The First Fifteen Lives of Harry August
2014 • 405 pages
Ratings92
Average rating4.1
15
Ratings92
Average rating4.1
Harry August is on his deathbed. Again. No matter what he does or the decisions he makes, when death comes, Harry always returns to where he began, a child with all the knowledge of a life he has already lived a dozen times before. Nothing ever changes. Until now. As Harry nears the end of his eleventh life, a little girl appears at his bedside. 'I nearly missed you, Doctor August, ' she says. 'I need to send a message.' This is the story of what Harry does next, and what he did before, and how he tries to save a past he cannot change and a future he cannot allow.
Reviews with the most likes.
This should have been great and was just okay. I really like the kalachakra ‘Replay” aspect of it and just did not care for the cat and mouse game, which felt like a mediocre spy novel.
I'm a sucker for stories where the main characters is stuck in a time loop. Groundhog Day and Edge of Tomorrow stand out, but this one took it to an entirely new level. The title itself is a giveaway for the time loop – an entire lifetime. The concept of replaying your entire life sounds interesting, but the complications that come up when you (and perhaps others) can do this were problems I hadn't seen explored in Sci-Fi before.
Great pacing until Russia where, for me, it felt a little slow but picks up again after that.
Worth reading, but didn't live up to it's clever premise, for me. I enjoyed the quick little vignettes about some of Harry's lives that weren't examined very deeply, and about the lives of some of the others, and I thought the overall structure was interesting, but I couldn't get invested in Harry, or his nemesis, or each of their quests; this meant getting through the second half was a bit of a slog.
Featured Prompt
29 booksTime travel books are a great way to explore the possibilities and consequences of changing the past. They can also be a lot of fun, as you follow the adventures of characters who travel through time.
Featured Prompt
1,171 booksWhen you think back on every book you've ever read, what are some of your favorites? These can be from any time of your life – books that resonated with you as a kid, ones that shaped your personal...
