This is an intriguing and unique book, focusing on time travel, romance and relationships. The main character is an old man in a care home, unable to say much apart from advertising jingles. In the past he has been under investigation by the FBI. He had a habit of going off on what he called "John Deere days", which were an excuse for something else. He suddenly becomes lucid and goes off to New York with a special mission in mind. Ideally, this book should be read without too much knowledge of the plot.

Such a weird and wonderful book. Not weird but there some unease throughout, but also a lightness. There is hope but also moment of angt and heart tugging. It's an extraordinary look at this one man's life that also gives us so much more. And this intrigues me. Makes me want to know more. It's a story where all is as it seems and some thing definitely aren't. But also some moments are just left for us to ponder and think on our own about.
It's a story about Joshua who is 80 odd now and living in a nursing home.
His fanily visits but rarely and mostly don't seem to want to.
There is also the part of the FBI and why they are involved in JOshua? Because there appears to be some link between him and some rather big parts in history. And just who is Victoria? And how has she visited him from the future?
You see are you curious yet? I don't want to go further into the reveals as the beauty comes from the reading with this one. But it's truly is a little gem that I was lucky enough to get stuck in to.
There are nuggets of words and lines to think and feel wisened over. And this book just feels like it flows over and through you. I really enjoyed it.

4.5★s
The Hoping Well is the third novel by American engineer and author, Michael Stewart. Once a robust farmer and a not-entirely-satisfactory husband and father, at eighty-five, Joshua Macallan now resides in the Honeybee Nursing Home in Norton, Kansas, where he says little beyond repeating the 1950’s advertising jingle for the Bel-Air-red Beachgoer transistor radio.

The annual Christmas visit to the Honeybee is a delight only for his five-year-old granddaughter, Charlotte; his son, Tom finds it depressing; for his daughter-in-law, Claire, it’s a chore, and she never fails to make her low opinion of Joshua known, having heard about his John Deere Days in the Capital City, a cover for his cheating on Tom’s mother, Penni.

That the FBI has a thick file on this apparently demented old man would surprise his family, who are unaware of the number of times he was at or near the site of some disaster or tragedy. This December, though, Joshua begins talking about Victoria, a young woman he claims visited him from the future, back in 1958. Surely delusions, to which only Charlotte gives credence.

It‘s true that NYC literary agent, Victoria Preston has a teetering slush pile at home that she needs to get through, but she also admits, when her best friend Scarlett Admire presses her to join friends for a night out, that she looks forward to early nights and the dreams that follow. Her nightly encounters with the polite Kansas farmer seem so real, but as it’s just a dream, she has no qualms about telling him what the future holds.

Scarlett feels this fixation might not be healthy, but to Victoria, it’s starting to feel like it might be love. And then a certain encounter has her believing she really is visiting in November 1958, and the potential to avert certain disasters and tragedies almost feels like an obligation. Joshua is heartbroken when Victoria’s visits suddenly stop, but her conviction gives him the faith to try.

Also in New York City, accident victim Regina, on a very different wavelength to those around her, dances and rattles her beads to ward off the dark magic, while in Tennessee, Gordo, possessed by an unknown impulse, neglects his family to construct his obsession: a perfect replica of a wishing well. Also in New York, a confrontation between groups on opposite sides of a controversial issue grows larger and angrier.

Joshua surprises everyone with a lucid period that allows him to join the family at his farm, rather to Claire’s annoyance. Then a TV news story impels Joshua to go to New York, to find Victoria, with Charlotte, his only believer, in tow. And they aren’t the only ones heading to Times Square.

What a marvellous tale Stewart gives the reader: time travel and an impossible romance, but also speculation on the effects of AI. His main protagonists display naïve good intentions, while another effects a miraculous quelling of mass aggression. Smart and cheeky Charlotte is bound to be a favourite, and the dialogue between Claire and the FBI agent is entertaining.

Later in life, Joshua shows wisdom and insight “I was so wrapped up in doing something grand that I forgot about the journey. I forgot to live my life every day like it’s the last one. Well now I’m here, and it is the last one and I wish I could go back and be in the present for all those times that I was here but not really here. Not to mention all the times I wasn’t here at all.” A moving and uplifting read.
This unbiased review is from an uncorrected proof copy provided by NetGalley and Books Go Social