Time in Its Flight

The book is barely legible

I first read this book back in 1978 or 1979, and cannot begin to tally how many times I have read it again over the years. It is simply magical. Yes, the chronology doesn't always add up. But the book is a gem, with remarkably crafted characters, and a story that lingers in the mind, long after the book is finished. I would rate this as my favorite book.

I read this book years ago, I guess when it first came out. Since then, I've re-read it probably four times. It was amazing to me how much I came to love and respect each and every character in the book, and how sad I was when the book ended even though it was 1015 pages long. In this book, you learn to respect all kinds of ways of life, and all kinds of people and their personalities. To me, that was the most influential part of the book - how a character that I wouldn't like is make likeable because of the addition of depth and years and loyalty. I highly recommend this book, and though I haven't read it in years, I can still recall most of the characters and many of the things that happened, despite reading countless books in the meantime, enjoying their plots, and promptly forgetting them a week or two after I've finished. This book is one of the unforgettable ones.

I just finished reading this book for the fourth time, much to my surprise. I was amazed at how my attention could be held after so many readings, but I shouldn't have been. I have been a Susan Fromberg Schaeffer fan for many years, and her books are re-readable favorites. I have to agree with one reviewer that some of the chronology is a mess, but that, to me, is a minor quibble. "Time in Its Flight," in my opinion, is in the same class as "Jane Eyre": a book that can be freshly enjoyed and reinterpreted with each reading, according to the changes in the reader's own life and level of maturity. Granted, this is a long book, yet I wish it could have been longer. I hated to let go of these beloved characters. Also highly recommended by the same author: "Anya" (read twice so far) and "The Madness of a Seduced Woman" (just finished fourth read!).

In the intervening thirty years since I first read this book, many a character and plot line from lesser authors has fled my memory. It is strange; I remember Dickens, I remember Tolstoy, I remember Cervantes, and I remember this little book. Certainly I understand the author does not belong in the pantheon of "great" writers, but I applaud her vision, her wit, and her quiet attempt to halt "time in its flight". The chronology of the book is all a' tumble, deliberately so. It is memory that is being translated to page, memory imperfect yet vivid. The characters are interesting, believable. The greatest defects of the novel are the sometimes jarring modern sensibilities of the characters. The author understands and attempts to keep her people firmly rooted in their time, but sometimes the petticoat peeps. Although, I just thought of this, perhaps that too is part of her device to deliberately entwine centuries, decades, eras, days, hours. Funny, I've never read anything else by this author. I don't want to be disappointed, but want to remember this little book as charming, ephemeral, and delicate as a soap bubble wafted on a summer breeze.

It's been 22 years since I read this book and I still thinkabout it sometimes. It's an all-time favorite ... It's simply the story of a family, told in the slow accumulation of details from their daily lives. It's a long book, but it's quite involving and ultimately, deeply moving. Schaeffer has written some superb books..., but this remains her most deeply felt.