Replay - Ken Grimwood

This is my favourite book of all time, I read it at least once a year, usually around New Years for some strange reason - possibly due to the renewal factor of that time of year. Previous reviewers have given fully detailed accounts of this story, so there's not much to say except that reading this book can be a life-affirming experience. Jeff Winston has to re-live his life again and again, knowing each time what has happened to him not only in his 'original' life, but in each life that he has had to 'Replay'. Each experience leads him to experience each Replay differently, as he becomes enlightened, more cynical, experiences futility ...  Read the complete review

Replay by Ken Grimwood is my all time favourite novel. It begins with the death of the main character in the book, a guy by the name of Jeff Winston, a 42-year-old newsreader for a local radio station. On the 18th October 1988 at 1.06pm Jeff suffers a heart attack whilst sitting at his desk on the phone to his wife. This rather odd start to this novel takes a dramatic turn when Jeff wakes up again in bed. Realising that he hasn't died after all he looks around at his surroundings, which look oddly familiar. There's an old song playing on the radio and a poster on the wall that Jeff recognises as being similar to one that he'd bought when he was at ...  Read the complete review

"Jeff Winston was on the phone with his wife when he died" begins Ken Grimwood's 'Replay'. Confusingly, Jeff then wakes up in a strange, but at the same time familiar, bed. It doesn't take him long to realise what happened: that he died at 1:06 PM on October 18th, 1988 and somehow has woken up in his college dorm room at some point in 1963 complete with memories of his entire life. This causes Jeff some problems. What does he do? How has this happened? Is there a way back? In trying to explain these things, Jeff begins to realise that these matters are beyond his control but not, he hopes, beyond his understanding. Trying ...  Read the complete review

It's 1988 and Jeff Winston works at his local radio station, bored with the way his life has turned out. While on the phone to his wife, he has what seems to be a heart attack and dies, but instead of that being the end of poor Jeff Winston, he wakes up back in 1963, young again and at college. He is twenty-five years younger but has twenty-five years worth more experience to call upon. He knows the way the world will be shaped, he can gamble on events he already knows the outcome to, buy stocks in products he knows will take off, save politicians from assassination, and much, much more. The world is his ...  Read the complete review