History Literature / Lightning

* SurprisinglyRealisticOutcome: No one ever tells anything important to the head of the [=McIlroy=] house, because even the kids can tell she's bad at her job and she doesn't actually like children anyway. Which is why she's later blindsided by [[spoiler: the janitor being killed while trying to rape a former inmate, and his 'favorite' victim later killing herself and taking another child with her.]] Even worse, why did none of the children ever report Willy 'the Eel' Sheener? Because he wasn't the first pervert to work at [=McIlroy=] House. When a young boy dared to report the previous pedophile, the other boys were too scared to back him up, and the staff harassed the boy until he had a nervous breakdown. Not to mention that because of her twisted need of Willy's approval, Tammy sometimes helps Willy trap other victims. She ends up constantly rooming with Thelma, Ruth and Laura because everyone else uses her as a punching bag as they see her as the enemy, too.

* WhereAreTheyNowEpilogue: of sorts. The epilogue, titled 'Ever After' clears up the details about what happened in the three/four years after the main story. Its mostly straight narrative rather than full scenes, because it would take a novella to show in full and most of it's not very interesting, with several {{Time Skip}}s. [[spoiler: Laura spends a full year playing verbal Cat and Mouse with various branches of law enforcement, while Stefan hides out with Thelma and her husband. Stefen moves into Laura's spare room for several months, until they finally become a couple almost two years after the final showdown. Thelma becomes pregnant with twins.]]

* FaceHeelTurn: Stefan had one of these pre-story. In fact, it's what prompts the entire story: [[spoiler: After spending his late adolescence and young adulthood as a Nazi - his father was one of Hitler's first supporters - Stefan became sickened by the things he was ordered to do, but as one of the first SS members he couldn't just quit without being suspected. While on a 'jaunt' to the future, Stefan wandered into a book signing by the then-disabled Laura. He read all Laura's books and was inspired by them. His ongoing mission to change her life for the better isn't just because he fell in love with her, but as a thank you for helping him change for the better.]]

* HollywoodHomely: Laura's best friend Thelma Ackerson considers herself unattractive, but manages to find a handsome, rich husband when she's in her thirties.

* CoolGuns: Laura and the Nazis carry Uzis. {{Lampshaded}} by the SS officers, who don't like that the guns are of Israeli design.

The stranger turns out to be a [[TimeTravel time-traveling]] Nazi named Stefan, who has [[TimeTravelRomance fallen in love]] with Laura. Alternating between plots in 1944 and the present day (which takes place progressively between 1955 and 1989), Stefan and Laura fight to keep her life stable and protect her from constant tragedy on one end, while preventing the Nazis from using time travel to win the war on the other end.

* CallBack: done in-universe. One of the scenes of Laura's time with her father is about the start of a childhood game, about an invisible house guest named Sir Tommy Toad, 'a fine upstanding toad, a gentleman toad here on the Queen's business'. Danny first becomes aware of Laura when he reads a short story of hers based on her and her father's adventures with Tommy Toad, and initially courts her with anonymous gifts of toad figurines. Laura keeps Sir Tommy's tiny umbrella, scarf and rubber boots all through her own life, and when Chris is about six, she pulls them out and starts the game all over again. It's also mentioned that she's writing a children's book about Sir Tommy Toad's adventures.

* MyGreatestFailure: Poor Stefan has two of these when it comes to Laura: [[spoiler: firstly, not being able to prevent Danny's death, although Stefan honestly tried to save him and couldn't because of circumstances out of his control. A better fit might be Laura's final confrontation with Willy the pedophile janitor: Stefan warns him away from Laura, which works for awhile. At one point, Stefan checks newspaper articles and finds that Willy's dead, and Laura's safe, so doesn't interfere any further. He has no idea that Willy came after Laura at her new foster home, where she had to kill him herself. The shock of coming upon the bloody scene causes a fatal heart attack in Laura's [[IllGirl new foster mother]], which robs Laura of the chance to be HappilyAdopted. Then Willy's death triggers Tammy's suicide by immolation, which also kills Ruth Ackerman.]] Laura actually asks him about this; he replies that he couldn't fix everything for her, (that might cause her enormous damage in itself, never letting her learn perseverance and courage in adversity) only prevent catastrophe and disaster.

* StalkerWithACrush: averted. In the first half of so of the book, the reader tends to wonder whether Stefan is this, but it turns out to be an UpToEleven version of IWantMyBelovedToBeHappy. Stefan never does anything to interfere with Danny's courtship of and eventual marriage to Laura, and tries to prevent his death [[spoiler: without Kokoschka's interference he would have succeeded]].

* TheReveal: Stefan's plotline is written very carefully; the reader comes to the same conclusion that Laura does, that he's from a DystopianFuture. [[spoiler: It's not until after they actually meet that we find out Stefan's from Nazi Germany.]]

* WhereAreTheyNowEpilogue: of sorts. The epilogue, titled 'Ever After' clears up the details about what happened in the three/four years after the main story. Its mostly straight narrative rather than full scenes, because it would take a novella to show in full and most of it's not very interesting, with several TimeSkips. [[spoiler: Laura spends a full year playing verbal Cat and Mouse with various branches of law enforcement, while Stefan hides out with Thelma and her husband. Stefen moves into Laura's spare room for several months, until they finally become a couple almost two years after the final showdown. Thelma becomes pregnant with twins.]]

The stranger turns out to be a [[TimeTravel time-traveling]] {{Nazi}} named Stefan, who has [[TimeTravelRomance fallen in love]] with Laura. Alternating between plots in 1944 and the present day (which takes place progressively between 1955 and 1989), Stefan and Laura fight to keep her life stable and protect her from constant tragedy on one end, while preventing the Nazis from using time travel to win the war on the other end.

* OrphanageOfFear: While [=McIlroy=] House itself isn't too bad, it employs a janitor named Willy Sheener, who's a pedophile who tries to rape Laura. According to Thelma and Ruth, it's not the first time either (see RealityEnsues).

* RealityEnsues: No one ever tells anything important to the head of the [=McIlroy=] house, because even the kids can tell she's bad at her job and she doesn't actually like children anyway. Which is why she's later blindsided by [[spoiler: the janitor being killed while trying to rape a former inmate, and his 'favorite' victim later killing herself and taking another child with her.]] Even worse, why did none of the children ever report Willy 'the Eel' Sheener? Because he wasn't the first pervert to work at [=McIlroy=] House. When a young boy dared to report the previous pedophile, the other boys were too scared to back him up, and the staff harassed the boy until he had a nervous breakdown. Not to mention that because of her twisted need of Willy's approval, Tammy sometimes helps Willy trap other victims. She ends up constantly rooming with Thelma, Ruth and Laura because everyone else uses her as a punching bag as they see her as the enemy, too.

* BeenThereShapedHistory: done by Stefan by sheer accident. [[spoiler: As part of his plan to destroy the time-travel institute, Stefan 'jaunts' to England 1944 to visit with Winston Churchill to talk him into bombing the institute. While there, Churchill asks an idle question about the future of Russia, and Stefan tells him. It turns out that Churchill talked everyone into fighting after D-Day and turned on Russia; meaning the USSR never got started, Germany never split, and TheColdWar never started!]]

* FixItFic: In universe. Laura writes a book named "The Amazing Appleby Twins", with the titular twins based on Thelma and Ruth Ackerman. [[spoiler: The character based on Ruth lives a very long time.]]
* {{Foreshadowing}}: a couple of small but subtle examples. Firstly, When Stefan prevents a drunken doctor from going to Laura's delivery and crippling her, he tells the doctor that the reason his son's death turned him into a depressed, cowardly drunk was because he'd otherwise lead a charmed life and never learned to cope with adversity or tragedy. Much later in the book, Laura asks Stefan why he didn't keep certain awful things from happening (see MyGreatestFailure) in her life; he replies that he couldn't keep everything bad from happening, or she might never have developed the strength or perseverance to deal with adversity. Secondly, when discussing how the Nazi's couldn't change their past, but only change their future/Laura's past, Stefan remarks that if Laura's past changed she would never know the difference - if the Institute made the changes to their present they wanted to, Laura would simply think she'd always live in the world of the Third Reich. [[spoiler: After his final jaunts to the past, and [[BeenThereShapedHistory that discussion with Winston Churchill]], Stefan is the only person who remembers a world with the Cold War instead of universal democracy.]]

* ArcWords: 'Destiny struggled to reassert the pattern of what is meant to be'.
* BadAssInANiceSuit : The time travelling Nazis wear Luis Vuitton pinstripes and CoolShades, the "power suit" of the late TheEighties.

* BeenThereShapedHistory: done by Stefan by sheer accident. [[spoiler: As part of his plan to destroy the time-travel institute, Stefan 'jaunts' to England 1944 to visit with Winston Churchill to talk him into bombing the institute. While there, Churchill asks an idle question about the future of Russia, and Stefan tells him. It turns out that Churchill talked everyone into fighting after D-Day and turned on Russia; meaning the USSR never got started, Germany never split, and the Cold War never started!]]

* {{Foreshadowing}}: a small but subtle example. When discussing how the Nazi's couldn't change their past, but only change their future/Laura's past, Stefan remarks that if Laura's past changed she would never know the difference - if the Institute made the changes to their present they wanted to, Laura would simply think she'd always live in the world of the Third Reich. [[spoiler: After his final jaunts to the past, and [[BeenThereShapedHistory that discussion with Winston Churchill]], Stefan is the only person who remembers a world with the Cold War instead of universal democracy.]]

* MyGreatestFailure: Poor Stefan has two of these when it comes to Laura: [[spoiler: firstly, not being able to prevent Danny's death, although Stefan honestly tried to save him and couldn't because of circumstances out of his control. A better fit might be Laura's final confrontation with Willy the pedophile janitor: Stefan warns him away from Laura, which works for awhile. At one point, Stefan checks newspaper articles and finds that Willy's dead, and Laura's safe, so doesn't interfere any further. He has no idea that Willy came after Laura at her new foster home, where she had to kill him herself. The shock of coming upon the bloody scene causes a fatal heart attack in Laura's [[IllGirl new foster mother]], which robs Laura of the chance to be HappilyAdopted. Then Willy's death triggers Tammy's suicide by immolation, which also kills Ruth Ackerman.]]

* TheReveal: Stefan's plotline is written very carefully; the reader comes to the same conclusion that Laura does, that he's from a DystopianFuture. It's not until after they actually meet that we find out Stefan's from Nazi Germany.

The stranger turns out to be a [[TimeTravel time-traveling]] {{Nazi}} named Stefan, who has [[TimeTravelRomance fallen in love]] with Laura. Alternating between plots in 1944 and the present day (which takes place progressively between 1955 and 1988 (?)), Stefan and Laura fight to keep her life stable and protect her from constant tragedy on one end, while preventing the Nazis from using time travel to win the war on the other end.

* DefectorFromDecadence: Attempted and ultimately successful. [[spoiler: Stefan was the son of one of Hitler's earliest supporters, thus firmly ensconced among the Nazi elite years before he was old enough and experienced enough to realise just how awful things were. But he was in such an exalted position that he couldn't quit without being immediately suspected and killed. He started feeding information to the Allies as early as 1938; but he can't escape the Nazi party until the end of the book - by taking the Lightning Road to the future and staying there.]]

* DyingMomentOfAwesome: Laura's husband, Danny. [[spoiler: Mortally wounded, he charges the gun-wielding Nazi trying to kill his wife and son, enabling Stefan to kill Kokoschka.]]

* GeniusBruiser: Danny Packard, Laura's eventual husband, is six and a half feet tall and built like a WWE wrestler, and a former soldier who made it out of Vietnam. He's also a first-rate stockbrocker, and excellent with financial matters.

* WhatHappenedToTheMouse: we never find out what happened to the staff or other children of [=McIlroy=] house after [[spoiler: the deaths of Tammy and Ruth.]] Given the scandals of those [[spoiler: deaths, plus the pedophile janitor, who'd preyed on the home's children for years, being killed because he broke into the home of a former inmate and tried to rape her, which resulted in the death of another woman]], you'd think at the very least there would be a big staff turnover, maybe even the home being shut down altogether.

** Another, touching one. When Danny and Laura first meet, he babbles that he fell in love with her through her writing. [[spoiler: When Laura and Stefan finally meet properly, when she asks why he's done all of this for her, he tells her pretty much the same thing - only he didn't just fall in love with her, she changed his life. Which also explains why Laura believes him that it's that simple... it already happened to her once.]]

* EarnYourHappyEnding
* FaceHeelTurn: Stefan had one of these pre-story. In fact, it's what prompts the entire story: [[spoiler: while on a 'jaunt' to the future, Stefan wandered into a book signing by the then-disabled Laura. He read all Laura's books and was inspired by them to turn away from Nazi ideology. His ongoing mission to change her life for the better isn't just because he fell in love with her, but as a thank you for changing him for the better.]]

* StalkerWithACrush: averted. In the first half of so of the book, the reader tends to wonder whether Stefan is this, but it turns out to be an UpToEleven version of IWantMyBelovedToBeHappy. Stefan never does anything to interfere with Danny's courtship of and eventual marriage to Laura, and tries to prevent his death [[spoiler: without Kokoschka's interference he would have succeeded.

* DeathByChildbirth: Janet Shane, Laura's mother. It's implied the same thing would have happened to Laura without the improvement of medical treatment in the decades between.

* DyingMomentOfAwesome: Laura's husband, Danny. [[spoiler: It's implied that he uses HeroicWillpower, while mortally wounded, to take out several gun-wielding Nazi's trying to kill his wife and son, enabling them to escape.]]

* StalkerWithACrush: averted. In the first half of so of the book, the reader tends to wonder whether Stefan is this, but it turns out to be an UpToEleven version of IWantMyBelovedToBeHappy. Stefan never does anything to interfere with Danny's courtship of and eventual marriage to Laura, and when he finds out about Danny's murder, Stefan tries to make another 'jaunt' to prevent it, but can't.

* RealityEnsues: No one ever tells anything important to the head of the [=McIlroy=] house, because even the kids can tell she's bad at her job and she doesn't actually like children anyway. Which is why she's later blindsided by the [[spoiler: the janitor being killed while trying to rape a former inmate, and his 'favorite' victim later killing herself and taking another child with her.]] Even worse, why did none of the children ever report Willy 'the Eel' Sheener? Because he wasn't the first pervert to work at [=McIlroy=] House. When a young boy dared to report the previous pedophile, the other boys were too scared to back him up, and the staff harassed the boy until he had a nervous breakdown. Not to mention that because of her twisted need of Willy's approval, Tammy sometimes helps Willy trap other victims. She ends up constantly rooming with Thelma, Ruth and Laura because everyone else uses her as a punching bag as they see her as the enemy, too.

* StalkerWithACrush: averted. In the first half of so of the book, the reader tends to wonder whether Stefan is this, but it's turns out to be an UpToEleven version of IWantMyBelovedToBeHappy. Stefan never does anything to interfere with Danny's courtship of and eventual marriage to Laura, and when he finds out about Danny's murder, Stefen tries to make another 'jaunt' to prevent it, but can't.