3.5 stars

This was an intriguing and unique book. The set up was fascinating and the first chapter pulled me in right away. I guessed a few of the twists, but I liked how the different pieces and plot points connected and were related through time. While the book posed some interesting questions about how history is remembered, censorship, and right and wrong, the pacing was inconsistent and the explanations for the magic/world weren't entirely clear. I adored the main characters in the beginning, but as the book went on, I found myself liking Lisavet less and less. She made questionable and unilateral decisions that seemed to go against everything I loved about her in the beginning. I understand it was to show the lengths she would go, but it was difficult to accept. I'm still confused by that scene with Jack in the last third that finally gave her the "upper hand" too. The book wrapped up in a relatively satisfying way, but I'm still not sure exactly how that happened. I think in an effort to tie up loose ends, the overall message of the book got lost.

I mainly listened to the audiobook of The Book of Lost Hours and found it challenging at times. The sound quality varied chapter to chapter, from being incredibly quiet and muffled (like the narrator was mumbling) to loud and clear. Carlotta Brenten's narration was good overall though and she used a variety of accents and voices to bring the different characters to life. Unfortunately, the production of this audiobook definitely impacted my enjoyment.

Audiobook Review
Overall 3.5 stars
Performance 3.5 stars
Story 3-3.5 stars

CW: death of loved ones, depression & suicide (secondary character), infant death, murder, threats to safety, guns and gunshot wounds, violence, kidnapping, forced institutionalization

*I voluntarily read and listened to a review copy of this book*

When I started this book, I had difficulty staying focused on the characters, the concepts, and the details of the time space. I put it down for a week, but found myself wondering about Lisavet and her situation.
Luckily for me, I gave it another try. After getting past the beginning, I couldn't put it down. All of the characters are intertwined and each has a vital role. This story is engaging and has a few "a-ha" moments.
Fir me, this is a forever love story spanning real and space time. You will enjoy this read.

4.5 ⭐️

“There are no secrets that time does not reveal.” – Jean Racine

It was a night like any other for eleven-year-old Lisavet Levy in 1938. Tucked under her covers, her father Ezekiel told her a bedtime story about a watch, a friend, and an enemy who wants to destroy what he and so many others hold dear. But for Ezekiel, it was more than just a story–and for Lisavet, it turned into her reality when her father hid her in the time space, closing the door behind him and never opening it again.

She grows up among the endless rows of books that contain memories of everything that has happened on earth, knowing this is where she wants to stay for the rest of her life. But when government agents begin to destroy memories they deem “dangerous,” Lisavet does her best to save them, which leads to her meeting an American spy Ernest Duquesne in 1949, who shows her his world, the world she has never seen or experienced and changes hers, something that put them on a journey that changes time and history as they know it.

Fast forward to 1965, where sixteen-year-old Amelia and a cold, mysterious CIA agent meet at her Uncle Ernest’s funeral. Grieving and angry at the world, Amelia doesn’t want to do anything the agent wants her to do, especially with her uncle’s watch. But curiosity gets the better of her, and when she finds herself amongst the shelves of books of memories, her journey of finding the truth of not only time but her own life begins.

This book is nothing like I expected. Can we give Hayley Gelfuso a round of applause, please, because ho-ly cow! This was AMAZING! 👏🏼👏🏼

Think of it like The Book Thief, The Giver, and Interstellar had a love-child while Avengers: Endgame watched. Yeah, I’ll let that sink in for a minute.

Although I found some of the plot points predictable because I make it my life mission to figure out the story and the ending to any movie or book I consume before it ends (it’s always been that way–please send help), the story was so interesting, so mind-boggling, and oh-so nothing like I have ever read before but it delivered. There was science, there was romance, there was adventure–it’s the whole package. It’s going to be on my mind for the rest of the month, and I’m not mad about it.

The characters were written very well. They had flaws, they weren’t the plot’s punching bag, and as the story progressed, so did they. Did they make mistakes and decisions that made me shake my head? Yes, but I make dumb decisions all the time, so it just made them more relatable and realistic. And Jack? What a douchebag. (Pardon my French. 😅😂) He infuriated me every time he dared to show his face.

And the ending? It was not at all what I was expecting, yet it felt right. Absolutely brilliant.

Besides All the Tomorrows After, it’s been a while since a book made an impact. It has left me feeling dumbfounded and grateful. I’m blessed to be alive in this flawed yet beautiful world, making memories with friends and family and loving them to the best of my ability with the time I have on this earth. ❤ I highly, highly recommend this book, and I hope you will enjoy it as much as I did!

Thank you to Atria Books for inviting me to read the arc via NetGalley! All opinions and statements are my own.

❗Content Warnings❗
Murder, death, grief, blood, misogyny, & violence.
Swearing: Yes
Spice: Closed-door (Doesn’t go into detail.)

Evidently time-travel romances are my new thing. This was a sweet, cozy read that helped me to pass the hours away much more pleasantly as I have been caring for my mother in the hospital. I loved the setting of the time space, especially as a library filled with book of memories.

The mechanics of the world-building fell a little flat for me as I tried to make sense of time-walking, what it means to be outside of time, and the quantum mechanics of time displacement. Ultimately, I ended up abandoning the need to understand how it works and just enjoy the love story.

I adored Ernest and actually kind of wish the story had been told from his point of view. Lisavett on the other hand was, in a word, complicated. A bit more complicated than I would have liked in a cozy fantasy about time travel and memory but I guess it just makes her a little more human in that way.

Overall, an enjoyable story with a punch-able villain, sweet romance, and interesting time construction. You'll really enjoy it if you liked The Midnight Library.

I thought I'd be really interested in this concept because I love magical realism and time travel themes in books. This book was, I felt, unnecessarily difficult to understand and hard to want to keep going. DNF at about 30%.

I enjoyed this read more than I thought I would. I love reading dual timelines, but I feel like the ending was not really complete with Anton, like he was just there. I did enjoy the overall story and thought it was fun read! I think the perfect read for traveling.

I loved the concept but never felt fully hooked.

Thanks to the publisher for providing an arc through NetGalley for me to review!

Stories that handle time travel and the like can be pretty hit or miss for me - if the mechanism for controlling or moving through time doesn’t feel believable to the story, it’s a dealbreaker. Luckily, the method of time control and the idea of a pocket dimension within time in the Book of Lost Hours was really interesting.

There were a few things early on that felt predictable and I wasn’t certain if they were meant to be mysteries but as the book went on, I got more engrossed and the author started really tying together all the different moments in time nicely. I was worried in the last quarter that the ending was going to be weak but at the last minute it ended a way I was satisfied with. I didn’t particularly like any of the characters but still found the story ultimately interesting. I especially liked Gelfuso’s writing style and will be curious to pick up her future books, I was surprised this was her debut novel.

If you enjoyed Interstellar or time travel shows like Loki, you’ll probably enjoy the Book of Lost Hours.

Thank you to NetGalley and Atria Books for the opportunity to read this eArc.

A lovely, poignant piece of historical fantasy. Lisavet is just a child in 1938 when circumstances leave her trapped in the time space, where the world's memories are stored within the pages of magical books. When she discovers that those in power are using their access to this place to destroy the memories they deem dangerous, she makes it her mission to salvage what she can. Ernest is just one of those men, working for his government until Lisavet opens his eyes. Years later, sixteen year old Amelia is also thrown into the time space, tasked with finding one particular book and unraveling the mystery which connects them all along the way.

I adored this novel. The author's depiction of time and the potential of time travel was so beautifully done. It's a story of fighting censorship and the depths we'll go to for those we love. It's so emotional and the characters are perfectly written. Great romance too. 100% recommend.

I debated giving this book a full 5 stars, because I don’t hand them out lightly. But after finishing, I honestly couldn’t find much fault in it. The prose is superb - engaging, fluid, and beautifully crafted.

The description compared it to The Midnight Library, but aside from both featuring a mystical library where you can step into books, I don’t think that’s a fair match. The Midnight Library leans cozy and easy; The Book of Lost Hours is far more tense, layered, and ambitious, spanning lifetimes and timelines.

Despite multiple POVs and constant time jumps, I never found the story confusing. Instead, I was eager to see the strands finally converge. I especially loved the discussions of astrophysics, time travel, and paradoxes - complex but still accessible. And while there are many layers to explore, the love story between Ernest and Lisavet is the emotional heart. I was always rooting for them, and always frustrated by the choices that kept them apart.

The ending struck the perfect balance. With a subject as tricky as time, memory, and fate, the author had countless directions they could have gone, and I really loved the path they chose.

Like I said, I don’t give 5 stars easily, but this one checks every box for me. It’s smart, moving, and memorable, and it’s going to stick with me for a long time.

It was so hard to read the last few chapters of this book through my tears. What a beautifully moving story.

The beginning of the book is slow to set the scene, and I found myself almost frustrated with multiple POVS. Well, well, well, egg on my face. I was wrong in so many ways! Once it really gets going, it is nonstop, and I'm glad that I held on for the ride.

The characters in this book make a lot of bad choices. Dumb choices. Reckless choices. But they do it in the name of love. And who can say that they wouldn't do the worst for the people they love the most? And you may not get everything right in this one, but there's always the next timeline.

I also appreciated the author's emphasis on the importance of combating censorship, no matter the moral grounds people attempt to use to justify it. History belongs to everyone, not just the victors. This is a needed reminder in the current state of the world.

Lovvvvvvveeed this book!
I will preface I have been reading quite a bit of WWII era novels this summer and this one took me a few chapter to get into (because of all the other books). But I was hooked! I so desperately want to see what happened bf was rooting for Lisavet and Ernest. It such a good concept for. Book and very magical

This story is like if the TVA from Loki were running The Library from Doctor Who (River Song weirdness INCLUDED)

I enjoyed this book. That being said, I had a hard time getting into it and only started feeling really invested around the 60% mark. Hayley Gelfuso's writing is evocative and rich without falling into being too flowery or cloying, which I really liked. The story had a good flow to it, though I will say that some of the descriptions of the Time Space felt a touch hollow/vague.

I don't usually like time travel stories, so thankfully this isn't quite a typical one, rather it's about the manipulation of time as a physical realm vs just going back/forward along a static timeline.

Lisavet was an intruiguing character, as was Amelia, though they both had moments where they annoyed me. I liked Lisavet's love story and the feeling of fated inevitablity they had, and their continued fighting to protect their loved ones.

I do wish that Jack got kicked around a bit more though.

Thank you to NetGalley and Atria for the eARC!

I was excited about the premise, but disappointed in the execution. The main character was too flat and lacked emotion and complexity for someone in difficult situations across time with her "loved" ones. The author was hoping to provide surprises, but did not deliver. At the beginning, the plot felt almost appropriate for a Young Adult book, but clearly that was not the intention.

This book was CAPTIVATING! I was recommended it because I loved The Ministry of Time and this did not disappoint! The writing was the perfect combination of informative, narrative, and whimsical. I got lost along the way a couple times but the author pulled me right back in. Loved it!.

Thank you to NetGalley and Atria books for the ARC.

This book was enchanting and had a great atmospheric presence. I enjoyed the character developments across the book, and while I saw one twist coming, it was still well done. The undercurrent of love was well developed, and really pulled forward the question of "what would you do for the people you love?"

I highly recommend this for people who enjoyed The Midnight Library, The Butterfly Effect, and The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue, who want to read a book where they were combined into a single story.

Time travel stories and I have a complicated relationship. I love the idea of them, but they don’t always land. Too many confusing mechanics can make me want to tap out. Thankfully, this book was a win. It hooked me with its clever setup and kept me invested with layered characters and an emotional core that made the adventure matter.

The concept is reminiscent of The Midnight Library: we have a soaring library that holds the books of our memories. Each volume captures moments that can be read, stepped into, and even lived again. It’s haunting and imaginative. On one side, you’ve got people burning these memories, determined to prevent history from repeating itself. On the other, rogue preservers fight to protect them, slipping into the past to experience it firsthand and stealing the memory books that others seek to destroy. That tug-of-war between erasure and preservation grounds the story in a moral gray zone I found fascinating. Should some memories be destroyed for the greater good? Or do we risk losing truth when we start rewriting what’s been lived? (Sound familiar, U.S. residents?)

At the center of the book is Lisavet, who grows up inside this library of memories after her watchmaker father disappears in Nazi-occupied Germany. Her life is shaped by ghosts, words, and fragments of other people’s lives. She’s both isolated and deeply connected, her identity stitched together by the stories of others. I loved how the novel let her carry that duality. She’s haunted, yet she becomes a protector. Later, Amelia takes the stage, a teenager drawn into the same strange, fragile world through her murdered uncle. Watching the two threads of Lisavet and Amelia’s lives cross was one of the book’s big emotional strengths.

And yes, there’s romance and intrigue woven into the mix, but it never overshadows the heart of the story. It enhances it. Even days after finishing, I found myself thinking about how memory shapes identity, how memories aren't always reliable, and not everyone remembers things in the same way.

The time travel mechanics worked well for me, which is not something I can always say. The rules made sense, and Gelfuso kept them consistent. Nothing pulled me out of the story with “wait, how does that work again?” moments. Instead, the movement through time flowed well. Each leap mattered and moved the story forward.

If I had one gripe, it’s that the story didn’t surprise me much. I saw the major turns coming. The reveals were satisfying but predictable, and that kept me from giving it a full five-star rating. Still, predictability isn’t always a bad thing. Sometimes the journey is enough, and this was one of those cases. The writing is sharp, the pacing steady, and the characters memorable. Even knowing where things were headed, I enjoyed every step.

Overall, this is a thoughtful and engaging spin on time travel. It balances danger, romance, and family with a strong dose of wonder. If you like your speculative stories anchored in emotion rather than just clever twists, this one deserves a place on your shelf.

4.5 ⭐️

This was a wonderful debut! While this isn’t my usual genre, the premise was so intriguing that I had to give it a try, and I am so glad I did. I loved the time-travel and dual timeline elements, even if some of the finer details (such as how aging worked in the time space without food, water, or sleep) didn’t fully make sense. The characters were well developed, and even when I didn’t agree with their choices, I found myself rooting for them, something the multi-POV chapters really enhanced. The writing itself was beautiful, and the story struck a perfect balance of fantasy, romance, mystery, and historical fiction.

Thank you to Atria Books for access to an eARC!

“𝘗𝘦𝘰𝘱𝘭𝘦 𝘥𝘰𝘯’𝘵 𝘰𝘧𝘵𝘦𝘯 𝘳𝘦𝘮𝘦𝘮𝘣𝘦𝘳 𝘵𝘩𝘪𝘯𝘨𝘴 𝘵𝘩𝘦 𝘴𝘢𝘮𝘦 𝘸𝘢𝘺. 𝘐𝘴 𝘪𝘵 𝘦𝘷𝘦𝘯 𝘱𝘰𝘴𝘴𝘪𝘣𝘭𝘦 𝘧𝘰𝘳 𝘶𝘴 𝘵𝘰 𝘳𝘦𝘮𝘦𝘮𝘣𝘦𝘳 𝘴𝘰𝘮𝘦𝘵𝘩𝘪𝘯𝘨 𝘢𝘴 𝘪𝘵 𝘵𝘳𝘶𝘭𝘺 𝘩𝘢𝘱𝘱𝘦𝘯𝘦𝘥?”

Thanks Atria Books for inviting me to read and review an advanced readers copy via NetGalley!

Likened to a cross between The Midnight Library, The Book Thief (neither I have read), and The Ministry of Time, I also got some light A Short Walk Through a Wide World vibes. It’s a genre-blending tale (historical, magical realism, espionage drama with a love story) and I loved it!! The time and memory stuff can get a tad scratch-your-head at moments but overall I thought it all was very well done: the flow, the unfolding and intertwining of the stories, the characters with their depth and development, the original premise, the intrigue, the suspense, the banter, the yearning… I’d say once I was about 55/60% in I knew it would end up as a rare 5 star for me (I’m wicked stingy in giving those out) and the ending did not disappoint!

This debut novel is one I hope you all will find yourselves a copy to enjoy. Honestly though, this one would make a really good book club pick with the themes it holds and while I was able to predict some of the twists, there’s so much more to this than what one might expect. I plan to get a paperback copy once it’s available so I can revisit this one. Content includes mentions of murder and suicide, violence (physical, gun), sexual harassment (light), unexpected pregnancies, and loss of loved ones.

The Book of Lost Hours by Hayley Gelfuso is a sweeping tale of memory, history, and hidden worlds.
In 1938, Lisavet Levy, the daughter of a watchmaker, is sheltered from the Nazis in a way unlike any other—her father takes her through a doorway into the Time Space, an infinite library holding the memories of humankind. There, she grows up under the care of a spectral guide while protecting fragile histories from the mysterious Timekeepers who would see them undone.
The narrative shifts in 1965 to Amelia Duquesne, drawn into the same labyrinthine archive to recover a lost volume. As she unravels the truth bound in its pages, Amelia faces questions about memory, identity, and how the past is written—or erased.
The writing is both atmospheric and lyrical, balancing moments of intimacy with the grandeur of a world built on memory itself. The story occasionally feels dense with its time shifts and layered imagery, which might take some patience. A few plot moments are slightly predictable, but the richness of the world and the character journeys make it rewarding. The conclusion ties the story together beautifully, though it leaves some elements open to thoughtful reflection, which enhances the sense of wonder.
An inventive and thought-provoking debut that blends historical fiction with fantasy in a way that feels entirely its own.

Overall, I’d rate this around 3.75 stars, rounded up to 4, as the immersive world and compelling characters outweigh the minor pacing and predictability issues.

If magical worlds and mysteries of memory appeal to you, I’d love to share thoughts and discoveries—this one was a true gem.

Thanks to Atria Books for the advance copy provided through NetGalley. All thoughts are my own.