The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue
2015
- nyt:combined-print-and-e-book-fiction=2020-10-25
- fiction, fantasy, historical
- lgbtq science fiction & fantasy
- memory
- fiction
- immortalism
- deals
- man-woman relationships
- fiction / fantasy / historical
- fiction / literary
The story
France, 1714: in a moment of desperation, a young woman makes a Faustian bargain to live forever and is cursed to be forgotten by everyone she meets. Thus begins the extraordinary life of Addie LaRue, and a dazzling adventure that will play out across centuries and continents, across history and art, as a young woman learns how far she will go to leave her mark on the world. But everything changes when, after nearly 300 years, Addie stumbles across a young man in a hidden bookstore and he remembers her name.
What it’s like
Lush, melancholy prose that moves between candlelit 18th-century France, rain-slicked modern streets, and the hushed, book-lined corners of a New York bookstore, with the sensory detail of cobblestones, wet wool, ink and old paper rendered in close, lyrical sentences. The voice is intimate and wistful, slipping easily between sumptuous description and quiet reflection, so the world feels both vivid and dreamlike. The mood is bittersweet and ruminative, a steady ache of longing braided with small pleasures: fresh bread, a stranger's kindness, the thrill of a face that finally remembers. Pacing unfolds across centuries in loosely connected episodes, unhurried in the middle and gathering warmth toward the end. Its emotional center is a woman who has lived too long unseen, slowly learning what it means to be known, and a lonely man who wants to hold on to her. Violence is limited and mostly off the page, with some sexual content that is romantic rather than explicit, and no gore; the darkness is existential loneliness rather than fear. Well suited to a rainy Sunday, a late-night read, or anyone who loves atmospheric historical fantasy and a love story about memory, time and being remembered.
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