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A review by annettebooksofhopeanddreams
The Invisible Library by Genevieve Cogman
4.0
I'm a little ashamed of how long this book has been rotting on the shelf before I decided to read it. Everything about this book seemed made for me. A little bit of time travel, a little bit of dimension travel, some supernatural elements, a murder mystery and a magical library filled with important books. I've been on the brink of picking this one up quite a few times, but it was only a few days ago when I decided that I was gonna read it. For real this time.
This book does its world building the way I love most: Along the way. That means that in the first half of the book it's hard to understand all the technical details behind the library, dimension travel and how time is passing. However, once the characters encounter someone who doesn't know a thing about this world and are forced to explain things, things get clearer and clearer until it slowly starts making sense.
The plot should have been fairly simple. Get the book, get out of the world and bring the book back into the library. And then the traitor is introduced and the murder mystery and another agent being after the same book. At the beginning it all feels a little chaotic and all over the place, as if the author wasn't entirely sure what to focus on, but surprisingly enough everything does connect brilliantly in the end.
And while things are sometimes a little chaotic I loved how much potential this world and concept has! Everything is possible. Everything the author would want to write can happen in one of her dimensions. Nothing is too crazy. Nothing is too weird. Apart from messing with science. Like a really good science-fiction, which this book is, the book doesn't mess with the rules of science. And despite the chaos that does make the base of this book feel very very solid.
I can't wait to dive into the rest of the series.
This book does its world building the way I love most: Along the way. That means that in the first half of the book it's hard to understand all the technical details behind the library, dimension travel and how time is passing. However, once the characters encounter someone who doesn't know a thing about this world and are forced to explain things, things get clearer and clearer until it slowly starts making sense.
The plot should have been fairly simple. Get the book, get out of the world and bring the book back into the library. And then the traitor is introduced and the murder mystery and another agent being after the same book. At the beginning it all feels a little chaotic and all over the place, as if the author wasn't entirely sure what to focus on, but surprisingly enough everything does connect brilliantly in the end.
And while things are sometimes a little chaotic I loved how much potential this world and concept has! Everything is possible. Everything the author would want to write can happen in one of her dimensions. Nothing is too crazy. Nothing is too weird. Apart from messing with science. Like a really good science-fiction, which this book is, the book doesn't mess with the rules of science. And despite the chaos that does make the base of this book feel very very solid.
I can't wait to dive into the rest of the series.