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Lightbreakers
A luminous novel of love, loss, science, and art, that asks if the past can ever be truly revisited, and at what cost?
In the beginning, there was happiness. Maya, an artist obsessed with the nature of beauty, and Noah, a quantum physicist preoccupied by the mysteries of the universe, found in each other a shared curiosity about the world. But beneath the surface of their happy marriage is a third Serena, the lost child that Noah had with his ex-wife, Eileen.
One day Noah gets a call from an eccentric billionaire, asking him to participate in a clandestine project aiming to unravel the secrets of time and consciousness. The couple agrees to relocate to the Janus Lab, deep in the desert, where Noah finds himself drawn into a dangerous kind of time travel that could result in seeing Serena again.
As Noah delves into this groundbreaking, fringe work, his past begins to overtake him. And when his ex-wife, Eileen, joins the project, Maya embarks on a journey back to her own past, one that takes her to Japan, to her family, and to a formative lover who once shattered her heart. As Noah, Maya, and Eileen grapple with the balance between holding on and letting go, new information emerges that the Janus Lab might not be exactly what it seems.
A heart-achingly moving novel, Lightbreakers plumbs the mysteries of human connection, and explores how to love in a world where time is both a healer and a thief.
In the beginning, there was happiness. Maya, an artist obsessed with the nature of beauty, and Noah, a quantum physicist preoccupied by the mysteries of the universe, found in each other a shared curiosity about the world. But beneath the surface of their happy marriage is a third Serena, the lost child that Noah had with his ex-wife, Eileen.
One day Noah gets a call from an eccentric billionaire, asking him to participate in a clandestine project aiming to unravel the secrets of time and consciousness. The couple agrees to relocate to the Janus Lab, deep in the desert, where Noah finds himself drawn into a dangerous kind of time travel that could result in seeing Serena again.
As Noah delves into this groundbreaking, fringe work, his past begins to overtake him. And when his ex-wife, Eileen, joins the project, Maya embarks on a journey back to her own past, one that takes her to Japan, to her family, and to a formative lover who once shattered her heart. As Noah, Maya, and Eileen grapple with the balance between holding on and letting go, new information emerges that the Janus Lab might not be exactly what it seems.
A heart-achingly moving novel, Lightbreakers plumbs the mysteries of human connection, and explores how to love in a world where time is both a healer and a thief.
352 pages, Hardcover
First published November 4, 2025
743 people are currently reading
18152 people want to read
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 318 reviews
October 9, 2025
Now I gotta go stare at a wall and think about all of time being eternally present. I’ll write a full review when I come out of my black hole.
November 19, 2025
Lightbreakers is a story that starts with romance, wanders into physics, and ends up somewhere between grief counseling and metaphysical absurdity. I think of it as Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind rewritten by someone who really, really wants you to understand quantum entanglement.
At the center are Maya, a museum development manager who used to be an artist, and Noah, a physicist who used to be respectable. They meet cute: she gives a talk about art, he stumbles in, nervously rearranging his hair like a man auditioning for a shampoo commercial. She says art is for everyone; he replies that handwriting is dead. Sparks, meet equations.
Years later, they are married, slightly disappointed, and living among wealthy donors and moral fatigue. Maya's job is to charm rich people into funding the museum; Noah's is to convince NASA that the universe still makes sense. Neither job goes well.
Then a billionaire named Klein Michaels invites Noah to dinner and, with the confidence of a man who owns multiple islands and zero consciences, tells him he's built a machine that can transport consciousness across time. Essentially, a teleportation device for the soul, now available for private research and light existential crisis.
Noah, ever the scientist in need of redemption, says yes. Maya, ever the artist in need of meaning, also says yes. They move to Marfa, Texas, a sacred refuge for disillusioned artists and eccentric billionaires.
There, everything feels bright, suspiciously bright, like a dream engineered by someone with perfect taste and too much money. Klein's lab glows with secrets, the desert hums with tension, and Maya begins to notice that her husband's mind is no longer entirely in the same decade.
The novel splits its focus among Maya, Noah, and Eileen, Noah's first wife, the ghostly ex orbiting his every moral particle. Each chapter flips between art and science, faith and grief, as the trio circle the question: if consciousness can move through time, can guilt? If memory is quantum, is regret a law of physics?
Aja Gabel's test for static in the human brain hums with intelligent melancholy, the kind that makes you want to argue with a telescope. The book drifts through museums, laboratories, and desert mirages, all filled with people trying to prove that their pain is measurable.
Ehat begins as a story about time travel reveals itself as a story about what happens when people try to outsmart sorrow. The result is part ghost story, part thought experiment, part emotional audit.
Lightbreakers is a romance written in the language of physics, where every particle of love threatens to vanish under observation. It's clever, tender, and a little pretentious, like an expensive clock that's always five minutes fast but too beautiful to correct.
The book believes in its own intelligence a little too much, but at least it has the decency to be interesting while doing so. The premise is rich: love, grief, and time all entangled in the machinery of quantum physics. The execution, however, oscillates wildly. It is a book that desperately wants to be both poetic and profound, and occasionally it succeeds at one or the other, but rarely both at once.
The best parts come when Aja Gabel writes about ordinary human longing. Her characters ache in believable ways. Maya's exhaustion with artistic failure feels painfully real, Noah's attempt to resurrect meaning through science feels both arrogant and tragic, and their marriage is rendered with the quiet panic of two people who suspect that time is not on their side. When the book focuses on them as people instead of symbols, it glows.
Then comes the science. The metaphysics of the Janus Project sound impressive until you realize that half the characters seem to understand it about as well as you and I do, which is, at least in my case, not at all.
The novel keeps trying to be visionary but keeps bumping into its own ambition. At times it reads like a literary version of an indie sci-fi film that spent all its money on lighting and not quite enough on dialogue.
Time, memory, and love are all forms of the same illusion, and trying to control any of them only deepens the wound. To be human is to live in constant entanglement with what's gone and what might have been. That theme is valid, timeless even, though the delivery sometimes mistakes density for depth.
I think that it is a 3.5-star book. Half of it is beautifully written and emotionally alive, the other half is busy explaining why quantum mechanics might justify crying in the desert. When it's good, it's elegant, radiant, and moving. When it's not, it's a symposium in search of a heartbeat. Still, it's a bold and thoughtful attempt to measure the immeasurable, which counts for something in a world full of novels that don't even try.
At the center are Maya, a museum development manager who used to be an artist, and Noah, a physicist who used to be respectable. They meet cute: she gives a talk about art, he stumbles in, nervously rearranging his hair like a man auditioning for a shampoo commercial. She says art is for everyone; he replies that handwriting is dead. Sparks, meet equations.
Years later, they are married, slightly disappointed, and living among wealthy donors and moral fatigue. Maya's job is to charm rich people into funding the museum; Noah's is to convince NASA that the universe still makes sense. Neither job goes well.
Then a billionaire named Klein Michaels invites Noah to dinner and, with the confidence of a man who owns multiple islands and zero consciences, tells him he's built a machine that can transport consciousness across time. Essentially, a teleportation device for the soul, now available for private research and light existential crisis.
Noah, ever the scientist in need of redemption, says yes. Maya, ever the artist in need of meaning, also says yes. They move to Marfa, Texas, a sacred refuge for disillusioned artists and eccentric billionaires.
There, everything feels bright, suspiciously bright, like a dream engineered by someone with perfect taste and too much money. Klein's lab glows with secrets, the desert hums with tension, and Maya begins to notice that her husband's mind is no longer entirely in the same decade.
The novel splits its focus among Maya, Noah, and Eileen, Noah's first wife, the ghostly ex orbiting his every moral particle. Each chapter flips between art and science, faith and grief, as the trio circle the question: if consciousness can move through time, can guilt? If memory is quantum, is regret a law of physics?
Aja Gabel's test for static in the human brain hums with intelligent melancholy, the kind that makes you want to argue with a telescope. The book drifts through museums, laboratories, and desert mirages, all filled with people trying to prove that their pain is measurable.
Ehat begins as a story about time travel reveals itself as a story about what happens when people try to outsmart sorrow. The result is part ghost story, part thought experiment, part emotional audit.
Lightbreakers is a romance written in the language of physics, where every particle of love threatens to vanish under observation. It's clever, tender, and a little pretentious, like an expensive clock that's always five minutes fast but too beautiful to correct.
The book believes in its own intelligence a little too much, but at least it has the decency to be interesting while doing so. The premise is rich: love, grief, and time all entangled in the machinery of quantum physics. The execution, however, oscillates wildly. It is a book that desperately wants to be both poetic and profound, and occasionally it succeeds at one or the other, but rarely both at once.
The best parts come when Aja Gabel writes about ordinary human longing. Her characters ache in believable ways. Maya's exhaustion with artistic failure feels painfully real, Noah's attempt to resurrect meaning through science feels both arrogant and tragic, and their marriage is rendered with the quiet panic of two people who suspect that time is not on their side. When the book focuses on them as people instead of symbols, it glows.
Then comes the science. The metaphysics of the Janus Project sound impressive until you realize that half the characters seem to understand it about as well as you and I do, which is, at least in my case, not at all.
The novel keeps trying to be visionary but keeps bumping into its own ambition. At times it reads like a literary version of an indie sci-fi film that spent all its money on lighting and not quite enough on dialogue.
Time, memory, and love are all forms of the same illusion, and trying to control any of them only deepens the wound. To be human is to live in constant entanglement with what's gone and what might have been. That theme is valid, timeless even, though the delivery sometimes mistakes density for depth.
I think that it is a 3.5-star book. Half of it is beautifully written and emotionally alive, the other half is busy explaining why quantum mechanics might justify crying in the desert. When it's good, it's elegant, radiant, and moving. When it's not, it's a symposium in search of a heartbeat. Still, it's a bold and thoughtful attempt to measure the immeasurable, which counts for something in a world full of novels that don't even try.
September 27, 2025
Emotionally resonant and deeply felt, Lightbreakers plumbs the complex depths of love, loss, and grief through the eyes of three individuals caught in a tide of mourning and the “indestructible fiber” that can bind a family even when one strand is severed.
When Noah, a grieving quantum physicist, is recruited by an eccentric billionaire (are they ever not eccentric?), he gains access to a time machine that allows him to travel back to visit his 3-year-old daughter, just prior to her death. Gabel wisely avoids alternative timelines and branching paths, keeping the story grounded in the present and in the deep wounds that Noah and those in his orbit are working through.
I enjoyed my time spent with Lightbreakers and found Gabel’s prose quite lovely. Though heavy at times, it is never overwrought nor exceedingly bleak. I’m ill-equipped to vet any of the physics or quantum mechanics at play, but Gabel succeeds in making the science of time travel feel semi-plausible and always in service of the emotional heart of the novel.
My thanks to the publisher and NetGalley for an advanced reader copy in exchange for an honest review.
Blog | Twitter | Instagram | Bluesky
When Noah, a grieving quantum physicist, is recruited by an eccentric billionaire (are they ever not eccentric?), he gains access to a time machine that allows him to travel back to visit his 3-year-old daughter, just prior to her death. Gabel wisely avoids alternative timelines and branching paths, keeping the story grounded in the present and in the deep wounds that Noah and those in his orbit are working through.
I enjoyed my time spent with Lightbreakers and found Gabel’s prose quite lovely. Though heavy at times, it is never overwrought nor exceedingly bleak. I’m ill-equipped to vet any of the physics or quantum mechanics at play, but Gabel succeeds in making the science of time travel feel semi-plausible and always in service of the emotional heart of the novel.
My thanks to the publisher and NetGalley for an advanced reader copy in exchange for an honest review.
Blog | Twitter | Instagram | Bluesky
November 5, 2025
This is going to be a dissenting opinion. I could barely get through this book. Maya’s story and Noah’s story felt like two different universes. Or two different books. The time travel (metaverse concept) part has been done better elsewhere (see Dark Matter by Blake Crouch and TV show Fringe). I felt no urgency with the story. There is no movement. It’s slow and metaphysical (aka boring). I just never felt the pain that I was supposed to feel. Maybe I just didn’t understand it.
November 9, 2025
I can tell this was written by a good author with talent but I was so insanely bored. I do not DNF books because I genuinely believe in waiting for a book’s full potential, but I wanted to DNF so bad. Would’ve slumped me had I not had more time to read than usual. It was just way too complex for me. It seems like it’s geared toward people who really understand science and physics or people who are very interested in art, but I’m neither of those people. The actual time traveling scenes felt few and far between and they weren’t even that interesting. I could just be dense, but it was just really hard to get through. It was my BOTM so I was very excited by the premise, but it just was not for me.
September 27, 2025
Review taken from my bookstagram @chapters.and.catnaps:
If you could go back in time to see your dearly departed without fully understanding the consequences, would you? Lightbreakers follows a trio of main characters as they explore this question, and the impact on those around them.
☀️ What I loved:
- This book is emotional, tackling subjects of grieving a child and past love. The way the characters handle these problems feels real and appropriate to their personality. There's no obvious right or wrong, just complex characters handling difficult questions.
- The quality of Aja's writing is excellent. Her prose flows like a poem, and I can still see certain scenes vividly in my head. The book feels incredibly sensory at points too. You can really see, hear, and smell certain scenes.
🌧️ What I enjoyed less:
- My only slight negative I'd have (and it's not necessarily a negative - depends what you're after) is that the time travel elements aren't very well explained, and it isn't clear to me what (if any) impact the time travel has on the characters in the past. In the author's defence, it is kind of palmed off by one of the characters who says that it isn't their problem to worry about, but feels worth highlighting this for anyone looking for a hard time travel story.
Overall I really enjoyed this one. I love a book that has complex characters dealing with difficult questions, and this book does it brilliantly.
If you want a beautifully written, character driven drama with sci-fi elements, then this book is for you. If you're after a hard time travel sci-fi, then potentially not.
If you could go back in time to see your dearly departed without fully understanding the consequences, would you? Lightbreakers follows a trio of main characters as they explore this question, and the impact on those around them.
☀️ What I loved:
- This book is emotional, tackling subjects of grieving a child and past love. The way the characters handle these problems feels real and appropriate to their personality. There's no obvious right or wrong, just complex characters handling difficult questions.
- The quality of Aja's writing is excellent. Her prose flows like a poem, and I can still see certain scenes vividly in my head. The book feels incredibly sensory at points too. You can really see, hear, and smell certain scenes.
🌧️ What I enjoyed less:
- My only slight negative I'd have (and it's not necessarily a negative - depends what you're after) is that the time travel elements aren't very well explained, and it isn't clear to me what (if any) impact the time travel has on the characters in the past. In the author's defence, it is kind of palmed off by one of the characters who says that it isn't their problem to worry about, but feels worth highlighting this for anyone looking for a hard time travel story.
Overall I really enjoyed this one. I love a book that has complex characters dealing with difficult questions, and this book does it brilliantly.
If you want a beautifully written, character driven drama with sci-fi elements, then this book is for you. If you're after a hard time travel sci-fi, then potentially not.
November 18, 2025
I thiiink 4.5💫 this was soo good?! and just serves as a reminder that I really need to read more sci fi AND as a double down that I just love a good time travel novel🙂↕️
This was so smart and a THINKER! What would you risk in your present to be able to visit your past?!
The way the grief was handled was so thoughtful and honest - the way it changes you and can bond you to a partner in ways no one else will understand. ⚠️trigger warning : loss of a child (its in the synopsis so this is not a spoiler but it IS a major plot point so take care!!)
These characters were all flawed but likable, relatable! There’s a couple reveals (one I saw coming but one I didn’t), 3 POVs, and I was sooo engaged from the start! I did the audio (3 narrators) and it was excellent👏I highly highly recommend!
If you’re not a science person, fear not, while the quantum physics of it all is a lot Gabel makes it approachable and even seem plausible! Plus you don’t need to believe it or even understand it 🤪 to enjoy this one!
This was so smart and a THINKER! What would you risk in your present to be able to visit your past?!
The way the grief was handled was so thoughtful and honest - the way it changes you and can bond you to a partner in ways no one else will understand. ⚠️trigger warning : loss of a child (its in the synopsis so this is not a spoiler but it IS a major plot point so take care!!)
These characters were all flawed but likable, relatable! There’s a couple reveals (one I saw coming but one I didn’t), 3 POVs, and I was sooo engaged from the start! I did the audio (3 narrators) and it was excellent👏I highly highly recommend!
If you’re not a science person, fear not, while the quantum physics of it all is a lot Gabel makes it approachable and even seem plausible! Plus you don’t need to believe it or even understand it 🤪 to enjoy this one!
November 26, 2025
Loved. A speculative marriage in crisis story about a scientist and artist who can't communicate, can't connect, and can't overcome the husband's insurmountable grief.
I also loved all the depictions of artmaking, the process of painting, and descriptions of the Marfa landscape. The book delves into the science of it all, but behind that, this is a story of two people wondering if moving backwards is easier than moving forwards, and dealing with the consequences of choosing old lives over new ones. My favorite character is introduced 1/3rd of the way through, frozen and stoic, and her arc is just as good as those of the main couple.
I also loved all the depictions of artmaking, the process of painting, and descriptions of the Marfa landscape. The book delves into the science of it all, but behind that, this is a story of two people wondering if moving backwards is easier than moving forwards, and dealing with the consequences of choosing old lives over new ones. My favorite character is introduced 1/3rd of the way through, frozen and stoic, and her arc is just as good as those of the main couple.
November 15, 2025
I really loved the writing style here, and boy -is it a great concept. I love a science fiction book that reads like literary fiction. That’s absolutely this in a nutshell.
But why did this book just absolutely plummet with the pacing in the middle, it just got so slow. And the character motivations were pretty hard to understand.
Will try this author again though!
But why did this book just absolutely plummet with the pacing in the middle, it just got so slow. And the character motivations were pretty hard to understand.
Will try this author again though!
October 28, 2025
Thanks to NetGalley and Riverhead for this advance readers copy, in exchange for an honest review. This speculative fiction novel uses time to travel to explore grief, loss, love, changing relationships and more, through our three main characters, Noah, Maya, and Eileen. Noah and Eileen are still dealing, independently, with the ramifications of the loss of their daughter and subsequent dissolution of their marriage, while Noah is also trying to move forward in his current marriage with Maya.
This book uses the science fiction element of time travel cleverly here and it’s interesting to consider how far Noah will go to return to the past, despite the challenges, dangers, and risks that this novel technology poses. There are lots of questions for the reader to think about here, in considering what it’s worth for Noah to go back, how big of a role grief plays in his life, how he deals with it compared to his ex-wife… I did skim through some of the scientific content/language in this book, related to time travel, but found that it wasn’t an impediment to my reading experience. I was far more interested to be with the characters, in their memories or their present day life, as our omniscient narrator narrates their experiences and thoughts. These scenes gave the book its life in my opinion and were what I was eager to return to. I did find it a bit difficult to connect to the characters or find myself wholly invested in their story. I appreciated what the author was doing with the themes and concepts raised in this novel but, something just didn’t fully click for me, I think maybe because I got swamped down in some of the scientific language/setup in the book or struggled with some of the narrative shifts. But, this might just be down to me as a reader and my preferences.
I think this is still a great book and would recommend it to speculative fiction and literary fiction lovers.
This book uses the science fiction element of time travel cleverly here and it’s interesting to consider how far Noah will go to return to the past, despite the challenges, dangers, and risks that this novel technology poses. There are lots of questions for the reader to think about here, in considering what it’s worth for Noah to go back, how big of a role grief plays in his life, how he deals with it compared to his ex-wife… I did skim through some of the scientific content/language in this book, related to time travel, but found that it wasn’t an impediment to my reading experience. I was far more interested to be with the characters, in their memories or their present day life, as our omniscient narrator narrates their experiences and thoughts. These scenes gave the book its life in my opinion and were what I was eager to return to. I did find it a bit difficult to connect to the characters or find myself wholly invested in their story. I appreciated what the author was doing with the themes and concepts raised in this novel but, something just didn’t fully click for me, I think maybe because I got swamped down in some of the scientific language/setup in the book or struggled with some of the narrative shifts. But, this might just be down to me as a reader and my preferences.
I think this is still a great book and would recommend it to speculative fiction and literary fiction lovers.
November 17, 2025
this novel is labeled fiction, not because of time travel, but because it challenges you to believe that losing a child and being dumped by a hipster are equal hurts.
October 12, 2025
A beautiful, heartbreaking story. This reads as a literary novel but the story is rooted in science fiction. While there is an intense speculative vein to this story, it’s also a deep, compelling character study. I read an eARC of this book on NetGalley so thank you to the author and the publisher.
I had such strong reactions to some of the choices characters were making. Grief is a huge motivator some of the characters. Their loss creating a lens that they can’t see beyond and their miring in the past, destroying their present. I couldn’t bear to watch the self destruction and callousness this created, and yet, I also couldn’t put this book down.
It is so beautifully written. A core theme in this book is art, and the way this is written, certainly pitches the book as a work of art. Imagery is crucial, primarily in the lens of our artist character who is heavily influenced by what’s she sees as she makes the move to Texas to support her husband’s new job.
This was such an intense, fascinating book. I did not expect to be as mesmerised as I was but the book was absolutely gripping. Highly recommend.
I had such strong reactions to some of the choices characters were making. Grief is a huge motivator some of the characters. Their loss creating a lens that they can’t see beyond and their miring in the past, destroying their present. I couldn’t bear to watch the self destruction and callousness this created, and yet, I also couldn’t put this book down.
It is so beautifully written. A core theme in this book is art, and the way this is written, certainly pitches the book as a work of art. Imagery is crucial, primarily in the lens of our artist character who is heavily influenced by what’s she sees as she makes the move to Texas to support her husband’s new job.
This was such an intense, fascinating book. I did not expect to be as mesmerised as I was but the book was absolutely gripping. Highly recommend.
November 11, 2025
I chose Lightbreakers as my November 2025 Book of the Month pick mostly by process of elimination—I wasn’t excited by the other options. Normally, science fiction and time travel are genres I avoid completely, but stories about family dynamics, grief, and child loss are right in my wheelhouse. At its core, that’s exactly what this novel is: an exploration of grief and what it means to move forward after unimaginable loss. On that front, it delivers beautifully. Still, there were other aspects of the book that left me with mixed feelings.
The science side
Noah, one of the novel’s central characters, is a physicist who joins a secretive team researching time travel. There’s a lot of talk about quantum physics—some real, some speculative—and while it’s clear that readers aren’t expected to grasp every concept, that didn’t make those sections any more engaging for me. The scientific jargon reminded me exactly why I tend to avoid sci-fi. I know this is a matter of personal taste, but those passages often felt dense and hard to get through.
The art side
Maya, Noah’s wife, is an artist. You’d think that would provide a kind of counterbalance to all the physics—but for me, it didn’t. Oddly enough, I found her artistic meditations even more highbrow and inaccessible than the scientific ones. Discussions about the meaning of art often feel pretentious to me (especially when you can’t see the artwork being described), and Lightbreakers was no exception. Again, that’s not a flaw in the writing—it’s just an area where my own disinterest made those chapters drag.
The marriage
The pairing of a scientist and an artist is clearly deliberate, meant to show two ways of understanding the world, but I didn’t feel much chemistry between Maya and Noah until the very end. Early on, Noah’s obsession with his research—and his willingness to sacrifice his marriage for it—was frustrating. When he starts “folding” into the past and reconnects with his ex-wife, it felt icky to me, even if it served the story’s metaphor. That said, I did appreciate what Aja Gabel was doing symbolically: Noah’s physical deterioration as he folds deeper into the past mirrors how destructive it can be to live in your grief instead of in the present.
The grief
Everything involving Serena, the daughter Noah and his ex-wife Eileen lost, hit me hard. Gabel captures grief with raw honesty—not just how it devastates the individual, but how it reshapes relationships and isolates people from those who haven’t experienced the same pain. The connection between Noah and Eileen, though complicated, felt tragically real: divorced yet still bound by shared loss. I loved how Maya’s eventual glimpse into their past provides her (and the reader) with a small moment of release. That scene nearly made me cry—it’s where the novel’s emotional power shines brightest.
Final thoughts
Lightbreakers is a slow, emotionally rich meditation on love, loss, and the pull of the past. I found it moving and beautifully written, but also weighed down by long stretches of scientific and artistic theorizing that didn’t hold my interest. Still, the novel’s exploration of grief and connection stayed with me after I closed the book.
Rating: 3.5/5 stars — powerful, thoughtful, but occasionally a slog.
The science side
Noah, one of the novel’s central characters, is a physicist who joins a secretive team researching time travel. There’s a lot of talk about quantum physics—some real, some speculative—and while it’s clear that readers aren’t expected to grasp every concept, that didn’t make those sections any more engaging for me. The scientific jargon reminded me exactly why I tend to avoid sci-fi. I know this is a matter of personal taste, but those passages often felt dense and hard to get through.
The art side
Maya, Noah’s wife, is an artist. You’d think that would provide a kind of counterbalance to all the physics—but for me, it didn’t. Oddly enough, I found her artistic meditations even more highbrow and inaccessible than the scientific ones. Discussions about the meaning of art often feel pretentious to me (especially when you can’t see the artwork being described), and Lightbreakers was no exception. Again, that’s not a flaw in the writing—it’s just an area where my own disinterest made those chapters drag.
The marriage
The pairing of a scientist and an artist is clearly deliberate, meant to show two ways of understanding the world, but I didn’t feel much chemistry between Maya and Noah until the very end. Early on, Noah’s obsession with his research—and his willingness to sacrifice his marriage for it—was frustrating. When he starts “folding” into the past and reconnects with his ex-wife, it felt icky to me, even if it served the story’s metaphor. That said, I did appreciate what Aja Gabel was doing symbolically: Noah’s physical deterioration as he folds deeper into the past mirrors how destructive it can be to live in your grief instead of in the present.
The grief
Everything involving Serena, the daughter Noah and his ex-wife Eileen lost, hit me hard. Gabel captures grief with raw honesty—not just how it devastates the individual, but how it reshapes relationships and isolates people from those who haven’t experienced the same pain. The connection between Noah and Eileen, though complicated, felt tragically real: divorced yet still bound by shared loss. I loved how Maya’s eventual glimpse into their past provides her (and the reader) with a small moment of release. That scene nearly made me cry—it’s where the novel’s emotional power shines brightest.
Final thoughts
Lightbreakers is a slow, emotionally rich meditation on love, loss, and the pull of the past. I found it moving and beautifully written, but also weighed down by long stretches of scientific and artistic theorizing that didn’t hold my interest. Still, the novel’s exploration of grief and connection stayed with me after I closed the book.
Rating: 3.5/5 stars — powerful, thoughtful, but occasionally a slog.
November 14, 2025
Lightbreakers is a deeply interior, deliberately paced examination of a marriage under quiet pressure — and readers should know upfront that this is a slow, emotionally demanding read with a heavy emphasis on internal narrative rather than external action.
The first half is intentionally distant. The prose is cool, observational, and at times almost report-like, which can make it difficult to connect with the characters early on. But that distance is thematically purposeful. Gabel uses detachment to show two people who aren’t inhabiting the same emotional world, and the effect is both unsettling and incredibly realistic.
As the story progresses, the book becomes more emotionally accessible and the narrative choices begin to make sense. The structure relies heavily on internal tension: misalignment, unspoken fears, the weight of memory, and the subtle ways people drift apart without meaning to. The emotional impact, when it arrives, hits hard precisely because of the restraint that precedes it.
Readers should expect:
- a very slow start
- introspective chapters with dense internal monologue
- understated but precise emotional work
- themes of grief, identity, and the difficulty of living in the present
- a narrative that rewards patience rather than momentum
This is not a plot-driven novel, nor is it traditionally “romantic.” It’s thoughtful, controlled, and often painful in its accuracy about long-term relationships. But if you’re willing to sit with it, the book ultimately offers a nuanced, meaningful payoff.
Highly recommended for readers who appreciate character studies, quiet emotional arcs, and novels that examine relationships with honesty rather than dramatics.
The first half is intentionally distant. The prose is cool, observational, and at times almost report-like, which can make it difficult to connect with the characters early on. But that distance is thematically purposeful. Gabel uses detachment to show two people who aren’t inhabiting the same emotional world, and the effect is both unsettling and incredibly realistic.
As the story progresses, the book becomes more emotionally accessible and the narrative choices begin to make sense. The structure relies heavily on internal tension: misalignment, unspoken fears, the weight of memory, and the subtle ways people drift apart without meaning to. The emotional impact, when it arrives, hits hard precisely because of the restraint that precedes it.
Readers should expect:
- a very slow start
- introspective chapters with dense internal monologue
- understated but precise emotional work
- themes of grief, identity, and the difficulty of living in the present
- a narrative that rewards patience rather than momentum
This is not a plot-driven novel, nor is it traditionally “romantic.” It’s thoughtful, controlled, and often painful in its accuracy about long-term relationships. But if you’re willing to sit with it, the book ultimately offers a nuanced, meaningful payoff.
Highly recommended for readers who appreciate character studies, quiet emotional arcs, and novels that examine relationships with honesty rather than dramatics.
November 21, 2025
Damn this was pretty cool and very thought provoking
October 1, 2025
I loved Aja Gabel's debut The Ensemble and was incredibly excited to see that she was coming out with Lightbreakers. What a beautiful, overwhelming, and deeply resonant book.
Content warning: Child loss
Content warning: Child loss
August 14, 2025
This novel is a complicated look at past love, current love and dreams of changing the past.
Maya, an artist, and Noah, a quantum physicist, are married but Noah is privately grieving the loss of his child from his previous marriage. When Noah gets a chance to take part in a scientific experiment traveling back in time, he decides to attempt to change the fate of his child. Through this experiment, his ex-wife, Eileen, becomes a part of his journey which draws the two close again. Maya, feeling rejected and confused, turns to her ex-lover, Ren, who is also an artist.
This novel was well written and each chapter focused on a different character and their perspective which made this an easy and enjoyable to read. The characters made bad decisions and were not flawless, but seeing their struggles brought to light why they were making such bad decisions.
Thank you NetGalley and Riverhead Publishing for the Advanced Reader Copy in exchange for an honest review. #NetGalley #Lightbreakers #Riverhead @Riverhead
Maya, an artist, and Noah, a quantum physicist, are married but Noah is privately grieving the loss of his child from his previous marriage. When Noah gets a chance to take part in a scientific experiment traveling back in time, he decides to attempt to change the fate of his child. Through this experiment, his ex-wife, Eileen, becomes a part of his journey which draws the two close again. Maya, feeling rejected and confused, turns to her ex-lover, Ren, who is also an artist.
This novel was well written and each chapter focused on a different character and their perspective which made this an easy and enjoyable to read. The characters made bad decisions and were not flawless, but seeing their struggles brought to light why they were making such bad decisions.
Thank you NetGalley and Riverhead Publishing for the Advanced Reader Copy in exchange for an honest review. #NetGalley #Lightbreakers #Riverhead @Riverhead
August 9, 2025
I was always excited to pick this book up. It made me feel like I could make beautiful art. The thoughtful exploration of time and love and relationships was soothing and gently challenging. Really lovely.
Content warning: child death
Including this in my review in case I ever go to Japan and don’t have time to search this book for it: Shimokitazawa sounds like a great hang.
Content warning: child death
Including this in my review in case I ever go to Japan and don’t have time to search this book for it: Shimokitazawa sounds like a great hang.
November 13, 2025
3.5*
Lightbreakers is such an emotional and lovely, albeit slower paced, book. I think it was pretty different from what I was expecting- not in a bad way necessarily, just different. The time travel bit was much subtler, almost secondary to the rest of the story. Mainly, it is character driven, focusing heavily on the loss of Noah's daughter, and how it has impacted him, ex-wife Eileen, and current wife Maya. The characters were great, and certainly empathetic, and I could not help but feel deep emotion for their situations. For me personally, I would have probably liked to explore the time travelling piece a bit more, but I don't think that was the point of this story. So that is probably the takeaway here: if you are looking for a really lovely character exploration, this is a great one. If you are looking for more of a sci-fi vibe, this isn't it. But seriously, do come for the characters!
Lightbreakers is such an emotional and lovely, albeit slower paced, book. I think it was pretty different from what I was expecting- not in a bad way necessarily, just different. The time travel bit was much subtler, almost secondary to the rest of the story. Mainly, it is character driven, focusing heavily on the loss of Noah's daughter, and how it has impacted him, ex-wife Eileen, and current wife Maya. The characters were great, and certainly empathetic, and I could not help but feel deep emotion for their situations. For me personally, I would have probably liked to explore the time travelling piece a bit more, but I don't think that was the point of this story. So that is probably the takeaway here: if you are looking for a really lovely character exploration, this is a great one. If you are looking for more of a sci-fi vibe, this isn't it. But seriously, do come for the characters!
November 16, 2025
I don't think this is a bad novel but I found it difficult to get into, and ultimately I felt a bit bored reading it. I also felt déjà vu reading it, it reminded me of Who Wants To Live Forever (Hannah Thomas Uose), read earlier this year: science fiction, one of the main characters is of Japanese descent and returns to Japan, finding the place both familiar and foreign after spending much of their adult life away, there is a lot of focus on the marriage of two characters... In this one, Maya is a Japanese-American artist and curator who is married to Noah, a physicists who gets a job offer from a billionaire, to work in his secretive lab in Texas. There, he finds out that the secret project is time travel, and starts thinking he could go back in time to see his daughter from his first marriage, who died before her fourth birthday.
There's a lot about marriage and secrets, about longing for a child (Noah and his deceased daughter, Maya dreaming of her own unborn child), about relationships and moving on and settling... Aja Gabel put a lot of work into the pseudo science behind the time travel tech and that didn't interest me massively either. It wasn't badly written. Ultimately the themes of grieving for a child and parenthood just don't interest me enough.
Free ARC sent by Netgalley.
There's a lot about marriage and secrets, about longing for a child (Noah and his deceased daughter, Maya dreaming of her own unborn child), about relationships and moving on and settling... Aja Gabel put a lot of work into the pseudo science behind the time travel tech and that didn't interest me massively either. It wasn't badly written. Ultimately the themes of grieving for a child and parenthood just don't interest me enough.
Free ARC sent by Netgalley.
November 21, 2025
I liked this a lot! I struggled a bit in the middle - it just got sort of dull for a chunk. I loved the beginning and I loved the ending. I liked the middle of it, too, but it slowed down a lot.
The topic can be heavy. If you don't like time travel, this obviously won't be the book for you. You've got to love time travel books to enjoy this, in my opinion haha. This was a really heartbreaking and heartwarming story, all at once. When it comes down to it, it's really a story about life with grief. Not just grief that we experience after the death of someone we love, but also grief of unrealized dreams and unexpected changes. It shares this message in a really beautiful way, and I would definitely recommend!
The topic can be heavy. If you don't like time travel, this obviously won't be the book for you. You've got to love time travel books to enjoy this, in my opinion haha. This was a really heartbreaking and heartwarming story, all at once. When it comes down to it, it's really a story about life with grief. Not just grief that we experience after the death of someone we love, but also grief of unrealized dreams and unexpected changes. It shares this message in a really beautiful way, and I would definitely recommend!
November 24, 2025
Lightbreakers is a sweet look at how our pasts drive our future and the lengths we might go to in order to prevent trauma. This book had all the right elements for me - a farfetched concept serving as the backdrop for a story that is actually about human relationships - but I found the details distracting and the characters difficult to connect with.
November 16, 2025
Beautifully written, but this is more litfic about love and loss whereas I wanted more "time travel."
November 18, 2025
This book felt like the author was trying too hard.
November 24, 2025
DNF- I am so bored. I cannot go on.
November 14, 2025
Unfortunately this was kind of a miss for me. I was really interested in the premise: egotistical and eccentric tech billionaire, time travel, grief. It just didn’t deliver in the way I hoped it would. I never felt a connection to any of the characters so I didn’t feel the emotions that were being expressed. The scientific parts confused me more than they added to the story. I can see how someone else might enjoy this which is why it didn’t get a lower rating. I just didn’t “get” it.
November 2, 2025
I enjoyed Aja Gabel's previous novel, The Ensemble, and was excited to receive an early copy of her new one. This book was not at all what I expected, and I really loved it. This is easily one of my favorite books I've read this year.
This is not an easy book. There is so much raw emotion, and it really moved me and made my heart ache. I loved the writing, it was very compelling and I never wanted to put it down.
I loved both Noah and Maya, and also the side characters. I feel like they were all truly doing the best they could, at that moment, and while I wouldn't make some of the choices they made I really understood them.
I loved the setting of Marfa, and the parts in Japan. The descriptions were so vivid, I could picture all of it. I also really loved all the parts about the art world, and the descriptions of the artist experience.
I would recommend this to anyone who likes literary fiction and isn't afraid to have their heartbroken while reading. I cannot wait to read more by Aja Gabel!
Thank you to NetGalley for the advanced copy of this book!
This is not an easy book. There is so much raw emotion, and it really moved me and made my heart ache. I loved the writing, it was very compelling and I never wanted to put it down.
I loved both Noah and Maya, and also the side characters. I feel like they were all truly doing the best they could, at that moment, and while I wouldn't make some of the choices they made I really understood them.
I loved the setting of Marfa, and the parts in Japan. The descriptions were so vivid, I could picture all of it. I also really loved all the parts about the art world, and the descriptions of the artist experience.
I would recommend this to anyone who likes literary fiction and isn't afraid to have their heartbroken while reading. I cannot wait to read more by Aja Gabel!
Thank you to NetGalley for the advanced copy of this book!
November 11, 2025
I have read time travel and sci fi books and enjoyed them so I thought this book would be interesting and selected it for my BOTM. What a disappointment. The storytelling was choppy, I disliked the characters and their relationship and therefore did not experience any emotion other than annoyance and anxiously awaiting the ending. I did finish the book so I gave it 2 stars for completion but I believe that if you finish this book, you are more deserving of the stars and should treat yourself to a new book as a reward.
November 18, 2025
This was a book that halfway through I was literally thinking, “wait I think I hate this….” Yes, the writing itself is beautiful, but whew, this book? It was a ride I couldn’t get off fast enough.
I wanted this to be a metaphysical, parallel-universe-meets-grief story. I was fully ready for a mind-bending twist where we learn they cracked causality or were on different timelines, something that connected the grief to the sci-fi. But nope. Turns out this is really just a grief novel with a light dusting of science fiction that never actually goes anywhere.
And don’t get me wrong, I cannot begin to understand the grief of losing a child. Noah and Eileen’s pain over losing Serena is unimaginable, and I won’t pretend to relate. But I also don’t think this book handled that grief in a way that felt real or layered. The way Noah shuts down and repeatedly refuses to let Maya into his grief because she “never knew Serena and never would” only highlights how emotionally flimsy their marriage is. It feels like he never fully wanted to let her in at all.
Then there’s Maya, she wants to help, wants to connect, but instead it kind of feels like she’s trying to force a forward path on her terms. Her repeated pushing for them to have a baby, even at the worst possible moments, doesn’t read like hopeful future planning. It reads like she wants to “fix” things by filling a void she didn’t create. And instead of having that hard, honest dialogue? They both just quietly drift in opposite directions.
Which brings me to what was maybe the most frustrating part for me: the whole exes arc. Noah literally brings his ex-wife Eileen (Serena’s mom) into his new isolated life on this compound to show her the time-travel tech, before we ever see him really open up emotionally to Maya, the person he’s actually married to. And Maya goes home and reconnects with Ren, the ex who shattered her emotionally years ago, and then he basically admits he didn’t think their long-term, living-together relationship was serious… um, excuse me?
They both run back to their exes, not out of complex longing or grief confusion, but honestly just because things got tough and the story wanted some quick emotional chaos. And then? Just as quickly, they both go, “Wait I want my spouse again.” And the exes back off without any meaningful fallout. It’s like none of it mattered.
Meanwhile, the time-travel plot? Cool in theory. But also, basically a Blake Crouch mashup (Dark Matter and Recursion) without the depth. Noah gets in a fancy sci-fi bath, sees memories, doesn’t change anything (because they never figure out causality), then blows everything up. No consequences. No tension. No real purpose. Just vibes. It totally felt like a subplot that could have delivered something incredible… but just sat there while the book tried to be a marriage drama instead.
There are lines that absolutely destroyed me in a good way, reflections on identity, parents having lives before us, how grief rewires your sense of self. That’s why this isn’t a 1-star review. Because Aja Gabel can write. I would genuinely read her again with a different plot and maybe if someone else came up with the story for her... that’s actually original…
But this story? It tried to be two different books - a literary grief novel and a speculative sci-fi, and neither got the depth, clarity, or resolution they deserved. I kept waiting for “the moment” where it all clicked and paid off. It never came.
I wanted this to be a metaphysical, parallel-universe-meets-grief story. I was fully ready for a mind-bending twist where we learn they cracked causality or were on different timelines, something that connected the grief to the sci-fi. But nope. Turns out this is really just a grief novel with a light dusting of science fiction that never actually goes anywhere.
And don’t get me wrong, I cannot begin to understand the grief of losing a child. Noah and Eileen’s pain over losing Serena is unimaginable, and I won’t pretend to relate. But I also don’t think this book handled that grief in a way that felt real or layered. The way Noah shuts down and repeatedly refuses to let Maya into his grief because she “never knew Serena and never would” only highlights how emotionally flimsy their marriage is. It feels like he never fully wanted to let her in at all.
Then there’s Maya, she wants to help, wants to connect, but instead it kind of feels like she’s trying to force a forward path on her terms. Her repeated pushing for them to have a baby, even at the worst possible moments, doesn’t read like hopeful future planning. It reads like she wants to “fix” things by filling a void she didn’t create. And instead of having that hard, honest dialogue? They both just quietly drift in opposite directions.
Which brings me to what was maybe the most frustrating part for me: the whole exes arc. Noah literally brings his ex-wife Eileen (Serena’s mom) into his new isolated life on this compound to show her the time-travel tech, before we ever see him really open up emotionally to Maya, the person he’s actually married to. And Maya goes home and reconnects with Ren, the ex who shattered her emotionally years ago, and then he basically admits he didn’t think their long-term, living-together relationship was serious… um, excuse me?
They both run back to their exes, not out of complex longing or grief confusion, but honestly just because things got tough and the story wanted some quick emotional chaos. And then? Just as quickly, they both go, “Wait I want my spouse again.” And the exes back off without any meaningful fallout. It’s like none of it mattered.
Meanwhile, the time-travel plot? Cool in theory. But also, basically a Blake Crouch mashup (Dark Matter and Recursion) without the depth. Noah gets in a fancy sci-fi bath, sees memories, doesn’t change anything (because they never figure out causality), then blows everything up. No consequences. No tension. No real purpose. Just vibes. It totally felt like a subplot that could have delivered something incredible… but just sat there while the book tried to be a marriage drama instead.
There are lines that absolutely destroyed me in a good way, reflections on identity, parents having lives before us, how grief rewires your sense of self. That’s why this isn’t a 1-star review. Because Aja Gabel can write. I would genuinely read her again with a different plot and maybe if someone else came up with the story for her... that’s actually original…
But this story? It tried to be two different books - a literary grief novel and a speculative sci-fi, and neither got the depth, clarity, or resolution they deserved. I kept waiting for “the moment” where it all clicked and paid off. It never came.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
November 16, 2025
*Spoiler*
A great concept that couldn't quite stick the landing.
Lightbreakers presents a truly compelling premise: a quantum physicist, Noah, is given the opportunity to revisit his memories through a mysterious time-travel experiment, all motivated by his profound grief over the loss of his daughter, Serena. The core concepts surrounding time, grief, and the intersection of science and memory are genuinely fascinating, and what initially drew me into the book.
Unfortunately, despite the strong foundation, the execution felt inconsistent, leaving me with a sense of unmet expectation.
The biggest sticking point was the pacing and the focus of the "time travel." While the exploration of how deeply the past affects the present is a clear theme (and one that felt thematically similar to books like Before the Coffee Gets Cold), I was hoping for more narrative payoff. The process of entering the memories often felt choppy, and the reliving of moments, while emotional, grew frustrating because the characters, Noah in particular, were never truly able to act. I kept waiting for a major development or a pivot point, and even when Noah attempts a big change toward the end, the ultimate result confirms the premise: the past remains immutable.
While I appreciated the ambition of the quantum mechanics and physics ideas, they sometimes felt underdeveloped or went over my head, making it difficult to fully grasp the stakes of the Janus Project.
Furthermore, Maya’s parallel storyline, her own journey to Japan and reconnection with an ex-lover, was a bit tedious. While it was clearly intended to mirror Noah's fixation on his past, I struggled to connect with her emotional arc or her struggles as an artist, which made skimming some of those chapters tempting.
In the end, Lightbreakers feels like a profound meditation on grief and memory rather than the thrilling sci-fi narrative I was expecting. It's a beautifully written book with a stellar concept, but the overall pacing and lack of significant plot movement meant I finished it feeling disappointed.
Rating: 2.5 / 5 Stars
A great concept that couldn't quite stick the landing.
Lightbreakers presents a truly compelling premise: a quantum physicist, Noah, is given the opportunity to revisit his memories through a mysterious time-travel experiment, all motivated by his profound grief over the loss of his daughter, Serena. The core concepts surrounding time, grief, and the intersection of science and memory are genuinely fascinating, and what initially drew me into the book.
Unfortunately, despite the strong foundation, the execution felt inconsistent, leaving me with a sense of unmet expectation.
The biggest sticking point was the pacing and the focus of the "time travel." While the exploration of how deeply the past affects the present is a clear theme (and one that felt thematically similar to books like Before the Coffee Gets Cold), I was hoping for more narrative payoff. The process of entering the memories often felt choppy, and the reliving of moments, while emotional, grew frustrating because the characters, Noah in particular, were never truly able to act. I kept waiting for a major development or a pivot point, and even when Noah attempts a big change toward the end, the ultimate result confirms the premise: the past remains immutable.
While I appreciated the ambition of the quantum mechanics and physics ideas, they sometimes felt underdeveloped or went over my head, making it difficult to fully grasp the stakes of the Janus Project.
Furthermore, Maya’s parallel storyline, her own journey to Japan and reconnection with an ex-lover, was a bit tedious. While it was clearly intended to mirror Noah's fixation on his past, I struggled to connect with her emotional arc or her struggles as an artist, which made skimming some of those chapters tempting.
In the end, Lightbreakers feels like a profound meditation on grief and memory rather than the thrilling sci-fi narrative I was expecting. It's a beautifully written book with a stellar concept, but the overall pacing and lack of significant plot movement meant I finished it feeling disappointed.
Rating: 2.5 / 5 Stars
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