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ndvdv's review against another edition
adventurous
dark
emotional
mysterious
tense
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
5.0
Such an intricately woven plot, covering an important current world issue and concern. As the reader, you are taken through two different characters' points of view, getting to know their story. You don’t realize that at the same time, Lawrence has been building the main plot of the novel until their worlds collide and the connections between the two begin to show you the premise of the book. The author’s prose is incredibly captivating, and the nuances of the speech he uses and the beautiful world he is creating bit by bit continually draw you in. His words evoke emotion and you easily fall into the feelings these characters deal with throughout the story.
“Like all hunters, sorrow advances on slow, silent feet, until the last moment when it attacks from cover, springing with such speed that the impact rocks its victim on their heels.”
“Hurts don’t stop, but they fade into shadows of what they were. That’s sad. That something so vital, something that bit you so deep, can be eroded by time into a story that almost seems like it happened to someone else.”
Lawrence does an impeccable job at slowly creating this immense world of this library that connects all times and spaces. The connections from the beginning of the book kept happening right up until the last chapter, and it kept you invested as a reader to find more evidence of the intricacies of the world in this novel. He also leaves enough crumbs and unanswered questions to make you want to pick up the next book in the series.
I loved following Livira’s story, from a child who had limited access to knowledge, to an adult woman who fought for every moment in the space she created for herself amongst her peers. She didn’t accept the limitations of her status and challenged those around her for their acceptance of her presence. Livira was feisty, determined and motivated to understand the world she was in and to fight the very molds that were in place for her people, for her gender and the blindingly followed rules.
“Give her an inch and she would take all the miles you owned. She had chosen this door and win or lose she was going to fight for her place.”
Evar and Livira were true star-crossed friends/”lovers”. They are unknowingly one another’s enemies. During the building of their improbable friendship, they found a truth in each other that wouldn’t have been achieved if they never met. Evar and Livira were able to see the biases their worlds created, the knowledge that shaped their prejudices about their races and learn that what they knew wasn’t the full truth. The truths they knew were just what their worlds wanted them to see, a truth that existed by only seeing one side of the story.
“All of it is representative of a truth. Truths cast many shadows, some of which are very different when the light shines from one direction than from another.”
I loved how Evar’s journey with finding the one he lost, gave him answers to the world around him that he didn’t understand nor want to be a part of. He cared deeply for the people in his life and tried to truly see the perspective of others. Evar was fighting against the limitations long before this novel took place and was unwilling to settle for his unknowns.
“There’s a hole through the heart of me,” Evar said. “And it won’t be gone until I find her.”
“Evar understood now that the Clovis he knew was not the woman this girl would have grown into without this day. She had been forged by the events he’d witnessed, and another Clovis, one he would never know, lay dead with her brothers back among the stacks.”
“He was the cause of her hurt. He couldn’t take her suffering away but at least he could share it, and maybe there might be some ease for her in that.”
Now, onto the deeper meaning of this book. Our world lives on the precipice of excess knowledge. With technology abound, the knowledge of our world can be exponentially grown by an infinite number of contributors. Knowledge isn’t necessarily just world truth, but the truths we create for ourselves. Our history isn’t the only history. We focus on what we know without giving regard to what other’s life experiences are. We fixate on how events shaped us without recognizing those same events affected others, in potentially different ways.
“How it might be possible for two sets of eyes to witness the same events and later give accounts at odds with each other.”
Our ability to share this knowledge makes the deciphering of truth and bias that much more difficult. The accessibility of knowledge progresses us at speeds that humanity can’t keep up with. We can abstractly learn about what is possible, but because the search for knowledge is biased, we don’t allow ourselves to learn what we should seek or slow down our information gathering to fully grasp all avenues of the knowledge that is shared.
“We deal in affirmation. People don’t want truth. They say that they do but what they mean is that they want the truth to agree with them. Take ninety-nine books that say one thing and one that says the opposite. If that opposite was what the customer was hoping to hear, they’ll put their stock in the single volume. In this manner we learn more regarding human nature from closed books than from anything that might be written within them.”
These are the obstacles of our world right now in the age of knowledge and technology: who determines the facts that create knowledge, what education is required to ensure the truth behind the knowledge being shared, who should that knowledge be accessed by, and how much knowledge should be made available. There is an influence of accessible information and what is being shared. Often, manipulation of the knowledge available in our world exists to benefit the person, group or government who is sharing it.
“With an endless library,” Livira muttered, “if you search long enough, you can find a book that agrees with just about any opinion you have…We give the King what he wants to hear, what he wants the people to hear.”
“…in the endless aisles of the library there was almost certainly a book that agreed with any ridiculous idea that sprang into their head. Similarly, there would be a text to back up any convenient lie that might allow them to slide past an inconvenient truth in the wider world.”
It makes you ponder whether the amount of information that is accessible to us is too much, allowing for biases to form and ascertained knowledge to be gathered to confirm our biases. An excess of knowledge pushes us to continue to absorb rather than understand, leaving us to question how much we are educating ourselves.
“Livira had come to appreciate that an ocean of knowledge is apt to drown you long before it educates you.”
“I felt that knowledge should be earned through wisdom.”
This book was so much more than I expected it to be, and I can’t wait to continue with the series. At times this book does seem slower-paced, especially in the beginning as the framework for the journey Lawrence wants to take us on is laid. However, in the second half of the book, when the connections from the first half start coming together in the world-building and the paths these characters go on come into play, the pace picks up and I was left in awe many times with how intricate the story became. There are many aspects of this novel I will think about for many years to come, and it is a book that can be read again to find more information you may have missed on the first read-through.
“Life’s cheap, easily spent. And if there’s any joy to be had it’s in the moments between. So, when you find something that makes you happy you take it with both hands, and you hold on to it for as long as you can. It’s not going to last. It will be taken from you. But that’s not the point. The point is that you took your chance, you drank the wine, you took what good you could from the world, and you gave it yours.”
“Like all hunters, sorrow advances on slow, silent feet, until the last moment when it attacks from cover, springing with such speed that the impact rocks its victim on their heels.”
“Hurts don’t stop, but they fade into shadows of what they were. That’s sad. That something so vital, something that bit you so deep, can be eroded by time into a story that almost seems like it happened to someone else.”
Lawrence does an impeccable job at slowly creating this immense world of this library that connects all times and spaces. The connections from the beginning of the book kept happening right up until the last chapter, and it kept you invested as a reader to find more evidence of the intricacies of the world in this novel. He also leaves enough crumbs and unanswered questions to make you want to pick up the next book in the series.
I loved following Livira’s story, from a child who had limited access to knowledge, to an adult woman who fought for every moment in the space she created for herself amongst her peers. She didn’t accept the limitations of her status and challenged those around her for their acceptance of her presence. Livira was feisty, determined and motivated to understand the world she was in and to fight the very molds that were in place for her people, for her gender and the blindingly followed rules.
“Give her an inch and she would take all the miles you owned. She had chosen this door and win or lose she was going to fight for her place.”
Evar and Livira were true star-crossed friends/”lovers”. They are unknowingly one another’s enemies. During the building of their improbable friendship, they found a truth in each other that wouldn’t have been achieved if they never met. Evar and Livira were able to see the biases their worlds created, the knowledge that shaped their prejudices about their races and learn that what they knew wasn’t the full truth. The truths they knew were just what their worlds wanted them to see, a truth that existed by only seeing one side of the story.
“All of it is representative of a truth. Truths cast many shadows, some of which are very different when the light shines from one direction than from another.”
I loved how Evar’s journey with finding the one he lost, gave him answers to the world around him that he didn’t understand nor want to be a part of. He cared deeply for the people in his life and tried to truly see the perspective of others. Evar was fighting against the limitations long before this novel took place and was unwilling to settle for his unknowns.
“There’s a hole through the heart of me,” Evar said. “And it won’t be gone until I find her.”
“Evar understood now that the Clovis he knew was not the woman this girl would have grown into without this day. She had been forged by the events he’d witnessed, and another Clovis, one he would never know, lay dead with her brothers back among the stacks.”
“He was the cause of her hurt. He couldn’t take her suffering away but at least he could share it, and maybe there might be some ease for her in that.”
Now, onto the deeper meaning of this book. Our world lives on the precipice of excess knowledge. With technology abound, the knowledge of our world can be exponentially grown by an infinite number of contributors. Knowledge isn’t necessarily just world truth, but the truths we create for ourselves. Our history isn’t the only history. We focus on what we know without giving regard to what other’s life experiences are. We fixate on how events shaped us without recognizing those same events affected others, in potentially different ways.
“How it might be possible for two sets of eyes to witness the same events and later give accounts at odds with each other.”
Our ability to share this knowledge makes the deciphering of truth and bias that much more difficult. The accessibility of knowledge progresses us at speeds that humanity can’t keep up with. We can abstractly learn about what is possible, but because the search for knowledge is biased, we don’t allow ourselves to learn what we should seek or slow down our information gathering to fully grasp all avenues of the knowledge that is shared.
“We deal in affirmation. People don’t want truth. They say that they do but what they mean is that they want the truth to agree with them. Take ninety-nine books that say one thing and one that says the opposite. If that opposite was what the customer was hoping to hear, they’ll put their stock in the single volume. In this manner we learn more regarding human nature from closed books than from anything that might be written within them.”
These are the obstacles of our world right now in the age of knowledge and technology: who determines the facts that create knowledge, what education is required to ensure the truth behind the knowledge being shared, who should that knowledge be accessed by, and how much knowledge should be made available. There is an influence of accessible information and what is being shared. Often, manipulation of the knowledge available in our world exists to benefit the person, group or government who is sharing it.
“With an endless library,” Livira muttered, “if you search long enough, you can find a book that agrees with just about any opinion you have…We give the King what he wants to hear, what he wants the people to hear.”
“…in the endless aisles of the library there was almost certainly a book that agreed with any ridiculous idea that sprang into their head. Similarly, there would be a text to back up any convenient lie that might allow them to slide past an inconvenient truth in the wider world.”
It makes you ponder whether the amount of information that is accessible to us is too much, allowing for biases to form and ascertained knowledge to be gathered to confirm our biases. An excess of knowledge pushes us to continue to absorb rather than understand, leaving us to question how much we are educating ourselves.
“Livira had come to appreciate that an ocean of knowledge is apt to drown you long before it educates you.”
“I felt that knowledge should be earned through wisdom.”
This book was so much more than I expected it to be, and I can’t wait to continue with the series. At times this book does seem slower-paced, especially in the beginning as the framework for the journey Lawrence wants to take us on is laid. However, in the second half of the book, when the connections from the first half start coming together in the world-building and the paths these characters go on come into play, the pace picks up and I was left in awe many times with how intricate the story became. There are many aspects of this novel I will think about for many years to come, and it is a book that can be read again to find more information you may have missed on the first read-through.
“Life’s cheap, easily spent. And if there’s any joy to be had it’s in the moments between. So, when you find something that makes you happy you take it with both hands, and you hold on to it for as long as you can. It’s not going to last. It will be taken from you. But that’s not the point. The point is that you took your chance, you drank the wine, you took what good you could from the world, and you gave it yours.”
rjdey's review against another edition
adventurous
mysterious
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
4.0
libertyalleston's review against another edition
adventurous
mysterious
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
4.0
amywilke's review
slow-paced
3.0
This book was a struggle to get through. Wasn’t for me and wouldn’t personally recommend.
It had elements of a good fantasy - character development, creative world building, themes of xenophobia/ethics/ pursuit of knowledge/cyclical nature of civilization and war, but it just didn’t execute well for me. Pacing was uneven as well - sometimes the plot was advancing quickly (mainly when Livira and Evar were together, which was never), but most of the times it just dragged.
It had elements of a good fantasy - character development, creative world building, themes of xenophobia/ethics/ pursuit of knowledge/cyclical nature of civilization and war, but it just didn’t execute well for me. Pacing was uneven as well - sometimes the plot was advancing quickly (mainly when Livira and Evar were together, which was never), but most of the times it just dragged.
luluhouse7's review
emotional
mysterious
reflective
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? It's complicated
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
4.0
It had all the elements of a fantastic book -- great prose and character development, creative world building, themes of xenophobia/ethics of pursuit of knowledge/cyclical nature of civilization and war, a twisty mystery plot, and a star-crossed romance -- but somehow the whole thing fell kind of flat in the execution. Some of that is uneven pacing; I found myself alternating between being unable to put the book down and getting bored enough that I would switch to looking at my phone partway through a page or impatiently skimming to get to the next interesting part. This may have been in part due to Livira and Evars being the only fully developed characters but spending much of the book apart. Frequently it felt like the central plot was only moving when they were interacting and everything else was to set up those scenes. Unfortunately this meant that despite these being the scenes that pushed the story forward, their relationship was fairly underdeveloped as well. I'm also not sure the microcosm of Livira and Evars' stories were able to carry the themes of the book on their own, which lead to shallower and less subtle exploration of ideas due to telling instead of showing. Also, especially for the first half of the book, it had a tendency to repeat information about characters as if it were the first time.
Overall it had all the pieces but didn't quite work, probably because character, plot, and theme development came at the expense of one another. That said, Mark's prose is a joy to read, I loved Livira and Evars characters, the library and its mysteries were super fascinating, and I did not see the twist in the third act coming!
Overall it had all the pieces but didn't quite work, probably because character, plot, and theme development came at the expense of one another. That said, Mark's prose is a joy to read, I loved Livira and Evars characters, the library and its mysteries were super fascinating, and I did not see the twist in the third act coming!
marcusk's review against another edition
adventurous
funny
mysterious
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? It's complicated
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
4.0
tinsica's review
challenging
mysterious
reflective
tense
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
4.5
I really enjoyed most of this book. Didn’t mind it being long and was enjoying the journey of reading it but did think that the ending let it down a bit
myrthefroukje's review against another edition
adventurous
dark
slow-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? A mix
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? It's complicated
3.25
blamelucy's review against another edition
adventurous
dark
emotional
sad
tense
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? It's complicated
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.75
A fun read! The world building doesn’t make complete sense to me, but really interesting to read between the lines and extrapolate what the author was suggesting in real terms through their fiction.
I really like fantasy based around books and libraries at the moment so if that is something that entertains you, you’ll really like it.
Clean and clever use of the time function in story telling. Interesting new world.
On occasion could get a little repetitive so skipped past some paragraphs of description towards the end to get to the action and dialogue. This might be a me-problem with patience though.
I really like fantasy based around books and libraries at the moment so if that is something that entertains you, you’ll really like it.
Clean and clever use of the time function in story telling. Interesting new world.
On occasion could get a little repetitive so skipped past some paragraphs of description towards the end to get to the action and dialogue. This might be a me-problem with patience though.
janicesierra's review against another edition
adventurous
challenging
dark
emotional
funny
mysterious
sad
medium-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Character
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? Yes
- Flaws of characters a main focus? No
4.0