In Langfeld’s SF novel, governments, secret agents, and an ancient alien traveling the cosmos circle a teenage boy in 21st-century Britain who seems immune to the passage of time.

The story begins in the 2030s. Tom Wright is a London schoolboy with a remarkable trait, at first known only to his twin brother/confidant, Alex—Tom can partake in “the Dive,” a condition in which his body goes on autopilot while, to his conscious mind, little apparent time passes. In this mode, Tom wins marathon races, remains underwater for protracted periods, abstains from nourishment, and performs other impossible feats of endurance. School psychologist Saskia initially dismisses Tom’s accounts as lies. She chances into a job with the U.K. diplomatic service and maintains casual contact with Tom. As the nonathletic Tom trains with Russian Olympians and Oxford rowing clubs, his anomalous talent comes to the attention of the military, the espionage community, and medical institutions. Tests prove that Tom is actually somehow removing himself from the flow of time during the Dive and thus could be theoretically immortal. Additionally, while in the Dive he’s had visions of an otherworldly female figure called Thumee, who has “bronze skin, copper hair and golden irises in otherwise red eyes” and declares that she’s coming for him. Thumee is a 42,000-year-old humanoid, part of a group whose longevity enables them to traverse interstellar distances and, occasionally, genetically seed more of themselves. Tom is their Earth progeny, and one who has gone overlooked—until now. In this inaugural volume of Langfeld’s Kindred of Old trilogy, the author matter-of-factly and convincingly depicts the international turmoil that might erupt with the emergence of a physiological/philosophical miracle such as Tom. The narrative takes a few curious tangents (including the establishment of the “Life-Is-Everything” activist group, Saskia’s love affair with a Life-Is-Everything member, and the widespread adoption of AI by the U.N. and the U.K.), but these threads come together satisfyingly in the open-ended finale. Langfeld’s measured, literate storytelling adds a few intriguing new wrinkles and a fresh approach to themes that SF yarn-spinners have tackled at least since Mary Shelley’s “The Mortal Immortal” in 1833.

A civilized SF take on the much-revisited theme of immortality.