A man dies and is reborn over and over again retaining the memories of his past lives. He’s not alone. Hijinks ensue.
The narratorial voice is on point. Harry sounds like someone who’s lived for hundreds of years. That’s a big part of what makes this novel so gripping.
The novel feels inspired by Ted Chiang’s short story Understand. But instead of a medical doodad of some kind granting the protagonist super intelligence, Harry is able to get through his many lives with ease because he knows the future and he’s lived through and remembered each of his previous lives.
He’s a time vampire!
Minor spoilers ahead
It’s a shame that only Harry and one other Kalachakra (people who relive their lives over and over again) are also Ouroboran (Kalachakras who can perfectly recall their past lives). They are very very veeeeerrrryyy special people and at the end of the day they’re the only people who really matter. Every other human being and Kalachakra is mostly along for the ride.
This conceit allows for Claire North to put most of her focus on the many lives of both of these characters. I understand that something like this was probably a concession that was made to make it feasible to tell a story with this premise in a reasonable number of pages. But, still, it feels a little arbitrary. The entire novel is built on this shakey foundation, so when both of these characters’s Ouroboran-ness becomes more and more of a critical part of the narrative, it’s a little deflating.
Thoughts on the author
If you get an old copy of the book like I did, you might be surprised to read the author’s blurb which says that this is Claire North’s first novel.
Technically, that’s true. But Claire North is a pseudonym of Catherine Webb. By the time The First Fifteen Lives of Harry August was published, Webb had spent at least 14 years of her life writing and being published.
This novel does NOT read like someone’s first novel because it isn’t.
Conclusion
Given her experience and the quality of her writing, it’s a real shame that Claire North’s work isn’t more popular. The number of ratings her books have on Goodreads is criminal.
Except for some minor complaints, I really loved The First Fifteen Lives Of Harry August and had a really hard time putting it down. I’m excited to explore more of Claire North’s other work.