#Booktamins Blogtour: For the Lost Time – Heather Blair – Excerpt & Mini Review

This is my first ever Booktamins blog tour – thank you so much to Sandra from Booktamins and to the author Heather Blair for having me! I’ve known Heather on Twitter for a while and am so proud of her for having made her dream of becoming an author come true. I was totally stunned by this absolutely gorgeous cover and couldn’t wait to read For the Lost Time! Today I will be sharing with you some book excerpts and a mini review with my thoughts! But first, here is what the book is about:

The Blurb

When Diego Delgado closed his eyes it was 2020. When he awoke, he was one-hundred years in the past. Thrust into the dawn of the Jazz Age with no money and nowhere to go, Diego encounters a veritable bouquet of acquaintances including a kind-hearted factory owner, a free-spirited flapper, a worldly-wise mystic, and a strong-willed heir named Thomas Greely. Diego, desperate to return to the future and reunite with his young daughter, must blend in with the roaring twenties lifestyle while searching for answers. But distractions are all around him, especially Thomas who is both beautiful and charismatic, and Diego must grapple with the reality that even if he succeeds in returning home, half of his heart will stay behind.

EXCERPT ONE

There he was, standing by the darkened bay window, staring ominously into the night sky—the most handsome man Thomas Greely had ever laid eyes on.

            He was very tall, over six feet to be sure. Perhaps six foot two? Three? And in all that long space between the top of his umber head and the soles of his umber oxfords, there stood an astonishing figure. He was broad-shouldered and slender-waisted, his posture delicately sloped at the shoulders as if he carried a lofty burden upon them.

From where he stood, paralyzed with curiosity, Thomas could make out only the
man’s profile. A long neck dotted with oversized freckles, a square jaw, a subtly cleft chin. His single visible eye showed an iris so dark one could hardly distinguish where it ended and the pupil began. The look of it might have been sinister were it not so spellbinding.

Every muscle in Thomas’s body ached to reach out and touch him. To trace the line of that commanding jaw with the pad of his thumb and follow it to the tip of his sturdy chin. To connect the dots of those beauty marks and discover the shapes they made. To brush the back of his fingers against the grain of his sandpaper stubble.

Thomas then began to wonder why the stubble was there at all and why the hair atop the man’s head hung a bit loosely in one spot. Why such sorrowful crinkles marked the wide plane of his forehead, and most puzzling of all, why did he cast a million-mile stare out thewindow with such torrid focus?
Why, why, why?

EXCERPT TWO

The restaurant Diego soon found himself in was far classier than the art deco diner where he usually ate lunch. After almost a month in 1920, he’d finally begun to understand what prices constituted as “high” and he knew that the eighty-five cent lunch specials at Caroline’s would have been too pricey for his blood. Incensed, he slapped the menu down on the table.
“Are you trying to rub it in my face?”
“Am I trying to what?”
“Where do you get off taking me to a nice place like this when you know that I…” He trailed off. Thomas’s mouth parted as he realized what Diego was trying to say. When you know that I’m homeless.
“I meant no insult. I simply have a thing for the creamed chicken on toast they serve here. Jeepers, friend, do you really think I would do such a pig-headed thing?”
“Yes,” Diego answered simply. “And why do you keep calling me friend?”
A solitary laugh puffed from Thomas’s lungs.
“You don’t consider me a friend?”
“I consider you a spoiled rich kid who’s never been told no in his life and wouldn’t know how to handle it.” Diego hadn’t meant to be so harsh. He was like a cornered animal, lashing out on instinct.

“Wrong on all accounts,” Thomas replied coolly. “I’m not rich, my parents are. I’m not a kid, I’m twenty-one years of age, and I’ve been told no plenty of times and I handle it by simply choosing to ignore it.”

Mini Review

I really enjoyed reading For the Lost Time, a contemporary male/male romance historical fiction! Huh? – you may think – contemporary AND historical? How does that work? Well, this book starts in 2020 (*shudders* – what a year…), but the main character soon awakes 100 years in the past. If you know me or my blog a little you know that I absolutely adore time travel stories – add in some romance and I’m happy sighing. This is what For the Lost Time did to me!

I loved seeing 1920s New York through Diego’s eyes. The setting makes you feel like you’re inside The Great Gatsby – we have the Jazz music, flappers, dapper dancers and the easygoing mentality of a time long, long ago. I liked seeing Diego’s inner conflict – it made the story feel all the more real I think. While he started getting more and more comfortable in the past, he also experienced homesickness. I found it very sweet how he missed his daughter.

Since this is also a male/male romance, I have to admit this is the second I ever read (the first was Carry On by Rainbow Rowell, which I found absolutely adorable as well) – and I really enjoyed this one! While I really liked the idea of destiny and soulmates in different times, I wished the whole time travel scenario would have been explained a bit better. While I don’t necessarily need a scientific explanation, the whys and hows did interest me more. That’s why I give this book 4 stars. I can’t wait for more Heather Blair books! Thank you all so much for reading!

xoxo

Noly

Book Info

Genres: Chick Lit, Contemporary, Historical Fiction, LGBTQIA, New Adult, Romance

Find out more about the book on Goodreads or purchase it on Amazon!

Author Info

Heather Blair is the author of new adult romance novels including Lucid Dreaming and
Wide Awake. She was born and raised in Vermont and has spent much of her adult life in New York and Los Angeles. She currently resides in Connecticut with her two cats.

Find out more about Heather or connect with her on her website, Goodreads, Twitter, Facebook, or Instagram!