The Librarian of Crooked Lane (Glass Library, #1) by C.J. Archer

The Librarian of Crooked Lane (Glass Library, #1) Reviews

• 
  TJ

  This book is filled with both lovely things and frustrating things. First, I’ll start with the lovely.
  
  As with every book I have read of Ms. Archers, her characters are so real, nuanced and endearing that it doesn’t take long at all to be completely enchanted and connected. So no matter what the plot is revealing - or not - one wants to continue just to spend more time with these wonderful people and see where their lives take them. I adored the closed but pragmatic Sylvia and the kind but enigmatic Gabe, along with each of the secondary characters. They are so deftly drawn that they jump right off the pages!
  
  Now the frustrating. The story itself is extremely slow moving, to the point of becoming almost dull. Yes, it is a mystery but not a particularly exciting or riveting mystery. And the magic in this book is non-existent. Magic is talked about but not once is it actually seen in action… Not even a glimpse or a twinkle. In a world where magic is common, it not being any actual part of the story was weird and very frustrating. This exhibited most in Sylvia’s search to find out if she has any in her family. That thread was mentioned at the first but completely lost through the rest of the book. The question did surface at the very end again but only in passing. This leaves the mediocre mystery of who stole a painting from an art gallery the only focus of the entire story.
  
  So overall, I was disappointed. I guess I was expecting something creative and exciting reminiscent of the Glass series where India (heroine) displayed an interesting talent that developed into discovering her magic. That magic was an internal part of all the mysteries that followed and is part of what made the books so fun to read. Now I know this spin-off series needs to be different, but it is set in the same world with many of the same characters, so one will naturally assume similarities. As it stands now, however, it just doesn’t hold a reader’s attention because it lacks something to make it stand out. And sadly, I couldn’t find anything to make it so… Well, except for the captivating characters. :)
• 
  Phrynne

  The Glass Library is set in 1920 and is a spin off from the author's Glass and Steele series. India and Matthew are overseas apparently hoping to delay son Gabe's marriage to Ivy. That plot point is mentioned and then left for a future book.
  
  In the meantime Sylvia finds herself as Librarian at the Glass Library and ends up assisting Gabe in his investigations for the police. There is a very strong attraction between the two of them. This is also going to be continued in future books. Oh and Sylvia thinks her brother may have had magic abilities and is trying to discover them. Also to be continued.
  
  One plot does start and finish in this book - a mystery about a stolen painting. Basically then
  The Librarian of Crooked Laneis a solid foundation for a new series. All the characters are in place, the magic system is explained and it is clear that there are going to be romantic issues. I am looking forward to reading book two.
• 
  Maria

  Solid start to a series. No crazy plot holes. Pleasant story. This is more of a case of nothing being wrong vs a lot of things being great in this book. Interested in the next book.
• 
  Clarisse (The Bookcase Diaries)

  I listened to this at speed 2x. This was semi frustrating because it had such potential but in the end it did not meet my expectation. The concept of the magic system is interesting but not properly explored. I understand it’s a first book but to not have anything concrete to show is for me not a very strong way to start things.
  
  The characters are a confused lot of stereotypes that are trying to break out of the mold but fail to. The heroine for instance shows some guts and smarts but keeps reverting to a doormat. She flip flops so much from what she says she’ll do that she ends up letting people make decisions for her instead. I did not feel that she was very well-written. The side characters are annoyingly tropey. I can’t believe one can still write such a terrible best friend at this day and age. She completely disregards the consequences her actions may have to her “best friend” the heroine and the heroine allows all of it. The aunt of the hero hates the heroine for no apparent reason. The hero is your typical “oblivious” to girls falling all over him but has a playboy history that gets alluded to. In itself there’s nothing wrong with that since it seems he has turned a new leaf, and it would’ve been interesting if we spend some time getting to know the hero to see the differences, but the author throws in a betrothed instead to bring a complicated love triangle to life. Why???
  
  The investigation parts are also kind of haphazardly done for me. There isn’t a lot of detailed questioning that goes on.
  
  I believe this is my novel CJ Archer novel so I am going to be more forgiving but I felt the potential of this and so I feel the disappointment strongly too.
• 
  Mary

  I can't quite remember how I came across
  The Librarian of Crooked Lane by
  C.J. Archer, maybe my library's Hoopla? but I am so happy I did! This is a slow-burn historical fiction novel that has a mystery and a beautiful touch of magic that I actually wished for more of. I didn't know what to expect going into it, but the cover immediately captured my attention, and the magician aspect was just icing on the cake of making me want to read it. I was thinking the story would be really magic-heavy, but this was a fairly light theme overall, and I really hope the next book in the series will explore a bit more of that. I had never heard of Archer before, and it turns out she is an indie author! I love supporting them, and she has so many backlist books that I am going to have to go back and read.
  
  I did in fact listen to the book on Hoopla, and I really enjoyed Marian Hussey's narration of it. I would love it if she continued to narrate this series in the future, and I was honestly just glad there was an audiobook at all since not all indie authors are able to make that happen. The character of Gabe turned this into more of a mystery, and once Sylvia teams up with him on solving it, I couldn't have been happier. I'd be a happy camper if the next book explored a bit more of her magical background, but honestly, I will just be happy to be back in this world. The pacing does move fairly slowly, so I recommend taking this into consideration before you start. I definitely had to be in the right mood for it and luckily, I was. The Librarian of Crooked Lane would make a wonderful movie, miniseries, etc., and it is one of those novels that you just picture on a screen while reading it. Super solid start to a series, and I can't wait until book 2 comes out!
• 
  Belle

  Captures all the magic felt in The Watchmaker’s Daughter and then some. I appreciate that even though it’s a spin-off of the Glass and Steele series, the book is perfectly accessible for someone unfamiliar with earlier events.
  
  Sylvia is an amazing heroine, capable and independent. It’s nice to see familiar faces, as well as meeting new characters. The dynamics between Daisy and Alex are already top notch.
  
  I’m a little bit dead inside having to wait until March to see what happens next. Will probably end up doing a re-read whenever my physical copy arrives.
  
  100% 5 stars, go read this boooook.
  
• 
  Sydney

  This was … fine. It wasn’t bad, but it wasn’t great either. Frankly, it felt like nothing really happened, although clearly it did have a plot so I am not sure why I feel this way. The characters weren’t fleshed out too well and I did not feel like the setting was very well realized either. It’s hard to describe how meh this ended up being. Maybe if I had read the author’s other series set in this world I would have appreciated it more … but I suspect it wouldn’t have helped a lot. There just isn’t much here.
• 
  Barb in Maryland

  This was a cute, light-weight bit of magic and mystery, set in early 1920s London. It was a fun way to spend a few hours, but I'm not sure if I will continue on with the series.
  The magic system that the author set up was interesting, but the characters were a bit under-developed. They seemed more types (girl with mysterious past, war hero with a secret, etc) than real people.
• 
  ♥Xeni♥

  I found this book a bit lackluster. Apparently there are 2 mysteries set up in this story: 1. the mystery of Sylvia's family history and if she is or is descended from magicians, and 2. the theft of a magical painting and all it's surrounding plot lines.
  
  The former basically has no real development at all. But it seems that that's done on purpose, as the sequel story seems to be about that. The latter... well it's quite straightforward, mostly boring, and I'm honestly surprised that these police of 1920's England managed to solve a mystery at all. All it took was a normal plot progression and talking to all the NPCs.
  
  The main driving force of Sylvia seems to be her attraction to Gabe. Yet she is constantly, 100% of the time denying it, maintaining that she'll never see him again after today / tonight / tomorrow, then inevitably seeking him out or him seeking her out. It became incredibly tiresome. On top of that, I felt Sylvia herself to be a bit of a self-insert protagonist. She is such a doormat until the plot needs her to become a bit angry and then she'll immediately apologize to everyone around her for daring to speak her mind. It feels very incongruous when compared to her best friend (typical Flapper girl / Bright Young Thing / artist) or Gabe's cousin ("American cowgirl" who wears male clothes and shoots her gun everywhere). Granted, they're all quite stereotypical characters. And all the side characters are also rather superficial. I wanted to know more about Ivy, more about India, more about Daisy. But we're stuck with Sylvia. And I love librarian bookworm characters usually, so this is doubly annoying me.
  
  I was considering checking out India's story or continuing this one, but I find it all a bit too simple for my tastes. And also the constant "I need to stay away from him, but there he is oops!" makes me feel I cannot handle any more.
• 
  Venetia

  When I finally reached the end, I read the note from the author, and I felt bad. She’s an independent author, and here I am, about to say a lot of unkind things about this book. So I will start with what I did like:
  
  I liked the descriptions of rooms and food. It felt very scenic and made you wish you were there, and hey! I learned what a mezzanine is, so that’s cool! The first half of the book does an amazing job of placing you in the time period right after WWI, and you can tell it was well researched (if only in the first 50%). The only character I did like was Daisy, but even then I found her annoyingly pushy and immature. I’m sorry there is not more to add to my list of things I liked, especially since I am about to discuss things I greatly disliked:
  
  WRITING: The writing style is so clunky and awkward it reminded me of what I used to write when I was eleven years old. That may seem harsh, but it got on my nerves how weird the writing was, and several things added to my frustration. First, almost every joke or funny moment of this book was ruined by an explanation of the joke *as it was being told*. It’s as if the author was so afraid we wouldn’t get the jokes that she had characters explain why these jokes or funny moments were funny. I did not laugh once.
  
  Second, for an adult book, this had the writing and simplistic plot of a middle grade novel. That’s kind of an insult to middle grade as a genre, because I’ve read good middle grade before! What I really mean is that it felt like this was geared for much younger readers, except for some of the very adult themes mentioned in the book.
  
  I thought the historical aspect was amazing and well researched up until the last half of the book, when all of that fades away into nothingness, and we are left with what feels like super formal Regency era language paired strangely with a vague 1940’s vibe. The inconsistencies don’t end there: in one scene, it is mentioned that Gabe owns a pocket watch rather than a wristwatch, which is stated as unusual for young men at that time. Then, later on, he looks at his wristwatch for the time…a wristwatch he apparently has after the author explicitly said he does not have one. This was never mentioned again.
  
  Another annoying habit of the author was having characters explain what the reader just saw happen to absent characters in detailed dialogue, instead of just saying, “We filled Daisy and Alex in on our meeting with so-and-so about XYZ. When I finished, Daisy huffed, and Alex’s brow had creased in frustration.” That would have been much better than the reader having to hear all of it again when we had just read it ourselves. Also, no one talks like these characters in real life. I can usually put a bit of unrealistic dialogue to the side in my mind, but it’s like the author has never had a conversation with real people! Every single interaction with other characters, including Gabe and Sylvia, was awkward, or painfully unfunny. This will be apparent when I talk about characters next.
  
  The ending was so unsatisfying as well: it ends with no further progress on the main mystery of Sylvia’s family and silver magicians, and not even a small cliffhanger to keep you interested. It ends with Gabe bringing her donuts at the library and they flirt, and suddenly she feels better than she did at the beginning. The End. Ugh.
  
  CHARACTERS: Like I said above, I really only liked Daisy. Sylvia was bland, miraculously capable of anything needed at the time, and worst of all, she became someone entirely different by the end. At first she was quiet, smart, and put together, if a bit of a shy loner. By the end she had gone boy crazy over Gabe so much so that it read like a smutty romance between a small bookish woman and a super tall, ultra masculine war hero. She talks so much about library work, but she does maybe five minutes of any actual work on page, and then has the audacity to complain about how Daisy and Horatio live so comfortably without working. Drove me insane.
  
  Alex had three responses: anger, groaning, or laughter, and professor Nash was kind and always pleasant. Daisy, as I mentioned, can be pushy and immature, but over all she was a kind friend to Sylvia and had a more realistic emotional range.
  
  I cannot tell you how much I disliked Gabe. He ties with Willie as my least favorite character in this book. The handsome, rich, bland Clark Kent of London is supposed to be someone the readers love and adore, but he got on my nerves. He always manages to be a perfect gentleman who can force a confession out of a bad guy in two seconds. He’s always there to catch Sylvia or to protect her at the perfect time, and I rolled my eyes so hard during his white knight scenes. It’s also revealed he is engaged to be married soon about 60% through this book, after flirting and being close to Sylvia almost the whole book. The flirting and close moments do not end after this reveal, which means we are meant to root for them as a couple. Gabe would go hot then cold and leave Sylvia confused and dejected. Ivy, the fiancee, is actually really nice, so all of this just felt gross. I also found it so weird that Gabe barely knows Sylvia, and yet here he is, giving her a new dream job created just for her, pays her wages, imvites her to live with him for a while, calls her and meets up with her so many times, and trusts her enough to bring her in as a colleague (she is a librarian, and has zero law enforcement or art knowledge) to a art theft/murder case. By the end, it was like he was weirdly obsessed with her while keeping her at arms length. He was a bland, cardboard cutout of a gentleman who everyone else kissed the ground he walked on, even if he was a terrible character.
  
  Now on to Willie. She was absolutely meant to be comedic relief and an endearing character for the reader, but she is the equivalent of fingernails on a chalkboard. She’s a stereotype of an American woman from the south, as she brings her Colt gun everywhere, says things about hogs, and is proud of her “mean as a feral cat/creature” status. She has no other emotion than irrationally angry or insanely overprotective, and any scene with her is terrible. She’s Mrs. Bennet-level annoying, but we’re meant to find this oh-so funny and endearing. Ugh. Tommy Allan was apparently a misogynistic bad guy until Sylvia gives him a speech like, “I was scared of men but not all men are bad. Your ex wife’s behavior doesn’t mean all women are bad”, except her speech goes on for three paragraphs AND HE STANDS THERE AND LISTENS! This guy tried to physically attack her that same day and now he’s listening to her speech on sexism. Unbelievable. In general, the characters also spent a lot of time snarling, barking, and pinching/flattening their lips. For all that barking you would have thought 90% of the characters had been turned into dogs.
  
  MYSTERY: The main mystery is Sylvia’s investigation into her family origins (that she suspects could have been a family of silver magicians), because her deceased brother wrote that he thinks they were, and a powerful magician named India Glass holds the answers. The set up was so good for this to be the main mystery of the book, but it is quickly abandoned in favor of a simplistic, poorly (and conveniently) plotted Scooby-Doo-esque painting theft. They pick it back up at the very end and Sylvia’s just like, “Oh, well, who cares? I have no answers about my burning question I created such a mess for, and I am content with that. Oh, Gabe, your green eyes and irresistible masculinity have turned me into a lovesick fool!” She never meets India Glass, the supposed KEY TO THE WHOLE THING, but oh, well. Sylvia doesn’t care, so why should we?
  
  The mystery about the painting theft/subsequent murder is so obvious and poorly thought out. Almost everything to do with this MAIN MYSTERY happens off page, and the reader is only privy to repetitive, short interviews with suspects, sometimes several times over again. The reveal of the mastermind is so comically and unrealistically written I almost laughed. Really? The bad guy is going to act like that, at that exact moment? Hilarious…not really. Gabe’s interrogations of suspects are laughably awful as well. He says something in a “scary” low voice, and suddenly every suspect he interrogates confesses to everything immediately as if he had tortured them for hours. Apparently all it takes to break criminals hardened by war is to ask them three basic questions in a low voice. Sylvia, poor idiot, finds this sooo incredibly hot. Eww.
  
  MAGIC SYSTEM: Nonexistent, very poorly explained, and only talked about 50% of the way through in large quantities of ridiculous infodumps. There are apparently magicians that only have magic pertaining to certain things (ex. silver, gold, time, painting, ink, rubber) but we never get ANY OTHER explanation of the magic, how it works, how it effects the world, and what the magic looks like/how people experience it. The worst magic system explanation and set up I have ever read. The idea is amazing, but the execution was so pitiful and it’s barely explained even as an afterthought that I have to give it an F minus. It was a hot mess.
  
  FINAL THOUGHTS: The only reason I didn’t DNF this was because the first half was actually pretty good, it just became an inconsistent, ridiculous mess at the 50% mark, and by then I needed to know several things, like is Sylvia a magician? (we don’t know), what does India Glass know? (we still don’t know), what is Gabe’s magical power? (we never find out), and who is behind the crappy art theft? (we unfortunately DO find out, and it’s so anticlimactic that it wasn’t worth reading to the end). And thanks to that bland, uninteresting ending, I have no desire to keep reading to find out any of these unanswered questions. Please, save yourself the headache and don’t read this book.
• 
  Anna Mog

  Audiobook - barely held my attention. Forced myself to finish listening to it. I felt the plot was basic and a bit predictable. The characters lacked development and depth. Just wasn’t what I hoped for.
• 
  Katie T

  Dnf 42% this is fine but not my genre
• 
  Giselle

  not sure why this had 5 stars
  
  The plot was so basic and ridiculous. What a waste of time. The romantic arc kept me reading it. The Willie character is disgusting with no explanation for her being in the book. Waste of money and time
• 
  Melissa Bennett

  4.5 stars
  This was a delightful surprise. Although, I thought I would enjoy this book, I didn’t realize that I would relish it as much as I did. There is a smattering of magic and romance with a heap of mystery. While I am not the romance type, it was nicely done and I actually liked it.
  
  The story centers around Sylvia Ashe, a librarian that loves her job but not necessarily who she works for. Her days are made brighter on the times that her dear friend, Daisy, pops in unannounced.
  
  Sylvia’s past is unknown. Never knowing her father and her mother refusing to talk about it, all she could do is guess. Then she finds that she might be descended from magicians. Although doubtful, she sets off, with help from Daisy, on a quest to find out. She ends up meeting Gabe, a handsome war hero, and hopes that he can help. He ends up not having answers to her questions but in a tangle of events, they both help each other on a mission to find out who stole a painting.
  
  The adventure was fun and the characters were magnificent. I truly had lots of fun reading this story. I would’ve have loved it more if it delved deeper into the magic but hoping to see that happen in book two.
• 
  Ashley Haas

  I really enjoyed this.
  If I had to compare it to another book I would say it’s similar to Pride and Premeditation by Tirzah Price and Spellbreaker by Charlie Holmberg. All of which are amazing books ♥️.
• 
  Besmet El Manel

  I didn’t realize at first that it was linked to another series I’ve been reading. That’s what I get for picking books without reading their synopsis, I guess 😅
• 
  Ron

  “Sir, I need to understand where I come from.”
  
  3.5 stars. Historical fiction with magic. Set in post-Great War, post-pandemic London focusing on how those who survived adjusted. Or didn’t. Beyond the main characters, the cast lapses into stereotypes.
  
  Willie exploded with a string of expletives until Cyclops ordered her to pipe down. She fell into a stroppy silence.
  
  Quibbles: protagonist is smart and clueless simultaneously. The risk she puts rare books into is as appalling as those to which she subjects herself. “Ain’t” doesn’t make an American accent. Willie was the most unconvincing character.
  
  Daisy had warned me that men who had everything handed to them in life didn’t understand the realities of the world for the rest of us. In this instance, she might be right.
  
  Plenty of hooks into the next story, but a satisfactory conclusion to this book. Mysteries aren’t my cup of tea, but Archer threw in enough misdirection to keep the detectives (and readers) confused.
  
  ... should have kept alert as I walked alone through a quiet lane.
• 
  Tracy

  DNF. Loved the concept of the book but execution fell short for me.
• 
  Lovely Day

  3.75⭐️
• 
  C. McKenzie

  Sylvia is struggling to make a life in London just after WWI, but it's not easy to find work since so many soldiers are returning from service, and as men, they're given priority. The one job she does find, doesn't last long and soon she's unemployed. Besides sorting out a way to exist as a single woman, she's also on the hunt to find out about her deceased brother's connection to a famous magician and to perhaps discover if he'd inherited magic. She has no idea of her family history, and that's perplexing because she can't understand why her mother would have kept that so secret.
  
  The intriguing aspect of this book is the unique treatment it gives to magic and how it weaves together fantasy with a very real world kind of crime. The potential for romance is there once a wealthy aristocrat enters Sylvia's life, but the fulfillment of that romance is kept tantalizingly out of reach. I'll have to read book 2 to see if this thread is neatly tied up.
  
  A fast and enjoyable read for those who enjoy some fantasy, but also well-developed characters and interesting plots.
• 
  Brenda Engen

  3.25
• 
  Stephanie M.

  PBS Masterpiece meets magic and I'm all for it! A refreshing take on magic - throughly enjoyed the idea of it being genetic and ultimately extremely narrow in one's ability.
• 
  Xandy

  Enjoyable but nothing particularly special. Sort of weird to talk so much about magic and never once see it actually done. I just realized this was a spin-off to another series, might check that one out before continuing this one.
• 
  Vikki

  ⭐️⭐️💫2.5 Stars
  
  Just plain boring??? Why is everything I pick up horrible lately!!!!
• 
  Laura

  A comedy of manners with theft, waitressing, class differences, and murder. There is the suggestion of magic but not much realization.