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chaosowl 's review for:
Library of Souls
by Ransom Riggs
Ok I read this a while ago so I don't remember exactly which parts are which book so I'll just write the review for the whole series here.
As it may be evident I do not like this book at all...or the other two for that matter. Even after a few years this series still makes me so angry. Since I read this on my phone the number of pages was different and I read the version where all three books were together so it seemed like one book and I thought it was all just the first book (don't judge it was very confusing). Had I known that, had I read the books separately, I would've stopped after book one.
[Note: Loops are magically protected places for peculiars. Only they can enter it and you need some kind of magical permission from the bird-lady that created it to get in and out. Basically, it's the same day every day; the events from the day before are exactly the same as they are today and will be tomorrow and the peculiars and their bird-lady are the only ones aware of it. That certain day just repeats itself over and over again (loop) so it stops the peculiars from aging. If they were to leave their loop, enter the normal world and stay for a longer while they would start aging forward.]
(Beware of spoilers from now on.)
Now the cover is really pretty. And the vintage/creepy looking pictures inside are what really got me interested in this book, I was expecting something really creepy and scary, something that'll give me shivers, I thought Miss Peregrine was the bad guy and that she's keeping all this poor kids with superpowers captured or something. What I got instead was really dissappointing and not creepy or scary at all. The only thing that may have been scary are those monsters that Jacob controlled but they are a big let down too.
So most of the characters could be replaced with those cardboard people (I forget what it's called) and it wouldn't make any difference because they were two-dymensional anyway. Furthermore, the characters that did have some personality are so annoying and unlikeable. And ok, you don't have to like all the characters, but I think it's kind of important to like the main characters because you need to be interested in their story. I do not like Jacob. At all. He's so selfish and self-centered, ungrateful and has no common sense. I have a simmilar problem with Emma but for different reasons. If I remember correctly, at first she was really cold towards Jacob and treated him badly because she didn't want to like him because of her history with his grandfather (yes, his grandfather). I get the reasoning but...that is not an excuse to act like that toward someone with zero explanation. And then later she changed her mind! Which was even worse! I'm still not over your gramps so I'll give you the cold shoulder but you look exactly like him so we'll start flirting about noon. No. Nonono. And their entire 'romance' is just...just no. But I'll get to that later. Also the way all character acted like kids didn't make sense to me. Yes, they are physically children because the loop they live in stops them from aging but that doesn't mean they're children. Some of them have been alive for over a hundred years, no matter how sheltered and cloistered they are, they aren't going to behave like children because they aren't, they are old people trapped in children's bodies.
Anyway the characters that have some potential (like the invisible guy and the necromancer) are underdeveloped and the ones that have some personality are unlikable.
Moving on to the plot. There is barely any plot. Not to say that every book has to be plot-driven, on the contrary, character-driven books are great too but for them to work for me I need to actually like the characters which isn't the case here (see above). Also I don't think the authors goal was to write a character-driven book and it isn't a character-driven book. It isn't anything-driven book, there's not much going on besides the really weird romance and some (very repetitive) side adventures where they meet peculiars every few minutes (when they should be dying out and really rare). And then there were the very obvious plot holes but, you know, happens to everyone, right? Yeah, but then the characters themselves question it! And then never acknowledge it again! I don't remember exactly what it was but I know that Emma and Jacob talked about how something didn't make sense within the magic of the world and how that shouldn't have happened. And I was like, great so that'll get cleared up! And then it didn't! It was never mentioned again! Why acknowledge it in the first place if you're not going to explain it? Also the plot is supposed to be this war among the peculiars but who died? Only 3 people died, one of them was the Bad Guy so he had to be taken care of and for one of them we don't even know if she actually died or not (that may become clear in later books, idk I'm not reading that). The plot is barely there, especially in the first book (which also changed directions out of nowhere). It is predictable and not very interesting.
And we've reached the romance. Oh how I wish I could unread that romance. If it weren't for the...peculiar circumstances of their connection their romance would've still been bad. As I've mentioned, Emma treated him badly at first and then did a one-eighty and decided she wanted to be with him. There was no build-up, no chemistry, the flirting was weird and seemed forced and it's insta-lovey. Now for the peculiar circumstances. Emma dated Jacob's grandfather. His grandfather! And now she's dating Jacob? Who's been described as the spitting image of his grampa several times? And that's just accepted? How is that ok? She hasn't been able to move on from Abe (the grampa's name, if I remember well) for 70 years and now that Jacob's here he magically healed her broken heart. And no one bats an eye! HOW is everyone so ok with it? HOW?? In an alternate universe she could've been his grandmother. And even if that's not the case! Even if the only reason she likes Jacob isn't because she was never able to let go of Abe and because he reminds her of him it would have been disgusting. She's an old woman! I don't care that she looks 16, she's his grandmother's age. WHY is all that ignored? WHY is it condoned and swept under the rug? The romance is forced and rushed and disguisting and I can't stand it. I don't understand why it was so necessary to write it in. Think we could have all lived without it.
With all this said, there are things I liked about these books, like the pictures and the stories behind them that were fairly interesting and might have gotten this a two star rating had the author chosen a different ending. Honestly, the ending is what really threw this story down the drain for me, it felt so cheap and unsatisfying.
So first there is the big final battle which is, first of all, kind of lame (All that thing with taking souls to get powers just didn't make sense to me. What, do they now have a dozen souls in them? What?). Second of all we didn't even get to see the entirety of the final battle. It wasn't even much of a battle, it was just two magical giants throwing some punches. Then there's that whole thing with that very important and difficult spell to destroy loops that the bird-women had to use to save the day. Sounds exciting, doesn't it? Well, here's how that played out: the bird-woman stepped aside, formed a cricle, held hands and read the spell from a piece of paper while our crew chit-chatted about who knows what and payed no attention whatsoever to the magic happening around them. You'd think there'd at least be some special effects from the spell, some shining light or something to emphasize the importance and whatnot but there wasnt any. The bird-women read their spell and then they all left, not even sure if the spell would work. Oh well...we did our best, time to go home!
Then there is the aftermath of all that. While I was reading I was so confused because there were so many things to sort out in so little pages but yet it seemed like the story is ending because the war is over so there was no more story to follow. But there were so many loose ends I didn't see how the author was going to tie them all up. If it where a sweater, it would fall apart before you manage to get it over your head. His solution was not to even try tie them up at all but to rip them out completely. So the spell worked (shocker) and it just conveniently got rid of all their problems. Very low quality sweater. The peculiars don't age forward anymore in the real world! No no, the collapsing of that one loop somehow, incredibly, reversed their years back so now everyone's as old as the look like! Just a question though: HOW? HOW DOES THAT MAKE SENSE? Why would the collapsing of a loop do that, how is it connected? It makes apsolutely no sense in the magic of the world you have thus explained, why would you do something so ridiculous? Even if it did make sense, if the magic allowed it, it would've been so stupidly convenient. It's such a cheap ending and it really cast a shadow over everything I did like about these books and it makes me angry. Unsatisfying endings are one of my biggest pet peeves and this one certainly wins the grand prize.
There are other smaller things I don't like about these books like Jacob treating his actuall, decent parents poorly just because they didn't believe his very weird story and how he just...left them without a second thought. I could talk about that and some other things but I think you get my point by now. This is where I take my leave, I hope you'll enjoy my review more than I enjoyed these books.
As it may be evident I do not like this book at all...or the other two for that matter. Even after a few years this series still makes me so angry. Since I read this on my phone the number of pages was different and I read the version where all three books were together so it seemed like one book and I thought it was all just the first book (don't judge it was very confusing). Had I known that, had I read the books separately, I would've stopped after book one.
[Note: Loops are magically protected places for peculiars. Only they can enter it and you need some kind of magical permission from the bird-lady that created it to get in and out. Basically, it's the same day every day; the events from the day before are exactly the same as they are today and will be tomorrow and the peculiars and their bird-lady are the only ones aware of it. That certain day just repeats itself over and over again (loop) so it stops the peculiars from aging. If they were to leave their loop, enter the normal world and stay for a longer while they would start aging forward.]
(Beware of spoilers from now on.)
Now the cover is really pretty. And the vintage/creepy looking pictures inside are what really got me interested in this book, I was expecting something really creepy and scary, something that'll give me shivers, I thought Miss Peregrine was the bad guy and that she's keeping all this poor kids with superpowers captured or something. What I got instead was really dissappointing and not creepy or scary at all. The only thing that may have been scary are those monsters that Jacob controlled but they are a big let down too.
So most of the characters could be replaced with those cardboard people (I forget what it's called) and it wouldn't make any difference because they were two-dymensional anyway. Furthermore, the characters that did have some personality are so annoying and unlikeable. And ok, you don't have to like all the characters, but I think it's kind of important to like the main characters because you need to be interested in their story. I do not like Jacob. At all. He's so selfish and self-centered, ungrateful and has no common sense. I have a simmilar problem with Emma but for different reasons. If I remember correctly, at first she was really cold towards Jacob and treated him badly because she didn't want to like him because of her history with his grandfather (yes, his grandfather). I get the reasoning but...that is not an excuse to act like that toward someone with zero explanation. And then later she changed her mind! Which was even worse! I'm still not over your gramps so I'll give you the cold shoulder but you look exactly like him so we'll start flirting about noon. No. Nonono. And their entire 'romance' is just...just no. But I'll get to that later. Also the way all character acted like kids didn't make sense to me. Yes, they are physically children because the loop they live in stops them from aging but that doesn't mean they're children. Some of them have been alive for over a hundred years, no matter how sheltered and cloistered they are, they aren't going to behave like children because they aren't, they are old people trapped in children's bodies.
Anyway the characters that have some potential (like the invisible guy and the necromancer) are underdeveloped and the ones that have some personality are unlikable.
Moving on to the plot. There is barely any plot. Not to say that every book has to be plot-driven, on the contrary, character-driven books are great too but for them to work for me I need to actually like the characters which isn't the case here (see above). Also I don't think the authors goal was to write a character-driven book and it isn't a character-driven book. It isn't anything-driven book, there's not much going on besides the really weird romance and some (very repetitive) side adventures where they meet peculiars every few minutes (when they should be dying out and really rare). And then there were the very obvious plot holes but, you know, happens to everyone, right? Yeah, but then the characters themselves question it! And then never acknowledge it again! I don't remember exactly what it was but I know that Emma and Jacob talked about how something didn't make sense within the magic of the world and how that shouldn't have happened. And I was like, great so that'll get cleared up! And then it didn't! It was never mentioned again! Why acknowledge it in the first place if you're not going to explain it? Also the plot is supposed to be this war among the peculiars but who died? Only 3 people died, one of them was the Bad Guy so he had to be taken care of and for one of them we don't even know if she actually died or not (that may become clear in later books, idk I'm not reading that). The plot is barely there, especially in the first book (which also changed directions out of nowhere). It is predictable and not very interesting.
And we've reached the romance. Oh how I wish I could unread that romance. If it weren't for the...peculiar circumstances of their connection their romance would've still been bad. As I've mentioned, Emma treated him badly at first and then did a one-eighty and decided she wanted to be with him. There was no build-up, no chemistry, the flirting was weird and seemed forced and it's insta-lovey. Now for the peculiar circumstances. Emma dated Jacob's grandfather. His grandfather! And now she's dating Jacob? Who's been described as the spitting image of his grampa several times? And that's just accepted? How is that ok? She hasn't been able to move on from Abe (the grampa's name, if I remember well) for 70 years and now that Jacob's here he magically healed her broken heart. And no one bats an eye! HOW is everyone so ok with it? HOW?? In an alternate universe she could've been his grandmother. And even if that's not the case! Even if the only reason she likes Jacob isn't because she was never able to let go of Abe and because he reminds her of him it would have been disgusting. She's an old woman! I don't care that she looks 16, she's his grandmother's age. WHY is all that ignored? WHY is it condoned and swept under the rug? The romance is forced and rushed and disguisting and I can't stand it. I don't understand why it was so necessary to write it in. Think we could have all lived without it.
With all this said, there are things I liked about these books, like the pictures and the stories behind them that were fairly interesting and might have gotten this a two star rating had the author chosen a different ending. Honestly, the ending is what really threw this story down the drain for me, it felt so cheap and unsatisfying.
So first there is the big final battle which is, first of all, kind of lame (All that thing with taking souls to get powers just didn't make sense to me. What, do they now have a dozen souls in them? What?). Second of all we didn't even get to see the entirety of the final battle. It wasn't even much of a battle, it was just two magical giants throwing some punches. Then there's that whole thing with that very important and difficult spell to destroy loops that the bird-women had to use to save the day. Sounds exciting, doesn't it? Well, here's how that played out: the bird-woman stepped aside, formed a cricle, held hands and read the spell from a piece of paper while our crew chit-chatted about who knows what and payed no attention whatsoever to the magic happening around them. You'd think there'd at least be some special effects from the spell, some shining light or something to emphasize the importance and whatnot but there wasnt any. The bird-women read their spell and then they all left, not even sure if the spell would work. Oh well...we did our best, time to go home!
Then there is the aftermath of all that. While I was reading I was so confused because there were so many things to sort out in so little pages but yet it seemed like the story is ending because the war is over so there was no more story to follow. But there were so many loose ends I didn't see how the author was going to tie them all up. If it where a sweater, it would fall apart before you manage to get it over your head. His solution was not to even try tie them up at all but to rip them out completely. So the spell worked (shocker) and it just conveniently got rid of all their problems. Very low quality sweater. The peculiars don't age forward anymore in the real world! No no, the collapsing of that one loop somehow, incredibly, reversed their years back so now everyone's as old as the look like! Just a question though: HOW? HOW DOES THAT MAKE SENSE? Why would the collapsing of a loop do that, how is it connected? It makes apsolutely no sense in the magic of the world you have thus explained, why would you do something so ridiculous? Even if it did make sense, if the magic allowed it, it would've been so stupidly convenient. It's such a cheap ending and it really cast a shadow over everything I did like about these books and it makes me angry. Unsatisfying endings are one of my biggest pet peeves and this one certainly wins the grand prize.
There are other smaller things I don't like about these books like Jacob treating his actuall, decent parents poorly just because they didn't believe his very weird story and how he just...left them without a second thought. I could talk about that and some other things but I think you get my point by now. This is where I take my leave, I hope you'll enjoy my review more than I enjoyed these books.