagonist and his love interests are romantic, sentimental, soppy, sometimes verging on over-the-top mushy. But they’re also authentic; the reader quickly cares a great deal about them and the tricky decisions they have to make. The plot moves briskly. It’s not your average romance or time-travel novel because the way those two aspects fit together is original, even artful. This novel is from a debut author already tagged as a rising star.
- P.W.