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bernie13's review against another edition
1.0
DNF at 250 ish pages. This book is so hard to get through I couldn’t tell you what is going on at any point in the book.
spinstah's review against another edition
I got about a quarter of the way through this and just kind of lost interest. There’s a point where a lot of things start happening and there’s not quite enough explanation for me, at least so far. I also am not particularly interested in the mystery that’s (somewhat) set up before that point so there was no real driver for me to keep going.
edward528's review
5.0
Rich, wonderful (as in ‘full of wonder’), challenging, well-written. I kept thinking about it for a long time after I had finished reading it (twice), which is always a good sign.
hebo1987's review against another edition
4.0
Kommer nog ta ett tag att smälta, vissa delar extremt vackra, vissa delar läskiga och andra delar lite långtråkiga. Intressanta karaktärer som verkligen är mångdimensionella. Stark 4 som med fördel läses så sammanhängande som möjligt.
lavoiture's review against another edition
3.0
Absolutely about 250 pages too long.
3 stars because I finished it, but I'm not even sure what happened at the end.
3 stars because I finished it, but I'm not even sure what happened at the end.
mthyrring's review against another edition
adventurous
challenging
dark
emotional
mysterious
medium-paced
4.75
posthumusly's review against another edition
2.0
I did not like this book. I found the characters to be extremely flat without any personality. The writing was sometimes lovely, but the plot and book as a whole felt fuzzy and confusing.
zoevancauwenberg's review against another edition
4.0
What a strange tale.
If you’re up for a wild and slightly bizarre journey that combines fantasy and mystery, you’ll be in for a treat with this one.
This is a story where you continuously loose your footing. I couldn’t quite get a handle on the world and its cast of characters. And this sense of unease works incredibly well with this book. It was confusing and at times unsettling, but the story moved along and the various plot elements came together quite nicely and in surprising ways. The advocacy for libraries was wonderful and I kind of wish I could get my hands on Taryn’s book. Those bits and pieces about libraries and the discussion on transmission of books reminded me of the importance of simply keeping (or hoarding) books, just for the sake of it. As Knox writes, “an unhoused book is doomed”. So let’s hug our beloved volumes close to our chest and cherish them.
If you’re up for a wild and slightly bizarre journey that combines fantasy and mystery, you’ll be in for a treat with this one.
This is a story where you continuously loose your footing. I couldn’t quite get a handle on the world and its cast of characters. And this sense of unease works incredibly well with this book. It was confusing and at times unsettling, but the story moved along and the various plot elements came together quite nicely and in surprising ways. The advocacy for libraries was wonderful and I kind of wish I could get my hands on Taryn’s book. Those bits and pieces about libraries and the discussion on transmission of books reminded me of the importance of simply keeping (or hoarding) books, just for the sake of it. As Knox writes, “an unhoused book is doomed”. So let’s hug our beloved volumes close to our chest and cherish them.
tlindhorst's review against another edition
3.0
This book flows from modern day crime drama to fantasy to morality play. It is like being in a fast car where the driver is shouting out what’s passing but never tells you where you’re going. There were many things I liked about this book, but it also felt like important initial storylines disappeared. By the end, I had lost the plot and wasn’t sure why the story ended up where it went.
mifterkim's review against another edition
3.0
This book was certainly a thing that I now have read!
I don't regret reading it and there were parts I really liked, but I'm still not sure what was going on.
It is about books (which I'm a sucker for) and the Fae (also one of my favourite subjects) but it's also about grief, and murder, and contract killing, and whether contract killing is worse than murder, and gods (lots of them) and magic and the police and government and celebrity and incarceration and memory and sisterhood and ultimately environmentalism. And lots more. That is too many themes!
The tone and plot is also all over the place. It's a book that wears its influences on its sleeve, both those explicitly mentioned (the Da Vinci Code, Kate Mosse's Labyrinth) and those alluded to but not named for unknown reasons (The Lord of the Rings films, Game of Thrones). The tone of the book veers wildly between these types of books - it's a thriller and a mystery, then a fairy tale, with fantasy action peppered in, and some extremely harrowing kidnapping and violence thrown in as well. There are so many other influences and plot threads as well. So many. The book I would most compare it to is Neil Gaiman's American Gods, which is also an obvious but unstated influence.
The book starts really slowly, lasts a long time and then goes at absolute breakneck speed to catch up with itself at the end.
There were a lot of pieces of plot that I thought were going nowhere until the last few pages of the book, at which point everything gets resolved extremely rapidly with little satisfaction for the reader. Although there is a little piece of revelatory backstory that gets introduced, for the first time, near the very end and is never mentioned again.
There really are some lovely scenes and descriptions and a lot of it was enjoyable to read, but it was so scattered and unfocussed that I just could not like it. Also, there are some truly interminable sequences near the beginning about a book tour. The book tour, and how good the main character's book is, did not need to be in there. The time spent on that, and some other mundanities near the beginning, compared to the very little time spent wrapping up the actual plot, is very strange.
I can't honestly recommend this book but if, like me, you tend to read any book about books, you will probably read it anyway. You might not be wasting your time? I'm really still not sure.
I don't regret reading it and there were parts I really liked, but I'm still not sure what was going on.
It is about books (which I'm a sucker for) and the Fae (also one of my favourite subjects) but it's also about grief, and murder, and contract killing, and whether contract killing is worse than murder, and gods (lots of them) and magic and the police and government and celebrity and incarceration and memory and sisterhood and ultimately environmentalism. And lots more. That is too many themes!
The tone and plot is also all over the place. It's a book that wears its influences on its sleeve, both those explicitly mentioned (the Da Vinci Code, Kate Mosse's Labyrinth) and those alluded to but not named for unknown reasons (The Lord of the Rings films, Game of Thrones). The tone of the book veers wildly between these types of books - it's a thriller and a mystery, then a fairy tale, with fantasy action peppered in, and some extremely harrowing kidnapping and violence thrown in as well. There are so many other influences and plot threads as well. So many. The book I would most compare it to is Neil Gaiman's American Gods, which is also an obvious but unstated influence.
The book starts really slowly, lasts a long time and then goes at absolute breakneck speed to catch up with itself at the end.
There were a lot of pieces of plot that I thought were going nowhere until the last few pages of the book, at which point everything gets resolved extremely rapidly with little satisfaction for the reader. Although there is a little piece of revelatory backstory that gets introduced, for the first time, near the very end and is never mentioned again.
There really are some lovely scenes and descriptions and a lot of it was enjoyable to read, but it was so scattered and unfocussed that I just could not like it. Also, there are some truly interminable sequences near the beginning about a book tour. The book tour, and how good the main character's book is, did not need to be in there. The time spent on that, and some other mundanities near the beginning, compared to the very little time spent wrapping up the actual plot, is very strange.
I can't honestly recommend this book but if, like me, you tend to read any book about books, you will probably read it anyway. You might not be wasting your time? I'm really still not sure.