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A review by rowena_m_andrews
The Left-Handed Booksellers of London by Garth Nix
4.0
It has been far too long since I’ve read a Garth Nix book (although Angel Mage is glaring at me on the shelf), and this was a wonderfully entertaining romp through an alternative London, complete with books (and you can never have too many of those), and folklore.
I adored the premise of this book, and for the most part, I thought that it was executed very well. This was a love letter to books, but not a book about books. It rode that line beautifully while very much taking that idea of there being magic in books, as well using folklore and mythology to create a world that felt very different, while also being something you could imagine being just one step out of line with our world. As though if you opened the right book, or went into the right bookshop, you could stumble into that world. The worldbuilding was certainly one of my favourite aspects of the book, from the New World to the Old World, and the magical system which was well-crafted and an excellent reminder of how much I enjoy Nix’s fantasy writing.
I enjoyed the characters, although I would have liked to have had more time to explore the secondary characters in the world, as we spent most of our time with Susan, Merlin and Vivian. However, those main three were, for the most part, well-developed, and it was fun to read about their adventures, and I was invested in the outcome of their goals and storylines.
The Left-Handed Booksellers of London was incredibly fast-paced, and hits the ground running and doesn’t let up, and at times it felt as though you were caught up in a whirlwind, seeing glimpses of the world and characters without being able to get a proper grasp of them. While I love Nix’s writing, I would have loved to see it slow down in places, to get a better grasp on the wider cast of this fantastic world, and to find out more about the interaction between the Old and New Worlds, and even more about the Booksellers. However, for all that, the book felt very complete in and of itself, with just enough in the ending to leave me hoping that at some point in the future we might see more from this world.
I adored the premise of this book, and for the most part, I thought that it was executed very well. This was a love letter to books, but not a book about books. It rode that line beautifully while very much taking that idea of there being magic in books, as well using folklore and mythology to create a world that felt very different, while also being something you could imagine being just one step out of line with our world. As though if you opened the right book, or went into the right bookshop, you could stumble into that world. The worldbuilding was certainly one of my favourite aspects of the book, from the New World to the Old World, and the magical system which was well-crafted and an excellent reminder of how much I enjoy Nix’s fantasy writing.
I enjoyed the characters, although I would have liked to have had more time to explore the secondary characters in the world, as we spent most of our time with Susan, Merlin and Vivian. However, those main three were, for the most part, well-developed, and it was fun to read about their adventures, and I was invested in the outcome of their goals and storylines.
The Left-Handed Booksellers of London was incredibly fast-paced, and hits the ground running and doesn’t let up, and at times it felt as though you were caught up in a whirlwind, seeing glimpses of the world and characters without being able to get a proper grasp of them. While I love Nix’s writing, I would have loved to see it slow down in places, to get a better grasp on the wider cast of this fantastic world, and to find out more about the interaction between the Old and New Worlds, and even more about the Booksellers. However, for all that, the book felt very complete in and of itself, with just enough in the ending to leave me hoping that at some point in the future we might see more from this world.