Review: ‘The Invisible Library’ by Genevieve Cogman

You all know my weakness for books about books, so it should come as no surprise that I had to read The Invisible Library. I wrote about it in a Wishlist Wednesday not long ago, and actually preordered it just to make sure I had it on hand the moment it was released.

Synopsis: Irene works for The Library acquiring rare and unique books from alternate universes, which is usually an easy job, except for the times that it isn’t. Her latest mission already seems destined for trouble when she is saddled with a new trainee named Kai and they are being sent to a world where Chaos has taken hold. Neither of them are sure why this particular copy of Grimm’s Fairy Tales is so important, but everyone, including one of the worst villains The Library has ever seen, wants to get their hands on it.

This book is silly. It’s random-alligators silly. And yet all that silliness just adds to the awesomeness. Irene and Kai are a really great team, and just when I thought I knew who or what the bad guy might be I was completely thrown for a loop. There is a lot of great world building happening in this book that will set up the rest of the series to be equally as interesting and fun, I’m sure of it.

“The atmosphere of the place soothed her automatically; the rich lantern lights, the sheer scent of paper and leather, and the fact that everywhere she looked, there were books, books, beautiful books.”
― Genevieve Cogman, The Invisible Library

At first I just kept thinking of Jasper Fford’s Thursday Next series, which was great at the beginning but got too weird for me around book 4. I really hope that the same thing doesn’t happen with this series, but since it’s only supposed to be three books I think it will be fine. Sometimes the longer a series goes the less coherent the story becomes, especially with books that are written with humour and randomness in mind. So far this author seems to have a purpose for each of the silly events that she’s written, but it’s a careful balancing act that she’s undertaken.

Since I liked this book so much, I’ve already preordered the next two in the series, which will be out this year. I love when authors put their books out quickly, because these days I just don’t have the time to wait around for years for the end of a story. Now, if we could just convince some other authors to do the same (*cough* George RR Martin *cough*) those of us who read a lot might not have to re-read all the previous books in a series to try to remember what the heck happened!

LC rating: (great start to a series, lots of random fun)

Other books in the series: