Adrian Cousins writes the sort of time travel where nobody builds a machine or explains the physics. A grumpy fortysomething divorcee simply wakes up in the sweltering summer of 1976, six months before the day he was born, wearing somebody else’s skin and carrying forty years of hindsight he has no earthly idea what to do with. That is Jason Apsley’s Second Chance, and if you’ve already read it, you understand the appeal: standpipes in the road, a heatwave that refuses to break, and an ordinary bloke handed the one miraculous opportunity all of us secretly want. His Frank Stone books point the same idea at an unsolved murder, and his Deana novels smuggle guardian angels into 1980s Hertfordshire, but the DNA never changes. Warmth, plenty of laughs, and a lump in the throat you didn’t anticipate.
I write in the same postcode. My novels drop ordinary people into extraordinary situations and wind the clock back to the decade of Space Hoppers and three TV channels. The laughs come first; the ache arrives on the last page and refuses to leave. In The ’86 Fix, Craig Pelling lands a single weekend back in 1986 to unpick the life he has quietly ruined. If you want to test whether Cousins and I share a wavelength, my Start Here page will steer you to the right book to begin with. And for readers across the Atlantic: the whole lot are available on Amazon US, free in Kindle Unlimited, and narrated on audio.
Now, the good bit. Three more authors a Cousins fan should be reading, and why each one scratches the itch.
Jason Ayres, if you want the nostalgia turned up to eleven
Ayres is a Worcestershire author, originally from Oxford, who has quietly built one of the biggest back catalogues in British time travel. Since his first novel in 2014, he has published twenty-four books and shifted more than 250,000 copies, which for a writer the broadsheets have never once mentioned tells you plenty about how much readers trust him with a wet Sunday.
His flagship is The Time Bubble, a fifteen-book series that roams across the past, the future, and the odd alternative timeline where things went differently. For a Cousins reader, the sweeter spot might be A Year in the Life, a run of standalone novels planted squarely in 1980s Britain, because Ayres pulls the same trick Cousins does. He takes an unremarkable person, gives them one small nudge through time, then follows how a single daft decision reshapes a whole life. He also writes The Ronnie and Bernard Adventures, which stir comedy and a splash of horror into the pot. Same refusal to take itself too seriously, and the same knack for making 1983 feel like a place you could still catch a bus to.
Shawn Inmon, for the do-over done properly
Inmon is the American in the line-up, writing from Seaview on the Washington coast, and he proves the second-chance story crosses the Atlantic without losing a thing in the wash. His Middle Falls Time Travel series now runs past eighteen books, all built on one lovely, simple premise: in the town of Middle Falls, dying is not the end of the matter. You pass away, then wake years earlier with every memory intact and one more go at the life you fumbled the first time.
It began with The Unusual Second Life of Thomas Weaver in 2016, and the appeal is exactly the ache Cousins plays on. Who among us has not lain awake at three in the morning, replaying the row we should have walked away from, or the phone call we never made? Inmon lets his characters actually go back and try, then makes them live with the fallout. He writes the Alex Hawk Time Travel Adventure books too, though the Middle Falls novels are the ones to press into a Cousins fan’s hands first. Moreish, generous, and quietly devastating the moment you drop your guard.
Jodi Taylor, for when you like your history to go sideways
Taylor is the biggest name here, and the most gloriously chaotic. Her Chronicles of St Mary’s follows a band of historians who investigate major events from the past in what they primly insist on calling “contemporary time.” Say the words “time travel” anywhere near them and they will look at you as though you have broken wind at a christening. They are, in the books’ own phrase, tea-soaked disaster magnets: forever setting off to observe something quietly and returning singed, hunted, or one colleague short.
Born in Bristol and schooled in Gloucester, Taylor self-published the first book, Just One Damned Thing After Another, in 2013 at the age of sixty, which ought to be pinned above the desk of anyone who thinks they have left it too late. The fit with Cousins is not the nostalgia; it is the tone. British to its bones, funny on nearly every page, and then, with no warning, it puts a hand flat on your chest and presses down. You will laugh out loud on one page and find yourself blinking hard three pages later. Taylor works that switch better than almost anyone writing.
What actually ties this lot together
Strip away the standpipes and the clever plotting and every one of these writers chases the same feeling: the past you can nearly reach out and touch, and the version of yourself you might have been. Cousins does it with a heatwave and a grumpy divorcee. Ayres does it with the decade of shell suits and Ceefax. Inmon does it in a small American town where death hands back the receipt. Taylor does it at a dead sprint, historians tumbling through the centuries with the volume cranked up.
My own books live in that exact spot. The ’86 Fix sends Craig Pelling, a fortysomething stuck managing an electrical store and a marriage with the spark long gone, back to one weekend in 1986 to work out where it all came apart, and like every character above he discovers that a second go is never the same as a clean one. If Adrian Cousins is your man, Craig will feel like someone you knew from the old estate. You can meet him right here, and I will happily take the blame for the late night that follows.
Frequently Asked Questions
What kind of books does Adrian Cousins write?
Adrian Cousins writes light-hearted, humorous British time travel set mainly in the 1970s and 1980s. His Jason Apsley series sends a grumpy modern divorcee back to the summer of 1976 for a second chance at life, while his Frank Stone books turn the same idea towards mystery. Expect warmth, period detail, and a laugh on most pages.
Which authors are most like Adrian Cousins?
For the same blend of British humour, nostalgia, and time travel, try Jason Ayres (The Time Bubble and A Year in the Life), Shawn Inmon (the Middle Falls Time Travel series), and Jodi Taylor (The Chronicles of St Mary’s). Keith A Pearson’s second-chance time travel novels, including The ’86 Fix, sit comfortably in the same company.
Where should I start with Keith A Pearson’s books?
The ’86 Fix is the natural first stop for anyone who enjoys Adrian Cousins, since it drops an ordinary fortysomething back into 1986 for one weekend to fix his life. If you would like a personalised suggestion, the Start Here page on keithapearson.co.uk will point you to the right book for your taste.
Do you need to like science fiction to enjoy these time travel books?
No. None of these authors writes hard science fiction. The time travel is really a doorway into ordinary lives, second chances, and plenty of comedy, with the mechanics kept firmly in the background. If you enjoy character-led stories with heart, the genre label need not put you off.
Are Keith A Pearson’s books available in the US and on Kindle Unlimited?
Yes. Keith’s novels are available on Amazon US as well as in the UK, free to read in Kindle Unlimited, and available as audiobooks. Adrian Cousins, Jason Ayres, Shawn Inmon, and Jodi Taylor are all widely available on both sides of the Atlantic too.