A review by louisekf
Notes on Infinity by Austin Taylor

challenging emotional informative sad medium-paced
  • Plot- or character-driven? A mix
  • Strong character development? Yes
  • Loveable characters? No
  • Diverse cast of characters? Yes
  • Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes

3.25

 Notes on Infinity is a debut novel from Austin Taylor that is getting a lot of hype. If you don’t mind a lot of scientific jargon, this book may work better for you than it did for me. I wound up kind of breezing through the science stuff and letting it go over my head a bit, and that seemed to work out well, allowing me to focus more on the actual story. Having access to the audiobook version helped with that too, somehow. (Thank you, Celadon Books for both the hardcover, the ebook and the audiobook versions, as part of their Read Together program!) 
 
Zoe and Jack meet as undergrads at Harvard; they are both gifted chemistry students. They wind up working together on an anti-aging drug as a secret project, ostensibly working under a mostly-retired professor, but really working on their own. They decide to drop out of Harvard to create a biotech startup, which gets a ton of interest from investors. 
 
This is being compared to Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow, but I loved that book and didn’t love this one. On the surface, we have similar situations: two college students working together and forming a startup company, with a third student friend joining in. That book also highlights misogyny in the STEM field. But I think that’s really the only similarities. This story is extremely reminiscent of the Elizabeth Holmes/Theranos story and takes place at virtually the same time (mid-2010s). 
 
There is SO much science and SO much Harvard. (I get it; the author went to Harvard!) I enjoyed the middle sections of the book the most. The beginning dragged for me (science talk!) and the end kind of felt rushed. And I never got really invested in any of the main characters (Zoe, Jack and Carter). 
 
The audiobook narrators (Helen Laser and Shahjehan Khan) were quite good. We finally get some chapters from Jack’s POV near the end of the book and that’s when we hear Khan. 
 
Thank you to Celadon Books and NetGalley for the opportunity to read an advance readers copy and listen to an advance listeners copy of this book. All opinions are my own. 
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