Books like The plot to save Socrates by Paul Levinson

In 2042, Sierra, a graduate student in Classics, encounters a freshly discovered dialogue of Socrates that includes a time traveler proposing that the great philosopher could escape death by journeying to the future. The elderly scholar Thomas—who first shows her the manuscript—disappears, compelling Sierra, with her boyfriend Max, to uncover the provenance of the document. Their investigation leads them to a time machine hidden in a gentlemen’s club in London, then to New York, and ultimately into the past, where a future time traveler impersonates Heron of Alexandria in 150 AD. As Sierra navigates time loops and shifting realities, she must discern who intends to rescue Socrates—or whether she herself is the instrument. The narrative weaves historical figures such as Alcibiades and 19th‑century publisher William Henry Appleton alongside Socrates, presenting a tangled web of mystery, adventure, and philosophical inquiry that explores the paradoxes of time travel.

First publish date: 2006