My friend and colleague here at SFFWorld Mark reviewed The Everlasting in October.
Once again, Alix E. Harrow has given readers a novel that has, at its cornerstone, the power of story. While her previous novels had story as a component, The Everlasting is the driving force for the characters, the world, and the history. It is a fantasy novel involving time travel with echoes of the Arthurian myth. The Everlasting of the title is Una, a Lady Knight (with both Arthurian and Joan of Arc echoes) whose story sets the foundation for a nation. But history has a way of being blurred by time.
Sir Una Everlasting was Dominion’s greatest hero: the orphaned girl who became a knight, who died for queen and country. Her legend lives on in songs and stories, in children’s books and recruiting posters—but her life as it truly happened has been forgotten.
Centuries later, Owen Mallory—failed soldier, struggling scholar—falls in love with the tale of Una Everlasting. Her story takes him to war, to the archives—and then into the past itself. Una and Owen are tangled together in time, bound to retell the same story over and over again, no matter what it costs.
But that story always ends the same way. If they want to rewrite Una’s legend—if they want to tell a different story—they’ll have to rewrite history itself.
Owen Mallory is a scholar, a historian who has made his primary area of study the legend of Una Everlasting, a woman whose knighthood has become a historical pillar for the nation of the Dominion. Like many historical figures of high import, the truth of Una’s life has become unclear. What was real? What has grown beyond fact into myth? Whatever is the truth, the Dominion bases its existence, justifies its society on the “sacrifice” Una made in unifying the lands about 1,000 years before the “current” time of the novel.
Through a mythical book that turns out to be real, Owen is able to go back through time and meet Una, chronicle the events of her life with accuracy. His admiration for Una becomes even more powerful once he meets the lady knight, love from afar becomes love in person. But Owen has a problem (a similar problem to our old friend Marty McFly*) in that he knows how events are supposed to transpire. He knows how and when Una will die.
Una, for her part, is weary when Owen first meets her. She wants to pack it and retire from knight life, being the Queen’s charge has taken its toll on Una. But even knowing this last mission she must undertake will see the end of her life, Owen must encourage and convince her to retrieve the Grail, to cure the Queen and restore vitality to the unified nations.
Carrying this compelling story is Harrow’s lovely prose, which acts as a comforting blanket that you know took skill and effort to craft. The story is more than just a gender-flipped King Arthur story. Of course those echoes are present, but heroism, love, avarice, addiction to power, and love are part of the story, too. Owen and Una are the hearts of this story and their hearts are connected. But there are two additional characters who form help to flesh out the story: Queen Yvanne from Una’s timeline and the ambitious Chancellor Vivian Rolfe from Owen’s time. Both powerful women push and drive our heroes (Yvanne pushing Una; Vivan pushing Owen) in order to ensure the sanctity of the land. Or so they say, because there’s one very important thing we should all remember about people in power – they are willing to go to great lengths to ensure they retain that power.
It isn’t often that time travel is present in a fantasy story (the only one that immediately comes to mind is D.B. Jackson’s Islevale Cycle), but Harrow doesn’t seem to care. The way Harrow utilizes the trope in such a brilliant way as if to say, why wouldn’t somebody use time travel in a fantasy story. Well, probably because few authors had the storytelling chops to pull it off so elegantly. In some ways, the time travel is analogous to being a writer, being a storyteller. How many drafts does a writer go through before they get to the version that is published? How many times is history retold before it becomes the accepted version?
If it isn’t clear by this point, I loved this novel. The story was addictive, the “easter eggs” (like Owen Mallory sharing his name with one of the foremost purveyors of Arthurian myth) were pleasing, the characters were incredible, the themes insightful, and the story was just plain fun. Every novel I’ve read by Harrow has been a highlight of the year for me and The Everlasting is no exception. It is one of those novels that is deceptively simple in how it reads because it is a freaking addictive novel, but you know Harrow put her heart and time into this one.
If you aren’t reading Alix E. Harrow and consider yourself a fan of fantasy and great storytelling, what are you waiting for? Jump into The Everlasting, you will not regret it.
Highly recommended
© 2025 Rob H. Bedford
Tor Books | Hardcover (Deluxe Edition)
October 2025 | 320 pages
https://alixeharrow.wixsite.com/
Excerpt: https://reactormag.com/excerpts-the-everlasting-by-alix-e-harrow-prologue-and-chapter-1/
Review copy courtesy of the publisher
*As it so happens, when I was writing up my review Back to the Future III was on my TV. Then again, one of those movies seems to be on fairly frequently with the 40th anniversary of the first film being this year (2025)
