Life Out of Order (Standard Edition) (Original)
Life Out of Order (Standard Edition) (Original)
Life Out of Order (Standard Edition) (Original)
Description
Description
The long-awaited new novel from author of the multi-million copy bestseller THE TIME TRAVELER'S WIFE, charting the epic and often perilous life of Alba DeTamble, who's inherited her father's time-traveling abilities.
Alba DeTamble has never lived a life in order. Born with the same rare Chrono-Displacement Disorder as her father, Henry DeTamble, Alba is an involuntary time traveler: she slips unpredictably through decades, carrying the weight of a future she can witness but cannot change. Yet she strives to maintain a normal life: as a gifted violinist, Alba finds refuge in her music, as well as her tight-knit community of artists and activists who fight to take care of each other in an increasingly unstable world.
As she dips in and out of time, Alba is haunted by secrets she must keep from those she loves most, including Zach, her safe, supportive anchor in the chaos. Her journey takes her from the riot-torn Chicago streets, to the eerie, timeless "Yellow House" - where she meets Oliver, a handsome fellow time traveler - to the digital corridors of the Museum of Lost Souls, a virtual sanctuary of forgotten memories and lost artifacts. Curating the museum is Isadora, Alba's mysterious stepsister and an increasingly unsettling presence in their family - whose fate may be intertwined with Alba's in more dangerous ways than she knows.
At once intimate and sweeping, Life Out of Order is a kaleidoscopic tale of love, resilience, and hope amid our fractured world where time itself is the greatest adversary. With every leap through the years, Alba is forced to reckon with the choices that define her, the people she cannot bear to lose, and the question that haunts every time traveler: can you ever truly belong to the present?
Alba DeTamble has never lived a life in order. Born with the same rare Chrono-Displacement Disorder as her father, Henry DeTamble, Alba is an involuntary time traveler: she slips unpredictably through decades, carrying the weight of a future she can witness but cannot change. Yet she strives to maintain a normal life: as a gifted violinist, Alba finds refuge in her music, as well as her tight-knit community of artists and activists who fight to take care of each other in an increasingly unstable world.
As she dips in and out of time, Alba is haunted by secrets she must keep from those she loves most, including Zach, her safe, supportive anchor in the chaos. Her journey takes her from the riot-torn Chicago streets, to the eerie, timeless "Yellow House" - where she meets Oliver, a handsome fellow time traveler - to the digital corridors of the Museum of Lost Souls, a virtual sanctuary of forgotten memories and lost artifacts. Curating the museum is Isadora, Alba's mysterious stepsister and an increasingly unsettling presence in their family - whose fate may be intertwined with Alba's in more dangerous ways than she knows.
At once intimate and sweeping, Life Out of Order is a kaleidoscopic tale of love, resilience, and hope amid our fractured world where time itself is the greatest adversary. With every leap through the years, Alba is forced to reckon with the choices that define her, the people she cannot bear to lose, and the question that haunts every time traveler: can you ever truly belong to the present?
Critical Reviews
Critical Reviews
"A graceful, complicated, satisfying metafiction, it takes on the biggest issues of our times without flincing." -Bonnie Garmus, New York Times bestselling author of Lessons in Chemistry "Life Out of Order is ambitious and inventive, a truly original book that whisks readers away on a time-bending whirlwind through the deeply human experiences of love, loss, self-discovery, and finding our way through a world that is constantly changing around us." --Nikki Erlick, New York Times bestselling author of The Measure and The Poppy Fields "Can a novel be both intimate and epic? Utopian and dystopian? Old fashioned in the best way and utterly contemporary? In the case of Audrey Niffenegger's Life Out of Order, the answer is yes, yes, yes. She engages with the large questions of our anthropocene era, yet her characters, tumbling through time, are so real, I'm hoping they'll appear in my kitchen. I can't stop thinking about this marvelous novel." -Margot Livesey, New York Times bestselling author of The Flight of Gemma Hardy and The Road from Belhaven Praise for The Time Traveler's Wife
"[This] inventive and poignant writing is well worth a trip." --Entertainment Weekly
"Dreamy and dark... I got trapped inside the magic of its pages." -Cosmopolitan
"Niffenegger plays ingeniously in her temporal hall of mirrors."--The New Yorker
"A literary sensation." -NPR
"A soaring celebration of the victory of love over time." --Chicago Tribune
"Haunting... Compelling and unsettling." --USA Today
"An intensely moving testament to the time-spanning power of true love." -Marie Claire
"A powerfully original love story . . . [An] amazing trip."--People
"A magical experience from start to finish." -Elle
"A hymn to the pleasures of the ordinary and tangible, the sensuousness of the here and now." -The Boston Globe
"A singular tale of a charming man with a funny condition (he slips in and out of time) and the woman who loves him. The setting, the city of Chicago, is luminous." --San Francisco Chronicle
"As if love weren't complicated enough, debut author Niffenegger dreams up a happy couple plagued by a peculiar problem...It is to Niffenegger's credit that she avoids cheap shots and develops her innovative concept in some exceptionally strange and witty ways." --Time Out New York
"[This] inventive and poignant writing is well worth a trip." --Entertainment Weekly
"Dreamy and dark... I got trapped inside the magic of its pages." -Cosmopolitan
"Niffenegger plays ingeniously in her temporal hall of mirrors."--The New Yorker
"A literary sensation." -NPR
"A soaring celebration of the victory of love over time." --Chicago Tribune
"Haunting... Compelling and unsettling." --USA Today
"An intensely moving testament to the time-spanning power of true love." -Marie Claire
"A powerfully original love story . . . [An] amazing trip."--People
"A magical experience from start to finish." -Elle
"A hymn to the pleasures of the ordinary and tangible, the sensuousness of the here and now." -The Boston Globe
"A singular tale of a charming man with a funny condition (he slips in and out of time) and the woman who loves him. The setting, the city of Chicago, is luminous." --San Francisco Chronicle
"As if love weren't complicated enough, debut author Niffenegger dreams up a happy couple plagued by a peculiar problem...It is to Niffenegger's credit that she avoids cheap shots and develops her innovative concept in some exceptionally strange and witty ways." --Time Out New York
Publishing Information
Publishing Information
Publisher:
Hanover Square Press
Pub date:
2026-10-27
Length:
544 pages
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