Could the Fountain of Youth be real?
Lorelei, a 60-year-old virgin, owns a Miami lingerie shop, eats organic food, and minds her own business. She never considers alternatives to this life until the day her well runs dry, when Juan the well-digger plunges its depths and taps into the flow of hidden water from an underground spring. She attributes her awakening sensuality and increasingly youthful appearance to her healthy lifestyle. Her business partner, Sharleen, suspects that the water has more to do with Lorelei’s changes than the ingestion of kale and quinoa, and embarks on a campaign to sell it from the shop.
Someone else is interested in this water: Winona, a 500-year-old Native American woman who has been following the spring through the ages in her eternal search for youth, and has lost its trail. She finds it in Lorelei’s back yard, and is desperate to claim it once again for herself. Her obsession leads to Juan’s linked ancestry to Ponce de Leon, to Winona’s connection with that history, and to the ultimate convergence of all their stories. Obsession with youth, fear of death, and the vagaries of time are ideas explored by quirky characters with depth and insight beneath their offbeat humor.
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Time in a Bottle is a story so delightful, so exquisitely told, and so exhilarating that you’ll want to stand up and cheer when you’ve finished. Marjorie Klein is always fun to read, and here she is at the top of her game. She’s breathed life into her characters, into Lorelei, Sharleen, and Juan, into the irascible Corabelle and the preternatural Winona, and these irresistible folks breathe life into us. Lorelei thinks she’s found the fountain of youth but may have found something more important—herself.
—John Dufresne, author of I Don’t Like Where This Is Going
Once again the fans of Marjorie Klein can celebrate as she brings a magical elixir of whimsy and gravitas to a tale that is spelling-binding in more ways than one. The city of Miami is a willing accomplice, providing a pitch-perfect backdrop to what is a wise meditation on youth and aging, disguised as a romp. A non-trigger warning: readers will revel in knowing nods of recognition and happy tears of laughter.
—Madeleine Blais is a Pulitzer-prize winning journalist and author of Queen of the Court: The Many Lives of Tennis Legend Alice Marble.
In this novel, Marjorie Klein bottles water from the Fountain of Youth with wacky humor, pop culture, sexy lingerie and an alluring sense of place (southeastern Florida). The magical water may be elusive, but the promise of a second chance at life and love will sustain readers long after they finish the book.
—Heather Newton, author of The Puppeteer’s Daughters and Under the Mercy Trees
What do Florida, lingerie saleswomen and The Fountain of Youth have in common? Time In A Bottle, a book with enough lace and larceny to keep the hilarity flowing.Watch out readers, this one’s hard to put down!
—Maryedith Burrell, Emmy-award winning writer and producer
Time in a Bottle is audacious and touching and comic and wonderfully written. It’s an adventure, one that relies on a fountain of youth, Ponce de Leon, and present-day characters who are frayed by time, then re-invigorated. You’ll be taken inside a world that is both magnetic and charming, a world you’d never be able to experience except here, in these pages.
—Judy Goldman, author of Child: A Memoir
Marjorie Klein is a teller of tales. Her colorful characters are exaggerated versions of people we recognize. It’s a glorious ride! But, make no mistake, there’s a lesson to be learned: the desperation to be forever young is very real.
—Susan L. Brooks, Changing the Face of Aging
Marjorie Klein has written a terrific book! Time in a Bottle is a page-turner that begins when a fountain of youth is discovered in the Miami backyard of a 60-something lingerie store owner. Nuanced characters, real wit, and an engrossing, original plot make this modern-day Tuck Everlasting a novel to savor and enjoy. I loved it.
—Dan Elish, author of Nine Wives
