The Window, by Dave Cole, for Timeslip Tuesday

The Window, by Dave Cole (Dancing Lemur, February 2021), is a story of time magic mixed with a slice in the life of a young teen. Brian starts the book as an ordinary 14 year old, who spends his days goofing around with his best friend, J.K., crushing on Charlotte (and then, miraculously, going out with her), worried about his parents' disintegrating marriage, annoyed by his little sister. But there's one part of his life that's far from ordinary--there's a window in his attic that only he can see. And it shows him the future. (It also, helpfully, provides him with copies of upcoming tests).

Most of what he sees is unremarkable. But then it shows him J.K. dying horribly under the wheels of a neighbor's car. Brian wants desperately to keep this from happening, but he doesn't know when it will be, and he can't keep J.K. off his bike and away from his street every day for months. And so the accident happens almost exactly as he saw it....(content warning--it is a horribly graphic death).

And now the window is showing him ominous hints of something bad about to happen to Charlotte....and so Brian becomes determined to destroy it, or at least break its power, almost dying himself in the process.

It's a fine, creepy premise, but somewhat disappointing--the window, though central to the plot, takes second stage to ordinary drama, and I didn't find Brian a particularly convincing or interesting character. He seemed a lot younger than 14 to start with, and also seemed a bit retro (I don't think any contemporary 14 year old boy would give a friend a Harry Potter wand as a Christmas present...and there was a striking amount of middle class suburban adult smoking, which seemed a bit dated). Brian's focus is mostly on the real world, where not much interesting (to me) happens (he and Charlotte have their first kiss, his parents split up), and lots of time goes by without the window doing much that's interesting either (it's also odd that the window, which seems a malevolent force, helps him with the blank tests). Brian does very little to try to keep J.K. alive; the one action he takes is rather lame, and totally ineffectual. He never warns J.K., and sure he wouldn't have been believed, but maybe J.K. would have been more careful. 

If it were just visions of the future, I wouldn't have counted this as a time slip story (clairvoyance isn't time travel), but the physical copies of the blank tests made it through the window from the future.  I wish more had been done with the window, and the time travel potential of it.  Obviously magical windows have a certain inexplicableness to them, but in this case there's no context or linkages to anything that would explain why the window is in the attic and only Brian can see it.  I like my time slipping to have some sort of explaining point to it, rather than being just one of those things that happens.

One the plus side, the horror mounts towards the end of the book, making the last thirty or so pages turn really quickly...

It's fine if you're in the mood for a quick read of time slipping horror mixed with an ordinary slice of life,  but it just didn't work well for me.  The age of the characters (14 to start, and than almost two years passing) makes this look like it's YA, but I think that kids of 11-12 are a much better audience for it.

disclaimer-review copy received from the publisher.