Comment

I enjoyed this and found it to be a fast paced book I couldn't put down. The plot really carried me through when not much else did. That said, I thought Alix was a little flat, seeming like a one-sided YA character. Her romantic chemistry with Beau wasn't there. They made great friends though and I did really like Beau (though he was also a bit flat). I don't know what he saw in her from the start. The side characters were not well fleshed out either, having been reduced to their tragic backstories they are running from. The villains were also very much cardboard cutouts as well as not being actually present until the end. While I agree that libraries are sanctuaries, I'm not sure I like the idea of jumping into a book world to escape your problems. I question how your sanity might shift if you are living in a perfect world making jam all the time. What are the consequences of building a family in this book world you didn't originate from? Was there no other way to get these people help, like a good lawyer? As this is set at the Boston Public Library, here are some corrections: It IS called Bates Hall. Staff will happily tell you its name as we call it that every day. The description of the Boylston Building(1972) in chapter 19 ("a municipal parking garage crossed with a health insurance headquarters") hasn't been true since the renovation in 2016. Also, it has, for many decades, held the bulk of the book collection, unlike the McKim Building(1895) which has only held a few reference collections for a long time. Anything else inconsistent with reality (doors where they don't exist), I'll chalk up to this being a fantasy novel. In short, I liked this but it could have been so much better. Having read The Alice Network, this book is not nearly as good, even though I couldn't put it down. It was just lacking.