The Book That Broke the World

February 1, 2024

From internationally best-selling Lawrence, this second entry in "The Library Trilogy," after The Book That Wouldn't Burn, continues to explore the ancient and mysterious great library that connects this fantasy world. But now Evar and Livira find themselves separated and on the run as something hunts them. Prepub Alert.

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March 8, 2024
At the end of book one in the Library trilogy (The Book That Wouldn't Burn, 2023), Livira, a human, is left a ghost doomed to wander throughout time. Her love, canith Evar, and his siblings are still stuck in the dangerous library. Livira must find her book in order to return to Evar. Unfortunately, her book is now a time loop and Livira soon finds how hard it is to capture a narrative that has outgrown the author. While Livira and Evar battle to find each other again, ganars Celcha and her brother Hellet are taken from the backbreaking work of excavating former civilizations to the Library. Ostensibly helping the librarians enter Library chambers only ganars can open, Hellet, along with the two "angels" that only he can hear, is plotting the destruction of the humans and sabbers who have enslaved him and his people. Fans of the first book will enjoy the return to this world that the author deepened with further mythology. Adding new characters and reconfiguring relationships, Lawrence explores they very concept of knowledge, and who controls it, as well as the power of libraries and books. Recommended for fantasy collections where book one is popular.

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Starred review from April 15, 2024
After the shocking ending to The Book That Wouldn’t Burn, Lawrence has a lot to answer for—and he doesn’t disappoint; there’s no trace of sophomore slump in this fast-paced sequel. The kaleidoscopic story of the vast and perilous athenaeum library continues, again jumping between different perspectives and points in time. Celcha and her brother Hellet, a pair of small, silky-furred ganars enslaved by the library, act on the instructions of the angels that Hellet sees. Meanwhile, siblings Evar, Clovis, and Kerrol, now free from the library chamber that trapped them since birth, are pursued by an insectoid race known as the skeer and a large mechanical monster that seems intent on killing Evar. Arpix and the other escaped librarians are now trapped in the wasteland called the Dust but protected from the skeer by a mysterious weapon. Meanwhile ghosts Livira and Malar search for a way to find solid form again. As these different perspectives weave together, the characters come closer to answers about who built the library, what future awaits it, who determines that future—and how the book Livira wrote affects them all. Lawrence makes the intertwining stories fascinating and propulsive, with enough scattered clues and shocking twists to keep the pages flying. This will keep readers up long past their bedtime. Agent: Ian Drury, Sheil Land Assoc.