1. What a strange and delightful read this is.
2. Time travel, cults, books, libraries…you never quite know what’s around the corner in this one.
3. I don’t think I read this, it’s more that I swallowed it whole. I couldn’t stop reading. I had to know.
4. Now I need to read all that Nathaniel Hawthorne I’ve put off reading all my life…and maybe a biography or two.

Dear Alice Hoffman,

Thank you. You have created worlds where books are a magic that anyone can have in their possession. Characters that are strong minded and content to love their lives between pages. You write for the reader. I’m forever grateful to you for helping me find myself in your stories.

The Invisible Hour is the story of a young girl finding herself in a hopeless situation. She runs from one man trying to control her choices or another controlling an entire community. Ivy gives birth to her daughter, Mia, while living under Joel’s care. One of my favorite themes in Alice Hoffman’s books is mother-daughter relationships. My mom is my best friend and what we have is special. I love how her women are always so connected and bonded.

When reading a book by Alice Hoffman you know some things will be happening before even starting to read. There will be powerful female characters, vile men, a love of books and a drop of magic. This books adds a new element of time travel. And like always, you’ll feel a heart wrenching pain of loss and love for characters you’ll never meet.

I love that this book is dedicated to readers and the books that have changed our lives. The Practical Magic series did that for me. It taught me that it was okay to be weird and you can find magic anywhere.

I will have to do a reread of The Scarlet Letter now. I have a feeling I’ll see it in a whole new light. Thank you, NetGalley and Alice Hoffman, for the opportunity to read The Invisible Hour. I have written this review voluntarily.

I was drawn to the invisible hour by the cover. It had such a witchy/magical feel to it. It wasn't until after I started reading that I found out the author is the one and only Alice Hoffman (you know, the women who wrote practical magic)
We follow the story of Mia, a young girl who grew up in a cult like community with her mother. The way the community is run you felt as this was in the past not present time. One-man rules over the community and forbids anyone from reading believe he is the word. Until one day Mia's life changes.

For this being my first Alice Hoffman book, she drew me in. It was slow but simple. I loved watching Mia find her way in the world through books and learning the truth of how she lived. Her love for the classics and the authors who wrote them.

The only con I saw was how it ended. It felt very abrupt, I wish we could see what happens to Mia after her standoff with the cult leader.

Thank you Netgalley for letting me read this book early!

⭐️ ⭐️ ⭐️ ⭐️

Thank you to NetGalley and Atria Books for the ARC!
I love the way Alice Hoffman writes. This book was very good and once I started reading I had a hard time putting it down.
The characters all felt so real. Author seems to have a way to pull the reader into her stories!
Enjoyed reading about the author's historical version of "The Scarlet Letter" and how NH decided to write the story.
A wonderful and magical story of loss, love and finding oneself.
Will recommend!

Ms Hoffman never disappoints. The Invisible Hour had me hooked from the moment Ivy found out she was pregnant. Nothing was ever easy for the Jacob women but their bond was beautiful. Getting to know the “history” behind Scarlet Letter (Alice Hoffmann version) has made me want to go back and re-read the classic.

This latest Alice Hoffman book is a winner. It is the story of Mia, raised in a cult in western Massachusetts, Mia leads a heartbreaking life and wonders if death is better than the way she is living.
The book is heartbreaking at times, but captivating as well as we see Mia navigate through her life looking to find her purpose.
A must read for fans of Hoffman, magical as always.
Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for this book.

Alice Hoffman’s newest book, The Invisible Hour, tells the riveting story of Mia Jacobs, a young woman who has grown up in an isolated farming community in the Berkshires. Run by a domineering man named Joel Davis, the community limits members’ interactions with the outside world and censors reading material. Although Mia and her mother’s experience takes place in the 21st century, it is an echo of Nathaniel Hawthorne’s The Scarlet Letter, a book that saves Mia’s life when she decides to escape.

Mia’s mother Ivy is married to Joel, but she never fully renounces the stories and fairy tales that helped her to navigate her own turbulent adolescence. Stories become the bond that helps the women “walk invisible”, and books become a way for Mia to understand the world and her place within it. Mia builds her adult life around the beauty of libraries, and she forges a romantic relationship with an author from the past to help her process the opportunities and limitations of contemporary women’s lives.

Alice Hoffman is at her best when exploring magic, and The Invisible Hour oozes with it. Hoffman returns readers to the enchanted apple orchards and gardens of Blackwell, Massachusetts, a town made famous by the stories in her book The Red Garden, and transports readers to a fairy tale past. She lovingly presents complex relationships between generations of women, and shows how even the simplest stories can change someone’s life. Her prose casts a magic spell over her readers, leading them to a deeper understanding of the power of stories and a recognition of the sacred bond between readers and writers.

I loved every word of The Invisible Hour. Fans of Hoffman will find delight in her lush description and perfect pacing, and new readers will be spellbound by Hoffman’s storytelling prowess. Like The Scarlet Letter, a novel that reaches back to a Puritan past to comment on 19th century life, The Invisible Hour reaches back to the 19th century to comment on the 21st. Hoffman’s writing offers her readers both a romantic escape and a social exploration. The Invisible Hour celebrates the joy and potential of storytelling and will be remembered as an Alice Hoffman classic.

Thank you to Netgalley for a free copy of the book in exchange for a fair review.

This book was so magical and so heartbreaking all at the same time. There are books thag I just close my eyes at the end and wonder how did the author create something so captivating?

Alice Hoffman brought new light to The Scarlet Letter with this novel. A mothers love and a girls desire to save herself.

I was drawn in from the beginning and could not put this book down!

I was touched to read Alice Hoffman’s letter to her readers at the beginning of this novel. “The bond between writer and reader is a cherished and mysterious one. A book doesn’t live when it’s written. It lives when it’s read.” What a perfectly beautiful thing to say as this book is in many ways a ode to the powers of books and how they touch people’s lives. In this particular novel, it’s about how a one novel saved the life of a young woman living in a cult where reading was forbidden. As in a number of her other novels, there’s an element of magic. It’s through time travel in this story. Yes, of course you have to suspend your disbelief for a while to experience the modern day character connecting with and falling in love with her favorite writer. But for an avid reader, things don’t get any better than to imagine that. It’s clear from the beginning that there is a reflection on issues that are very relevant right now - book banning, the freedom of women to choose. A message here, for sure, but it’s an engaging, well written story . I always find Hoffman’s writing magical no matter what the story is about.

ARC was provided by the publisher via Netgalley in exchange for an honest review.

I’m not entirely sure of when Alice Hoffman started to write this book, but I am certain she understood the hurt we face in this world and knew that we needed this book. I need this book. I need this story to carry me through the hard days when I feel as if my life, and its freedoms, is being rewound back to the stone ages.

The Invisible Hour tells of a tale when a young girl, Mia, decides she wants to die because death is better than life in The Community; an oppressive cult that forbids books and any contact with the outside world. But Mia’s plans to leave this earth is interrupted by her discovery of The Scarlet Letter, written by Nathaniel Hawthorne. She is mesmerized by his words. It’s as if the book, written almost two-hundred years ago, is about her mother. The more she reads and hides her stolen books, she realizes she must escape The Community to survive.

Now y’all, I’m not joking when I say I ugly cried. My husband brought me eye drops because I just couldn’t see clearly. It was as if I had poured salt directly into my eyes. This story will have your whole heart. The love between mother and daughter ran deep and showed up in Mia’s life in more ways than she expected.

This ARC doesn’t really need a review. It’s perfect. There’s nothing to be said to fix.

Mia’s story will live within me forever. Everyone on my Christmas list is going to be getting this book in their stocking this year. I’m not even kidding. OBSESSED!

• Star Rating: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️

Thank you to @netgalley and @atriabooks , especially the author @ahoffmanwriter for this free e-ARC in exchange for an honest review.

Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for providing an ARC for review.

You can never go wrong with an Alice Hoffman book. This latest novel took me a few chapters to get invested, but once I did, I was hooked. The book is told in two parts, one following Mia as she struggles to escape the cult where she and her mother live. The other part kicks in that magic realism, with Mia going back in time to meet her favorite author. I wish that the two parts just felt a bit connected. It almost felt like the back half was a completely separate novel, and then it felt like it ended very abruptly. I just wished for a little bit more, but despite that, I still enjoyed this one and didn't want to put it down.

I will start by saying that Alice Hoffman is one of my more recent auto-buy authors. I read and enjoyed the Practical Magic books, but The World That We Knew is a book that I absolutely loved.

The Invisible Hour was an excellent read. There are some wonderful themes in this book about the bond between mothers and daughters and the life-changing power of books. Strong female characters in this book abound-Ivy, Mia, Constance, Sarah, Elizabeth-and all of them are readers.

As with other Hoffman books, there are magical realism elements. For this one, there is some time travel involved. That doesn't bother me in the slightest and I don't have any trouble suspending reality in pursuit of a good story! My one wish for the story that kept me from giving it a full 5 stars is that I would have loved a flash-forward epilogue into Mia's daughter's (or grand-daughter's) life to get a final few details about how Mia lived out the rest of her life, some closure about what happened to Joel (really, rotting in an 1800s jail or asylum would be a fitting end for him!), and a nice ending for Sarah. I can make some predictions about what would happen to them, but an extra 5-10 pages would have given me 100% closure.

Overall, I greatly enjoyed The Invisible Hour and I would recommend it without reservation to any Hoffman fans. I would also like to extend a big thank you to the publisher for giving me an ARC to review!

Beautifully written book. Love Alice Hoffman's books.

Mia Jacob is living inside an oppressive cult community in western Massachusetts where contact with the outside world is forbidden, and books are considered evil. Mia discovers a building that looks like a castle in the town where they sell their fruit. She discovers a book on the shelf and takes it and opens it up. There is an inscription with her name on it. How can this be?

As Mia begins to read more and more books, she realizes that reading can transport you to other worlds or bring them to you, and that readers and writers affect one another in mysterious ways.

"I only had the life that I lived here, but I had found other possibilities every time I read a book."

"Turn someone into a reader and you turn the world around."

Mia had enough with the lies of the Community. She lost her mother in an accident on the farm. She decides its time to runaway. She took the one book that had the inscription with her name inscribed in it...The Scarlet Letter.

As a young woman she falls in love with a brilliant writer, Nathaniel Hawthorne, as she makes her way back in time. "A single dream is more powerful than a thousand realities." - Nathanial Hawthorne

Such a beautiful book of a girls dream and making it come true. Mia is a strong woman that learns she can think for herself. She can love and be loved.

This book touches on the trauma inside a cult community and the devastating affects it can have on someone's psyche.

Thank you NetGalley for this ARC. Loved It!!

Thank you to NetGalley and Atria Press for allowing me to read a digital ARC of Alice Hoffman's "The Invisible Hour: A Novel." First, Alice Hoffman is one of my favorite authors; I will read anything she writes. When I received an email from the publisher stating I could read "The Invisible Hour," I did a happy dance. Alice Hoffman draws the reader into her stories and transports them to other realms or eras. "The Invisible Hour," tells the story of Ivy, a seventeen-year-old girl, who gets pregnant and flees the confines of a wealthy, safe home to a restrictive life in a commune, the Community, led by a nefarious man. Ivy marries the commune leader and births an out-of-wedlock daughter named Mia Jacob. Mia cannot go to school, so she sneaks away from work to go to the town library. During these furtive excursions, Mia pilfers books from the library, sneaks them into the commune, and hides them until she can read them. Ivy encourages her to read. One day, when feeling like she is at the end of her rope, she finds Nathaniel Hawthorne's *The Scarlet Letter" and reads the dedication to Mia, which gives her hope and encouragement. She wonders how this book accurately describes her and her mother's experiences in the oppressive Community. Whenever a Community member breaks a rule, they must wear a letter around their neck depicting their infraction; the women's hair is shorn.

When Ivy, her mother and protector, dies, Mia realizes she has to leave the Community. She escapes the Community and New England town with the help of Helen, the town librarian, Helen. Mia grows up, excels in school, and researches Nathaniel Hawthorne (Hawthorne). She regularly visits his grave and is transported to the 16th century, where a young Nathaniel Hawthorne existed. They have mystical and blissful encounters; Ivy has a chance to right the wrongs of the future in the past.

In "The Invisible Hours," books and libraries have the power to save you; they are balms that soothe your soul and lighten heavy burdens. Books are a transport to magical times, realms, and eras. The plot is unique, magical, and filled with twists and turns. The writing is lyrical, but I must admit the time travel to the 16th century puzzled me, but I have to admit this device worked. Falling in love with Hawthorne was strange, but he was the only man who showed her love and recognition, physically or in his writing. The woman or protagonists of this novel were strong and resilient characters.

I recommend this book to all bibliophiles and encourage them to read this imaginative 21st-century version of "The Scarlet Letter." The characters are well-written, and you, the reader, experience their angst, pain, suffering, and happiness along with them. The women in this novel are strong and refuse to be victims even in society's oppression conditions. What if a woman wrote "The Scarlet Letter"? Kudos to Alice Hoffman for writing another great book.

Such a beautiful heart wrenching story of a woman who, in trying to find kindness and belonging, ends up in a cult. She doesn't have the courage to run but her daughter does.

So so good!! I cried so much.

Thank you to netgalley and the publisher for allowing me to read this book in exchange for an honest review.

Alice Hoffman is a national treasure and The Invisible Hour shows the reader just why.

Mia is raised in a "community' (i.e. cult) in New England. There is to be no contact with the world beyond the scope of the small world and this includes book being verboten. Mia becomes hopeless and it is in this moment that she discovers The Scarlett Letter and Hawthorne himself. The magic that enhances all Hoffman novels comes in and time travel becomes possible. Mia's world is opened and the love of words breaks the chains that bind her.

Magic is everywhere. It's the power in Words. The driving force behind Love. The champion of Choice.
It's Alice Hoffman's books.
The Invisible Hour is a subtle time warp of fates, loves intertwining, and women enduring.

Thanks to NetGalley for the eARC.

I didn't think I would ever be as invested in characters as I was in Alice Hoffman's Owens family, but she has done it again. I fell in love with Ivy, and then her daughter Mia, immediately. Hoffman has a way of bringing strong, vulnerable women vibrantly alive in the pages of her books, which is why I will always be first in line to pick up her books.
Ivy has left home after she tells her boyfriend she is pregnant and he dismisses her and her parents are arguing about her future and planning the adoption of her baby without her. She runs to where she feels safe, somewhere she belongs. But what she runs to is worse than what she left. Finding herself married to the leader of a cult, Joel, who says he loves her and will always take care of her and treat Mia as his own, she quickly finds out nothing could be further than the truth. Once her daughter Mia is born, she is considered the collective daughter of the cult. While Ivy and Mia find ways to form an indelible bond, Mia knows they need to leave. Ivy passes on to her daughter a love of reading, which is not allowed at the cult and needs to be done in secret. But when Ivy is no longer there to protect Mia, and her secret trips to the library are found out, Mia follows in her mother's footsteps and runs away to find a better life. Taking only a few sacred belongings, including her stolen copy of Nathaniel Hawthorne's The Scarlett Letter, Mia seeks refuge with the librarian that has been watching over her. Mia's life, however, is shadowed by the fear that Joel will find her, and if the discreetly placed leaves of the apple trees found at the cult commune is any indication, he is never going to let her go.
On the run from Joel, Mia finds not only comfort in Nathanial Hawthorne's words, but love with Nathaniel himself as they realize love cannot be bound by time.
Alice Hoffman is a master of magical realism, allowing you to suspend your belief to enter the world she has created. Her characters are complex and she reveals their innermost fears and dreams so slowly that you don't realize just how much they have become a part of your life until you have turned the last page, and they're gone.
The ending for me was somewhat abrupt and confusing and I had to reread the last few pages to see if I was missing something. However, overall this is a magical read that I could not put down.

I received an ARC of this book from Netgalley in exchange for my honest review.

REVIEW TO FOLLOW.

Another 2am read from Hoffman, and another triumph! I loved every page as always and think using Nathaniel Hawthorne with her usual twist of magical realism was perfection. Hit it out of the park again!