It's time for the American Bicentennial celebrations of 1976! An Army platoon is moving into Jockey Hollow near Morristown, New Jersey to reenact the use of military weapons ranging from 1776 to 1971. What they don't know is that this area possesses high energy lines called Ley lines which produce rather powerful connections with different parts of the world - and different times! What is about to happen to them could also be explained by something called the Synergistic Coupling Effect in which each member of a group agrees to participate in a certain event. It turns out everyone in Lt. James J. Erickson's troop has an ancestor who participated in the Revolutionary War.

So they wake up one morning in a very dangerous situation! They are about to do battle with British soldiers from Her Majesty's 16th Light Dragoons who think Erickson and his men are "rebels" and need to be destroyed. Is this real or is this a figment of their imaginations. As the novel shifts between past and present historical cycles, Erickson tries to avoid doing battle. He believes if they have truly gone into the past, and all evidence seems to indicate this is so, they may be changing history in unforeseen, devastating ways beyond their myopic vision and understanding. The military officials in 1976 are trying to prove Erickson and his men are insane; at least that's how it first appears until the reader begins to realize these troops passing through the time zone as we know it are really an experiment in the possible side effects of using the ley lines for spying on enemies.

So the battles and experimental tests begin and prove to be more mysterious than anyone involved could imagine. For what imagination can conceive that it is possible to transform lives by passing through alternate time zones of history? What happens to future generations when soldiers are killed on both sides? Is espionage worth the experimental side effects of playing with high, sacred energy formations that produce alternative realities?

Bonson's writing has definitely evolved since his last novel, Incredible Dreams?, and the pace never wanes through the adrenaline-pumping scenes of battle and mystery in this latest paranormal tale! The plot thickens but the reader is none the wiser for trying to imagine what will happen. Indeed, the reader's sympathy and wonder will increase as he or she imagines what it would be like to live two hundred years ago and what one's life would be like today after having dropped in on one's ancestors of old.

Finely written and a definite must read for anyone who likes plenty of adventure, intrigue and risks! Are we who we are or someone else because someone else altered history? Read, relish, reflect and wonder!

Well done, again, Robert E. Bonson!

Reviewed by Viviane Crystal - January 11, 2005

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