A review by novel_nibbles
The Book That Wouldn't Burn by Mark Lawrence

adventurous dark emotional hopeful mysterious tense slow-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? A mix
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? Yes

3.5

You know when people refer to a match as a game of two halves, well this book felt like that, except it was more 70/30. While I enjoyed the narration and found elements of both POV interesting It was very slow until approx.  70% of the way through. I was enjoying the book enough to complete it (3/5) but I was pretty certain that I wasn’t going to read the next one. Then in the final third or so Lawrence pulled all his carefully laid threads together for the big reveal (4/5) and  now I am committed to finding out more about the library what happens next for the characters (I’ve downloaded the second audio book!) 

Over all I give this book 3.5 stars. I hope the sequel builds on the momentum of the final third and quickly unravels more of the library’s secrets

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Content Warnings

Minor: Death, Violence, Death of parent, Fire/Fire injury, and War