This book has an exciting premise. The plotline is described in the blurb itself, from her nineteenth birthday, Oona will be experiencing a different time of her life for a year. Since this is mentioned right off the bat, her first leap is not much of a surprise.

Although Oona is a very realistic character who agonizes over the process in her first two jumps, she gets more used to the process, and we get to see more later. Frankly speaking, I would have loved it if this was split into multiple books each going through a different phase of her life since each time she is at odds with the age of her actual body and out of sync with her surroundings. It provides a fascinating background to work with. Time travel will get to face the age-old question of what comes first: the act or the result since the knowledge of the result incites the act. I found it hard to bond with every new Oona and given more time with each, I would have gotten there. It is an interesting concept and would play well into discussions in book clubs about what we learn at every stage of our lives and what we take with us and what we leave behind.

We see New York at different times of Oona’s life, and as she tests the rules of her out of order life, she has help from the most unexpected quarters along the way.

Although I liked the book, I struggled with reading parts of it or completely being invested emotionally. I would recommend it to those people who are on the lookout for a different type of coming-of-age storyline.

I received an ARC thanks to NetGalley and the publishers, but the review is entirely based on my own reading experience.

This was such a fun book! I knew I had to take part in this blog tour as I love time travel books, plus just like Oona, I’m a New Year baby! 🙂
I really liked Oona and felt just as disorientated as she did every time she leapt from year to year. I would love to time travel, but if I was going to do it, it would have to be much easier than they way Oona experienced it.
Oona leaps to 7 different years and I think my favourite year was 1995. It was much calmer than some of the other leaps and I’d love to spend a year the way she did. 😀
I loved her relationship with her mother Madeleine, although I’m not sure I’d want to have her as my mother.
I loved the letters she wrote to herself each year to help guide her through the forthcoming problems and excitements, and thought it was a great way to prepare for what was coming.
There are so many other things and people I want to mention, but can’t because it would spoil this clever, fun book. Oh yes and there’s a brilliant twist that was a fantastic surprise too.
A definite must read if you enjoy contemporary time travel stories!

Very fun read about Oona who lives her adult life after the age of 19 in a mixed manner. One year she's 51, the other she's 27, and who knows the next one! It's a really interesting concept, and fun read.
If you like time travel books, it's definitely recommended.

I don’t read time travel stories often nor am I often interested by them but when I read the synopsis I thought the spin would be enough to keep my interest. And it did.

Oona is about to turn 18 on New Year’s and faves with a dilemma on what to do the following year but she is surprised to find herself in the body of her older self when she “wakes up” soon after midnight, through no fault of her own. This phenomenon seems to repeat itself every year at random - meaning she doesn’t know in which year she’ll “wake up”.

Oona is essentially a teenager/young adult throughout most of the book and it shows when she’s forced to make life-changing decisions without any previous knowledge of how her the year before was save for little messages and letters her future self leaves for her. Imagine waking up and finding out you’re married but you’ve never met before the person who you’re sharing a house with? I mean, you did, but it wasn’t 20 yr old you.

I’m probably not doing a great job describing what I mean so I’ll cut to the chase. Her decision-making skills are shit. She’s stubborn and hates being told what she can and can’t do, which can be a stupid decision when future you is trying to help you out. This happened quite often but I do feel like it’s understandable under the circumstances since she’s too young to understand the consequences of her actions at the time. But she did learn from her mistakes and by the end of the book she’s embraced her condition despite meaning she’d not always be surrounded by her loved ones.

I loved how original this is. I love how the story and plot points were well planned and fit perfectly together. And I loved Oona’s relationship with her mother and with Kenzie.

By the last two leaps I was crying and I couldn’t stop. It broke my heart to read the scenes that followed. But the ending was heartwarming and full of hope.

I struggled a little in the middle but I’m so impressed by the story. I truly loved it and I’m glad I requested it because it was so refreshing to read something out of my comfort zone. I definitely recommend it.

I adore time travel/slip books and movies. The time travellers wife, About time, The age of Adaline, All our wrong todays, The psychology of time travel. You name it I’ve read it/watched it and loved it, if I haven’t then give me your recs. So I jumped at the chance to read this and was swept straight into the life of Oona.

It starts at a party, both New Years and Oona’s 19th birthday. At the strike of midnight Oona travels in time to land in the body of herself at different ages and in no order (hence the title), then has to live that year until the next birthday when it happens again. From the early eighties to 2015 and with some fantastic music references (especially for us 80’s teenagers) one minute she is 19 and then she is 50. Now I know what I was like at 19 and I would be horrified, now at nearly 47 reading this made me look at it slightly differently to how I perhaps would have read it when I was younger.

There is something to be said about the not knowing, as the old saying goes “ignorance is bliss”. So to have the knowledge of all that will happen to you and the possibility of changing it. Would you? I personally wouldn’t change a thing as I think our experiences good and bad shape us into who we are.

Oona leaves herself a letter for each time jump and having invested wisely in stocks and shares finances aren’t an issue. There are a few minor inconsistencies but it certainly didn’t spoil my enjoyment. Suspend your disbelief and just enjoy the adventure. The characters are fun especially Oona’s mother, the story is creative and different and the writing is top notch.

The ending was perfect and this book is a heartfelt lesson on what is really important in a life that is unpredictable.

What would our lives be like if we didn’t live our lives chronologically, instead each birthday we jump to any given year in our future. This is the premise for The Rearranged Life of Oona Lockhart by Margarita Montimore. New Years Eve 1982, Oona is partying with her boyfriend Dale, looking forward to seeing in the New Year, her nineteenth birthday and taking their band on tour. But as midnight strikes Oona finds herself in an unfamiliar house, with a stranger asking if she is ok. Every New Year Oona will find herself at a different point in her adult life. Still young on the inside, but her outer appearance will reflect the year she is in. This is a fascinating novel that had me gripped as I followed Oona on her strange but wonderfully unique journey.

In The Rearranged Life of Oona Lockhart we follow Oona on her first seven leaps, in real terms up to the age of twenty six, but in leaps she lives in her late twenties up to her fifties. There are plenty of surprises along the way including a husband she doesn’t know, boyfriend trouble and the shock of being nineteen in the body of a fifty year old. She leaves herself letters along the way, with advice and need to know information, being young she isn’t always good at following that advice. Her mother and assistant Kenzie, who she employs later in life, are the only two who know of her leaps. Oona has a great relationship with her mother, although there are times in the leaps where one or the other knows something of the others future. However hard it must be, neither give anything away that could effect their future and keep the mystery alive for Oona.

Margarita Montimore writes with a warmth for her characters and an understanding of a young girl, coming of age and facing a myriad of emotions and challenges. What really comes through is that we shouldn’t take life for granted, that we should grab every chance at happiness and live life to the full. Oona’s story brought every emotion out in me, I laughed, cried, cringed and smiled as I went on the journey with her.

The Rearranged Life of Oona Lockhart is like a jigsaw, there are a lot of pieces that seem disparate, but once they start to fit together the whole picture starts to emerge. Written with skill and insight, and with an inspiring and heartwarming main character this book had me gripped. Compelling, intriguing with a warmth and humour that shone through, I absolutely loved this book.

A brilliant and engrossing story, well written and full of food for thought at the same time.
The author is a good storyteller and I loved the plot that flows and the well thought cast of characters.
I look forward to reading other books by this author.
Highly recommended.
Many thanks to the publisher and Netgalley for this ARC, all opinions are mine.

This is the kind of sci-fi that I love: something where the logic isn't too complicated to follow and ultimately, there's a human element to everything that happens. This is a fast-paced novel about a woman who time travels through her life at the end of every year, experiencing new areas of her life while internally, she feels as though time has never passed. It's a very heartfelt book, with a strong emphasis on the emotional connections that Oona makes as she travels and I really enjoyed reading it. Its pace means that, whilst there are chapters that linger, you're never stuck in one era for too long. Ultimately, the book is not about the time travel itself but Oona's relationships with the people closest to her and how she discovers more about herself through them as she views her life in different years. An original and thoughtful novel.

Thank you NetGalley and Orion Publishing for this one.

This was my first ever Margarita Montomore book and I was very excited to start this story. This book revolves around Oona and her strange condition that allows her to live her life in moments. It all started in 1982 when she was a nineteen years old girl and at midnight of the new year she found herself in her future and a version of herself that she didn't recognize. Inside she was still her nineteen years old self but outside she was an adult with a very different life than the one that she had envisioned for herself or with whom rather. Nobody actually knew about her unique condition other than her mom and her assistant. She had no less than a year in each version of her life and in that small time she had to accept the changes and make somewhat peace with herself. Cause with the final stroke of midnight, Oona's life would change again and she will have to go through the changes all over again.

I found this debut to be extremely clever and somewhat sad. As I read along the story, I could feel Oona's emotions as she experienced all different versions of herself while still being a nineteen years old girl. This book definitely touched my heart and made us aware the importance of time cause our life can truly change at the blink of an eye. The story deals with love, loss, family and the author makes us realise the importance of living in the moment. The ending of the book can be considered both happy and sad. The fans of JoJo Moyes and Marian Keyes will definitely enjoy this book and Oona's story will definitely be inside your heart long after you finish the last chapter. Hope you all like it as much as I did.
Happy reading!

It’s New Years Eve and when the clock strikes midnight it will be 1983 and Oona Lockhart will turn nineteen. Surrounded by friends and the love of her life, Dale, she’s having an amazing night and feeling excited about the year ahead. Only when the clock strikes twelve she finds herself awakening in a strange house, with a strange man next to her who claims they are ‘besties’ and in a body that is much older and bigger than the one she was just in. It’s 2015 and Oona is nineteen on the inside, but she’s fifty-one on the outside. She’s just had her first ‘jump’ and learns that from now on at midnight every new year she’ll jump to an undetermined and unpredictable year of her life. She will never live chronologically and her internal and external ages will always be different. She only retains the memories her internal self has lives so it is like waking up with amnesia each year.

Frightened and full of disbelief, most of Oona’s first year is spent hoping she’ll wake up as her nineteen-year-old self again. Slowly she learns more about what to expect from her mother and Kenzie, her assistant, who are the only two people who know about her strange condition. As the years pass, Oona learns to navigate her unique situation and make the best of her rearranged life.

This was a charming, quick and entertaining read. The synopsis definitely piqued my interest. Afterall, who hasn’t thought it would be fun to jump back into a time we’re nostalgic for or know what will happen in the future? How would you feel if that actually happened? And can we really change our destiny or are some things just meant to be?

As we travel through Oona’s jumbled life we experience the highs and lows along with her on an emotional rollercoaster. Each year felt like it was almost a different person as she tries to get to grips with how best to live this crazy life. She grieves for the years and the people missing from her life in each jump, faces the temptation to know too much about her future and to change what she wishes were different and faces the heartbreaking realisation that any lasting relationships, be it romantic or friendships, will be virtually impossible. She doesn’t alway handle things well or do the right thing, like any of us in our chronological lives, but overall she does a great job of handling a situation for which there is no rule book.

The author skillfully weaves together the myriad of threads of this complex and intricate plot, peppering the story with surprising twists and revelations along the way. Though the ending was perfect for the story, I was left wishing I could have read more of her jumbled years. The characters are richly drawn and I quickly took to Oona, finding her relatable despite the bizarre situation she finds herself in. At the core she was the same as anybody else and that truth is what made her someone you care about.

Compelling, thought-provoking and quirky, The Rearranged Life of Oona Lockhart is a great debut. A perfect read for anyone looking for something a bit different.

Thank you to Gollancz and NetGalley for the copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

A Truly Trippy Time Travel Treat!

Over the last few years, I have read quite a few time travel/time slip novels. Most have been good, many have been great, few have been truly fabulous. The Rearranged Life of Oona Lockhart falls into the latter category. In fact, I would go so far as to say that it is probably the very best example of a time travel/time slip novel that I have read to date.

How to Stop Time by Matt Haig set the bar high for me, but I can honestly say that Margarita Montimore has surpassed Haig in every way. Her execution is truly flawless.

This fabulous book is so structurally intricate but effortless, the characters are beautifully drawn and the plot keeps you turning that pages. My only criticism... I didn't want it to end.

Oona Lockhart is a beautiful character. New Year's Eve in 1983 sees Oona enjoying drinks with friends as she prepares to start her 19th year. With the love of her life by her side, her friends flitting around the room and the ball dropping in the background, Oona has her whole life ahead of her - only she doesn't. Not really. Not the way we all expect our lives to play out anyway. At the stroke of midnight, she opens her eyes feeling every inch the 19-year-old, but staring at the reflection of a 51-year-old version of herself. Oona is time traveling! She soon discovers that she is destined to recreate this 'jump' through time each and every year on her birthday, never knowing what age she will become, never knowing what stage of life she will find herself in.

This is a book that you enjoy on the face of it for its pace and intricacy, for its intrigue and joy, but it's also a book that made me think about life. What would you do if you slipped into the future to see what your life had in store, but then traveled back in time... would you change your future? Would you leave clues for your future (or past) self?

I was left asking myself all kinds of questions - can we really change the path of our destiny? Would we want to even if we could?

As I traveled through the muddled up life Oona is experiencing, I experienced the highs and the lows, the pain, and the pleasure and found myself falling in love with a girl who handled it all in the most graceful way possible. The twists will not disappoint, but I warn you now, you will feel a sense of loss when you put the book down.

I will stop there with this review because I fear to say any more will give far too much away - to find out more.. you will need to dive right in for yourself. Enjoy - I know I did!

That was an amazing story to read. I love time travel stories and Oona's story was really unique. It hooked me from the start and i couldn't stop reading it. It was lovely and little bit sad. I loved it and definitely recommend it.

An epic read!
An intriguing concept that was well delivered.
Who hasn’t wished they could have had ‘prior knowledge’ or changed how they have lived using hindsight.
Every year Oona Lockhart ages one year, but her personality moves in to her body at a different age, so she could be 20 on the inside, inside her 50 year old body, in the timeline and lifestyle of the 50 year old. The following year, she might be 27 on the outside with her own 20 year old personality.
This makes for interesting scenarios and at times, anguish. Determined to avoid spoilers of her own life, only her mother and one other person knows of her secret. It’s a tantalizing concept, and thought provoking. How would you manage this life scenario?
I read this on the kindle and approaching the end, was worried that it had ended. I even breathed to myself “Don’t let this be the end yet!”

Thanks to Netgalley for the free copy in exchange for an honest review. This is a book I will not forget in a hurry!

5 star Review already posted to goodreads

We begin on New Year’s Eve 1982 with Oona at a party with her boyfriend, band mates and friends. New Year’s Day is Oona’s birthday. At the strike of 12, she gets a strange feeling and wakes up in her body but in another year of her life. Every New Year she jumps into another year of her life and she has no idea how old she’ll be (on the outside) as she doesn’t jump in chronological order.

I was eager to see how old Oona would be each time she jumped and what positives and struggles she would face. I’d have happily read more jumps than there were.

It was a well written, engaging, funny, deep, emotional rollercoaster of a ride. A thought provoking book with a great premise, I read it in no time and enjoyed it. 4 stars!

I loved the unique and quirky premise of this book so much! Oona wakes up at a different stage in her life each time she has a birthday - so even though she is turning 19, it is possible for her to wake up in the body of her 50 year old self, for example. It sounds a strange concept, but Montimore has somehow managed to write it in a way where it seems almost plausible.

One small issue I had was with the formatting of this ebook (but I'm sure these minor errors will have later been corrected)

This is a story based on an idea that many might have contemplated in their life. We all wonder what it would be like if we could go back in our younger bodies and relive that life, right? "Youth is wasted on the young." is something this book explores.

Oona has the "ability" to get into her own body at different ages each year on New Year's day, and at first, this leaves her disoriented and struggling to get a grip on life. We follow her on her journey through the first few years after she discovers this phenomenon.

As an 18-year-old, Oona is young and ambitious, but isn’s very sure about what she wants yet. She’s facing a choice that would affect the rest of her life. However, when she wakes up on New Year’s Day, she’s suddenly facing completely different problems. Oona struggles at first to grapple the idea of living in a random order. But as we would soon discover, she will get a grip on it and even use it to her advantage.

Oona experiences mid-life experiences of marriage, divorce, and losing someone she loves when she’s actually still a young women in her early twenties. These experiences teach her quite a few useful lessons about life. At the end of the book, we see Oona getting herself together and ready to live the rest of her life, challenging or not.

I like it that we only see her through a couple of years of this life. The rest was just passing references that leaves us guessing.

Oona lives her life differently from us, but she still only lives her life once. She’s bond to make mistakes and learn from them. That’s exactly what she does.

I enjoyed this one a lot.

Thanks to NetGalley for providing the ARC.
Actually it is 4.5/5!
This is the life of Oona Lockhart who time travels from her 19th birthday, that falls on a New Year. Unlike usual time traveling where the person itself travels, here after midnight she wakes up in a different year in a different age i.e. if she wakes up as a 51 year old on her 19th birthday, she's a 51 year old person but in her inner self she'd be 19 :-) So she has to live one year at a time. I know its complicated but the author has written it really well. All the logistics aspects were handled well.
The 0.5 star less, is for not knowing why Oona's life is the way it is. She did not inherit and it is not genetic either. There's nobody else like her and no one knows anything like that. But that did not stop me from finishing this beautiful ride. We get to see several of Oona's years in this book but it really started in the right place and ended in the right place.

I thoroughly enjoyed this novel and highly recommend. TI never wanted the book to end and would have happily continued reading even more. The characters in the novel are relatable, vibrant and fun and teach us that "everything has its time". The novel invites the reader into the characters shoes - particularly Oona. I felt for her and found myself wondering what I'd do in her situations. The novel also reveals so many great life lessons - enjoy life to the fullest, focus on the good things, let the people in our lives know that we care about and love them. An amazing and truly relatable read for all!

I received this book from Netgalley in exchange for an honest review – thanks so much to Netgalley for sending this to me!

The moment I heard about ‘The Rearranged Life of Oona Lockhart’ (or ‘Oona Out of Order’ if you’re in the US, which in my opinion is a vastly superior title) I was intrigued. Oona is a perfectly unremarkable teenager living life in the 80s, until one fateful New Years’ Eve she is catapulted into her own body many years into the future. Doomed to yo-yo back and forth throughout her own life, Oona wakes up every New Year at a new stage of her life, and what follows is a story about heartbreak, loss, love and learning how to live. Oh, and time travel.

I found this book really interesting, and also deeply sad. Thanks to her predicament, Oona is left feeling perpetually nostalgic for parts of her life that she hasn’t lived yet, doomed to live and love out of order. She lives through the end of some relationships before they even begin, loses people who she then spends the next few years of her life with, and struggles with a lot of resentment towards her future self for being older (sometimes), wiser and leaving her advice that she rarely ever follows. At first Oona attempts to seize control of her life – her knowledge of the past should surely allow her to influence her future? – but as with most time travel narratives, this rarely works out. The true beauty of the book is in Oona learning to appreciate the life she has, work with its drawbacks and learn to love her non-chronological existence, as she figures out how to live in the moment instead of constantly wishing to return to different parts of her life.

There were definitely parts of this book that stood out to me more than others. The first time jump, for example, felt a bit rushed. Oona is very quick to accept her new predicament as real, and while it sends her into an almost year-long depression, she never really questions it as much as one would expect. Another thing I noticed is that a lot of the book would be summarised, and told instead of shown. There were huge blocks of time where the narrator would say ‘Oona did this, and went there, and met these people,’ but we wouldn’t see any of this happening – and this continued throughout the book. Of course I understand that it would be hard to fit everything into one book, especially since Oona associates with so many people and places within the story and you could never dedicate time to them all, but I also feel like if anything the first jump should have had a lot of page time dedicated to it, as possibly the most important jump of all. Oona’s first ever displacement literally changes the course of her entire life, and yet it passes us by very fast, almost as if the reader is the one skipping huge chunks of time.

Other parts, though, were incredibly evocative and well-written. The second jump was probably my favourite, in all its messiness. I loved seeing Oona fall apart in different ways, because although it was sad it felt very raw and real. Unable to truly connect to the people around her because of her disjointed past, Oona becomes depressed, develops substance abuse problems and detaches from her peers – but when she finally finds the circle of people she can trust, it only becomes more wonderful to see her bounce back.
The best way I can describe this book is ‘quirky.’ It was fun but also had an underlying message that really made me think, and I would highly recommend it.

Thank you Negalley and Orion for the chance to read this ARC, what an incredibly original idea for a book. I was sucked right in from the beginning. Oona is so likeable and you find yourself feeling for her each new year. I loved how big events were incorporated into each year, it made it that much more relatable. I’m hoping the author has plans for more books following Oona’s adventures, I’ll be right there cheering them on.