A review by hannah_hethmon
The Cartographers by Peng Shepherd

Did not finish book.

I couldn’t get very far into this book before giving up in a huff. The main character, who we quickly learn is an academic mega nepo baby but also a natural genius in her parent’s field of historical maps (hmmm), goes to open a portfolio containing a map she’s taken from the NYPL. I kid you not, she pours a glass of wine then puts on new kitchen gloves to handle it. Is she cleaning a crime scene? Besides the fact that academics haven’t worn gloves to handle manuscripts for many many years, no one who has ever worked with any historical object would ever think kitchen gloves was a better choice than hands. Meanwhile she is drinking wine while examining this document *facepalm.* Anyway, the first few chapters felt like a weirdly cliche fantasy of academia. I could get over a cliche academic book lover fantasy but the character was so inconsistent in a short space of time, but not in a way that felt intentional and I just could’t see it getting any better from there.