Notes on Infinity

A Novel

by Austin Taylor

ebook

0 of 1 copy available

Wait time: About 2 weeks

Place a hold Read a sample Read a sample

0 of 1 copy available

Wait time: About 2 weeks

A Zibby Owens "Summer Read" * A Jordy's Book Club "Most Anticipated Book of 2025" * An Oprah Daily "Best Summer Reads"
"It stole my breath and my heart. It's a grand story of science and startups, and a simple story of first love and belonging." ―Chris Whitaker, author of All the Colors of the Dark and We Begin at the End
A singular, extraordinary debut about Zoe and Jack, Harvard students who find themselves propelled into the intoxicating biotech startup world when they announce they've discovered the cure for aging. A different kind of love story where the thirst for achievement consumes and the stakes are forever.
Zoe, the daughter of an MIT professor who grew up in her brother's shadow, can envision her future anew at Harvard. Jack, a boy in Zoe's organic chemistry class with unruly hair and a gleam of competitiveness, matches her intellect and curiosity with every breath. When Jack refers Zoe for a position in a prestigious professor's lab, the two become entwined as colleagues, staying up late to discuss scientific ideas. They find themselves on the cusp of a breakthrough: the promise of immortality through a novel antiaging drug.
Zoe and Jack set off on their new project in secret. Finding encouraging results, they bring their work to an investor, drop out of Harvard, and form a startup. But after the money, the magazine covers, and the national news stories detailing their success, Zoe and Jack receive a startling accusation that threatens to destroy both the company they built and their partnership.
A captivating novel about young love, the allure of immortality, and the recklessness that can come with early success, Notes on Infinity asks: How far would you go to achieve your dreams?

Creators
- Austin Taylor
  
  Author
Publisher

Celadon Books
Release date

June 3, 2025
Formats
- Kindle Book
- OverDrive Read
  - ISBN: 9781250376114
- EPUB ebook
  - ISBN: 9781250376114
  - File size: 3942 KB
Accessibility
Publisher statement (EPUB)
The publisher provides the following statement about the accessibility of the EPUB file supplied to OverDrive. Experiences may vary across reading systems. After borrowing the book, you may download the EPUB files to read in another reading system.
Ways Of Reading
- No information about appearance modifiability is available.
- Not all of the content will be readable as read aloud speech or dynamic braille.
Conformance
- No information is available.
Languages
- English
Reviews
- Library Journal
  
  January 1, 2025
  Harvard alum Taylor pens a debut about Zoe and Jack, Harvard students who create an antiaging drug and find themselves in the biotech startup world. Then an accusation threatens to destroy the company--and their partnership. With a 200K-copy first printing. Prepub Alert.
  Copyright 2025 Library Journal
  
  Copyright 2025 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.
- School Library Journal
  
  March 14, 2025
  This novel reads like a narrative alternative to Elizabeth Holmes's story with Theranos. The story is thick with biotech influence and East Coast academia references, as it follows two young Harvard students who boldly go out on their own with a theory to defy aging cells. The rotating points of view between Zoe and Jack allows readers to get to know who these characters were before they became partners, in so many senses of the word. The quick rise of Zoe and Jack's idea and later company sets up opportunities for a higher fall. The lengthy read and complex relationships, combined with the niche East Coast academia references, will likely be a challenge for readers who are just generally interested in the topic or idea. Though all content is appropriate for teen readers, there are instances of drug abuse, physical abuse, and suicide that some readers may want to be warned about. VERDICT Unless titles like John Carreyrou's Bad Blood or scientific memoirs are hot commodities in your library, this is one to pass on.-Samantha Hull
  
  Copyright 2025 School Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.
- Booklist
  
  May 1, 2025
  Zoe is a brilliant Harvard student studying chemistry and trying desperately to earn the same validation that her father, an academic, lavishes on her older brother. She sees an opportunity for greatness in enigmatic Jake, who seems brilliant, driven, and completely unbothered by the unwritten rules of Harvard's hallowed halls. Together, they become a nearly unstoppable team in their development of a pharmaceutical that could stop cellular aging, essentially the fountain of youth in a pill. With a trajectory that echoes that of Elizabeth Holmes' Theranos, Taylor's debut provides an insider's glimpse into the high-stakes Ivy League climate and the potentially devastating personal consequences for those caught up in ambition beyond their abilities. Zoe and Jake, both barely out of their teens, find themselves adrift and out of control in a dangerous house of cards of their own creation. The novel's focus is the breakneck pace of Zoe and Jake's success, leaving character development to play catch-up. This will interest readers who enjoy heady tales of academia and ambition or novels that delve into the underbelly of scam science.
  COPYRIGHT(2025) Booklist, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.
- Kirkus
  
  June 1, 2025
  Two Harvard sophomores rise to dizzying heights when they develop an antiaging drug. The brainy daughter of an MIT professor, Zoe gets distracted in her organic chemistry class by a very smart, unruly-looking boy named Jack. "Zoe found herself preparing the most esoteric theoretical questions to ask during lecture and familiarizing herself with the most esoteric experimental applications that she knew Jack would ask about so she could ask a follow-up question as though his initial questions had been common knowledge." There's a great deal of science talk in Taylor's debut; an afterword documents how far the author has gone to create a fascinating concept that is as close to real as possible. (Another reality-adjacent aspect is the seeming parallel to the story of biotechnology entrepreneur Elizabeth Holmes and her company Theranos.) Jack helps Zoe get a spot in the lab of an eminent professor who's working on an antiaging drug, but when she has an insight that could revolutionize the whole process, the two split off and begin working on their own, eventually dropping out of Harvard and getting venture capital funding to develop a drug called Manna. A TED talk, aVogue feature, a Porsche, and other markers of contemporary fame and fortune follow. Along the way, one of Jack's roommates, a computer science major named Carter, joins the team, and though it's clear that Jack and Zoe are meant to be together, Zoe moves in with Carter. The "young geniuses with a love triangle and a startup" aspect gives the narrativeTomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow vibes, but the novel suffers from problems with pacing that undercut its emotional impact. The first half proceeds at a languorous rate, building the story from Zoe's perspective, then hits an inflection point and retells the whole thing from Jack's point of view, filling in his missing backstory. After returning to the climax, it races through a hasty endgame that is not as moving as it should be, and references to theEpic of Gilgamesh don't help. A convincing portrayal of the hothouse collegiate environment in the sciences by an author with exciting potential.
  COPYRIGHT(2025) Kirkus Reviews, ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.