Due to a rare disorder, Tom ages much more slowly than the average person and has lived many lifetimes when we meet him in the present day. Of course these lifetimes are corrupted by the sadness and pain from having fallen in love when he was just a young man, in a time where suspicions often lead to death. He's had to run and hide, leaving behind his love and losing her and his daughter to time.
Today, Tom’s a mess, pinning for a daughter that may or may not be alive while enduring the same ageless gift that has him existing within constant fear. As a member of the Albatross Society, Tom lives his life in eight year increments, moving on to a new place and inhabiting a new identity when each period is up. All this comes with a price, and between each transition he must complete a task for the Society, who’s trying to recruit all the others like Tom. Those refusing to join, don’t always come to a natural end.
Right now, Tom is a history teacher in London, fighting off headaches and detailed reveries into his past where stories shift from sadness and pain to meeting people like Shakespeare and F. Scott Fitzgerald. He catalogues his great love and truly whines quite a bit. It all climaxes with an epiphany, a discovery, and a lot of philosophizing. There's also kind of a happy ending, but it’s not exciting. Tom may end the book hopeful, but he can’t shake his essence as a big 'ole downer.
I picked up this book because of The Midnight Library. I liked it and enjoyed Haig’s writing style, which is similar here, but it just doesn’t work for me. I never got into the characters and couldn’t tell what kind of book I was reading, so mixed were the signals. I’d recommend skipping this one, but trying Haig out by grabbing a copy of another one of his books.
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