Retro Review: Evil Librarian
/When I started this blog, I had been posting reviews on Goodreads for about 6 months. In the interest of having all of my book writing in one place, I will post one of these old reviews every Friday. They weren't written with a blog in mind, so please forgive the lack of summary and off-the-cuff tone.
2 stars. Quick summary: Cynthia's best friend, Annie, has a crush on the hot new librarian. Unfortunately, he's a demon. Time to battle evil, save Annie, save the world, win the boy, and give the best performance of Sweeney Todd ever.
Awesome premise. Poor execution.
I really had some issues with this, for some reason (seriously - am I the only one?).
It's actually kind of unlike me to be so grumpy about a book, usually I can find things to appreciate and I try to keep a healthy perspective. I guess maybe my expectations were a little too high for this one.
Basically, it comes down to two things. The first bothersome aspect, for me, was the romance. The character of Ryan has got to be about the least believable 16-year-old boy I've ever read. No teenage boy acts like he does, at least in my experience. And honestly, I could've done without the romantic subplot completely.
The second annoying aspect, and this is PURELY based on my preferences/interests and not REALLY a direct criticism of the book/author, is the musical theater theme. I love music, I love theater, and I was raised on musical theater, so I really do appreciate the references to some degree. But this book was, in my opinion, supersaturated. I have so much respect for those involved with musical theater in any capacity - it just seemed a little ... overdone? Obvious? I just really wasn't interested.
Here's the thing. I would've loved a book about an evil librarian had it been executed perfectly according to my tastes. But that's not really the author's job, is it? I can't exactly expect an author to read my mind and write a book catered for me and only me. So please don't think my goal is to knock the author. This book just didn't hit the right spot for me.
As far as butt-kicking, demon-killing teenage girls go, I'll stick with Buffy.