How to Stop Time
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4.2 • 176 Ratings
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- $12.99
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- $12.99
Publisher Description
*THE MIDNIGHT TRAIN, Matt Haig’s new novel from the world of The Midnight Library, is arriving in May 2026*
If you loved The Midnight Library, read How to Stop Time next!
HOW MANY LIFETIMES DOES IT TAKE TO LEARN HOW TO LIVE?
Tom Hazard has a dangerous secret. He may look like an ordinary 41-year-old history teacher, but he’s been alive for centuries. From Elizabethan England to Jazz-Age Paris, from New York to the South Seas, Tom has seen it all. As long as he keeps changing his identity, he can stay one step ahead of his past – and stay alive. The only thing he must not do is fall in love.
But what if the one thing he can't have just happens to be the one thing that might save him?
APPLE BOOKS REVIEW
How good is this book? Benedict Cumberbatch was signed to star in the film adaption even before its release. Matt Haig has updated a fairly familiar idea—a band of immortals battling their extraordinary fate—and carved a deeply affecting, totally charming novel. The story's lead, Tom Hazard, is a man who's been alive for centuries and lived everywhere (we particularly loved the pages spent in Elizabethan London), but he has always struggled to get over a forbidden love from Shakespearean times. Tom's plight had us bewitched from start to finish.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Tom Hazard doesn't age. Or, he does, but very, very slowly. He was born in France in 1581, but like other "albatrosses" (those who carry the burden of living forever), a century to him passes like a decade or less. In this enthralling quest through time, Haig (Reasons to Stay Alive) follows his protagonist through the Renaissance up to "now," when Tom works as a history teacher in London. As Tom goes on various recruiting missions for the Albatross Society, the setting of the story moves from Shakespeare's Globe to F. Scott Fitzgerald's Paris to Bisbee, Ariz., and other far reaches of the earth. The main rule of the Albatross Society is that, in order to stay protected from a group of scientists who want to study and confirm the existence of the albatrosses, an albatross cannot fall in love. And yet, all the while, Tom nurses a broken heart and searches for his long lost daughter, Marion, who is also an albatross. "Humans don't learn from history" is one of the lessons Tom learns, and, despite everything he witnesses over the expansiveness of history, nothing can cure him of lovesickness. His persistence through the centuries shows us that the quality of time matters more than the quantity lived.
Customer Reviews
Intriguing and captivating read
A fantastic read and interesting take on the concept of immortality. The story hooks you in from the beginning and takes you on an emotional journey through Tom’s life.
It truly makes you question whether immortality is all it’s cracked up to be.
Great read.
I couldn't put it down. It had just the right amount of philosophical messages. I just wanted to know what was up next.
Maybe I'm the right target market, but it tugged so many strings.
Intereresting!
I love the concept of time travel, and this book kept it real, no lighting bolts, flux capacitors etc.
It is the story of a guy who lives through time and hits reality head on. It’s just a pity he ended so quickly, I really enjoyed reading it.