Here is the story of Ivan Osokin, a young man who has squandered every chance life has given him. A fail-ure at school, ruined financially, and rejected by the woman he loves, he finds himself at a dead end. He wishes to live his life over again so he can avoid all his mistakes. Then he meets a magician who gives him that chance. "Strange Life of Ivan Osokin, while not the original inspiration for our film Groundhog Day, was one of those confirming cos-mic affirmations that we had indeed tapped into one of the great universal problems of being. In a novel that itself reads like a very entertaining high-concept film, Ouspensky suggests the anti-dote to the existential dilemma at the core of Groundhog Day: that trapped as we are on the karmic wheel of cause and effect, our only means of escape is to assume responsibility for our own destiny and find the personal meaning that imparts a purposeful vitality to life and frees us from the limitations of our contempt."-Harold Ramis, filmmaker