Mar. 22nd, 2023

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Ash and Quill (The Great Library #3) by Rachel Caine.

Are mid-book reviews a thing? Probably not, but here I go with one anyway.

If this were any other book series, I'd DNF it.

The story opens with some characters in a cell. Cell has a toilet and a bed with mattress in it. One character had a hair pin. The characters are called out one by one to be searched.

You want to hide that hair pin. Do you:

A) Drop it in or behind the toilet.
B) Drop it behind the bed or stick it in the mattress or pillow.
C) Pull a thread from your sleeve. Tie one end to the pin, tie the other to your tooth, then swallow the pin.

The character chose C. I swear to god, if this had been any other book series, I would have DNFed it right then and there.

I was being driven insane by all the other characters in the book calling the main characters "children". I was certain in the first book they were described as early 20s, but in this third book (or the second one?) someone in the military was described as being four times one of the main character's age. Even 15 x 4 = 60.

Also, I was wrong, I had thought these weren't YA books. YA books are usually short, five-ish hours to read, and the first one was nine and a half hours. But Amazon and the author's website both describe this as a YA series, so I guess the main characters really must be teenagers. I guess that explains why they came off as teenagers to me...

Even when I thought the characters were in their 20s, where I guess the plot is going was a real stretch. But if they're actually teenagers... I STRONGLY suspect this small group of main characters is going to change the world; I can't see any other way for this series to end. The Library is the biggest superpower in the world, it can crush entire countries (and has done so in the past). But somehow this group of teenagers is going to win and beat the Library. That is SO unbelievable.

Which leads me to my last big, honking issue. The relationships and jealousy. Jealousy is never a fun subplot, but it's especially annoying when the couple has zero chemistry. None. Not a single spark in three books. (The majority of reviews on Goodreads agree with this.) I really dislike the romantic relationships between the main characters (two different romantic relationships), I just don't believe them at all, and the one main character is so jealous, I just stopped reading mid-paragraph.

I never usually read reviews unless I'm ready to DNF a book, but I was so annoyed and frustrated that I checked them for this book already. Depending on which review you believe, either the last quarter or the last 10% of the book is where everything happens. I'm 37% into the book now, 4.5 hours more of reading to go, so that's a lot to push through to get to the last quarter.

I guess I'll keep going and just skim over the relationship/jealousy parts as much as I can.

I sure am disappointed though. The first book was so good I gave myself eye strain because I just couldn't stop reading...

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