The Book of All Hours
#8253.45 adjusted 3.58 for sample size in the official ranking · full ranking
Books 2 books Status Complete 2005–2007 Reading commitment Low Hal Duncan Last reviewed 2026-08-11
Overview
The Book of All Hours is a genre-boundary-pushing duology by Hal Duncan, comprising Vellum (2005) and Ink (2007). It follows a queer ensemble cast of angels, gods, and humans across countless parallel, unbound realities collectively known as the vellum, as a slow-building war breaks out between the Cabal, a bureaucratic order of angels who police and rewrite the vellum's texts to keep reality stable, and the unbound, a growing faction who see that control as tyranny and want the freedom to remake the world themselves. Duncan draws on Sumerian, Christian, and classical mythology simultaneously, treating gods and angels as characters who exist across many different retellings of themselves at once, and structures the narrative in fragmented, non-linear pieces that mirror the vellum's own instability. The duology's ambitious scope and dense, experimental prose made it a distinctive entry in mid-2000s fantasy, admired for its formal risk-taking as much as its mythological range.
New Weird · For Adult
Core Canon: Reading Order (2 works) counts toward ranking
The Book of All Hours Hal Duncan
| Work | Year | Internal chron. | Canon | Rating | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
 | Vellum | 2005 | 1 | core | 3.32 (2,139 ratings) |
 | Ink | 2007 | 2 | core | 3.83 (752 ratings) |
Completed duology (2005-2007).
Quick answers
- How many books are in The Book of All Hours? The Book of All Hours's Core Canon is 2 books.
- What is the reading order for The Book of All Hours? Publication order, starting with Vellum. Full list and years in the Core Canon table above.
- Is The Book of All Hours finished? Complete (2005–2007).
- How much reading does The Book of All Hours take? Low reading commitment (estimated from 2 Core Canon books · ~1,010 pages).
- How is The Book of All Hours ranked? #825 in this site's official ranking, based on 2,891 reader ratings across 2 Core Canon books. See the full ranking for how this is calculated.
Why is it ranked #825?
Ranked #825 in the official ranking.
- Average reader rating of 3.45 across 2 core books.
- A smaller readership (2,891 ratings), so the score carries less weight of numbers.
- Uneven reception: its books range from 3.32 to 3.83.
- 0.12 behind #824, Faebound.
- Below the top-10 average of 4.45.
Why explore this universe?
Modestly rated · 2 books · Complete · 3k ratings · Ranks #825 overall
Good choice if you want a quick, low-commitment New Weird universe that's already finished, so there's no wait for the next book.
Reading order
Publication order (2 Core Canon books)
- Vellum (2005)
- Ink (2007)
Documented internal/story chronology is recorded for every Core Canon book here, and matches publication order exactly, with no divergence to show separately.
Awards (verified)
- World Fantasy Award (Best Novel), 2006: nominated: Vellum
- Locus Award (Best First Novel), 2006: nominated: Vellum
- Gaylactic Spectrum Award (Best Novel), 2006: won: Vellum; Single-sourced (Wikipedia only), see CONF note.
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Suggestions computed from what The Book of All Hours and each of these worlds have in common on record (subgenre, audience, shape, reading commitment and score), not a documented narrative connection.
- The Endsong New Weird / Dark fantasy · Ongoing · Low commitment · 3.65
- Osama Dark fantasy / New Weird · Complete · Low commitment · 3.47
- The Locked Tomb Dark fantasy / New Weird · Ongoing · Medium commitment · 4.23
- The Lord of the Ice Garden Epic fantasy / New Weird · Complete · Medium commitment · 4.20
Official resources
Research details
Ranking metrics: weighted average 3.45 across 2,891 ratings on 2 Core Canon books. See Why is it ranked here? above for the full breakdown, or the full ranking.
How do we know this?
Admission: Admit The Book of All Hours (Vellum / Ink, Hal Duncan) as a new single-author universe accepted 2026-08-11
Sources: (see source tier definitions)
- Wikipedia: Hal Duncan Tier 2
Last reviewed: 2026-08-11
Rule: Core = the completed 2-novel duology (Vellum 2005; Ink 2007).