Hey, it’s not that hard for a cop to solve crimes if he can time-travel back a week and apprehend crooks before they even walk into the bank. Detective Aaron Mathews, the iPod’s new unsuspecting victim, sniffs around to track down its former owners, and begins to realize God is demanding a whole lot more of him than just lucky junkets to Atlantic City. His hard-boiled agnosticism begins to thaw as he witnesses the Columbine killings up close, and is sorely tempted to undo America’s first mass shooting. But as the other journeys unfold to shattered landscapes like New York City on 9/11, he comes to appreciate heaven’s patient timetable for the permanent rescue of God’s one renegade world. Music aficionados will savor Aaron’s time shuttle back to the debut performance of Handel’s Messiah. And as he settles in for a hot Philadelphia summer eavesdropping on America’s first Constitutional Convention, he begins to experience insistent romantic colonial temptations that have nothing to do with bylaws and amendments.

David B. Smith is a just-retired math professor from San Bernardino Valley College and also the author of “Love in a Distant Land,” an inspirational love story taking place in his childhood missionary home of Bangkok. Now also available as an audiobook download performed by Tonya Foster Yancey!