So the author went after something pretty big here...and I think she did a pretty good job with it to be honest. I had heard a lot about this book so I went in with some preconceptions, but on the whole it was about as good as I expected it to be. It is such an original concept and I was interested how she was going to pull things together. I was worried, after the beginning, that every single story was going to start over with her birth, but the author did a great job with different start points. I feel like she nailed the use of repeated quotes, stories, as a literary device. Enough to bring everything together (for example, Howie, Derek Oliphant, the beach trip/drowning, Izzie's roles, Teddy, Renee Miller, Crighton and Fred Smith and Ralph) but not too much that you get fed up reading about the same moment over and over. I also enjoyed that every once in awhile the stories would be drawn out, like her time with Derek, the life in Germany, the bomb warden in downtown London... It gave the book a little bit more flow, which was necessary. One thing I thought was interesting was that as the book progressed, she became more and more aware of her past experiences. I feel like that part was consistent throughout, but could have been flushed out just a little bit more. The one thing I wasn't a fan of was how the book started, with the shooting Hitler scene. I see what she was doing, but I would have preferred to start from scratch and built to that point, instead of waiting for it to come... Though the exploration of the different places she spent the war and the different ways it was handled/played out was super well done and also did create the sense that no matter what path she took, it would have been better without the war. So using that scene as an opener made sense from the perspective. All in all, I can see why this book got all the hype. Very entertaining and really quite creative.