A Quick Note On This Review: This article includes affiliate links to Bookshop.org as a way of supporting both local bookshops and my own ability to write.
WARNING: May contain spoilers.
The return of Libby Rhodes to the Alexandrian Society library opens the door to deadly consequences. The Six chosen by Caretaker Atlas Blakely are being slowly siphoned away by the library, and the group has to determine who to sacrifice if they want to survive. Atlas’s proposed experiment – to open a door to the multiverse – is seen as a possible loophole for Libby, Nico, Tristan, Paris, Callum, and Reina to escape the deal, but not everyone is as transparent about their goals as presumed, and that could have dire consequences when everyone’s life is on the line.
The Atlas Complex by Olivie Blake is the final book in the Atlas series, and offers an interesting series of twists that thread their way back through books one and two. The focus of the novel is around Atlas Blakely’s proposed experiment to enter the multiverse in search of a new world where he and the others can be gods, but the Caretaker is curiously absent through most of the goings on around the library. Instead, each of the Six are free to pursue their own aims and lines of inquiry, which ultimately culminate in the realization that the choices we make matter more than the heights we seek to achieve.
While still a strong book overall, The Atlas Complex relied on its characters far more than the first two novels and this may pose a challenge for some readers. It’s also possible that the book may not resonate as strongly if readers of the first two books waited too long between The Atlas Paradox and The Atlas Complex, because Blake seeks to knit everything together in quite a high-impact picture in the closing chapters of the series.
For casual readers, there are three groups that are likely to enjoy this novel the most. First and foremost, fans of the first two novels would benefit from finishing out the trilogy because it adds even more context to what the story is about and they are already familiar with the way Blake builds this particular kind of story. The second group that’s most likely to enjoy this book are those who prefer character-driven fiction; Blake relies on this mode of storytelling throughout many of her books, but it’s particularly prevalent in The Atlas Complex, and audiences that don’t like this kind of fiction would likely become quickly disengaged. The last group most likely to enjoy the book are those who enjoy complex, abstract narratives, because though The Atlas Complex packs a punch in the end, it does require a good deal of thought and consideration along the way to remain engaged in the narrative throughout.
For writers, The Atlas Complex is immensely beneficial for understanding how to sketch and manage characters around a plot. It shares some of the lessons from the first two books, of course, but The Atlas Complex takes the method to a different level that is useful for fiction writers to see in order to understand its relative strengths. Additionally, The Atlas Complex – and the series at large – is adept at taking seemingly disparate pieces from across the series and piecing them back together in a way that forces the reader to change their frame of reference, which is artistic and rarely done well. Blake’s work could provide a framework for understanding how to do it in your own stories if that’s an effect that’s desired.
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What’s Next?
I am an avid reader and have quite a few thoughts on how some books could benefit both people that want to be entertained and those looking to sharpen their literary skills.
If you’re interested in finding out more about what I’ve been reading – and how it could benefit you – I will be publishing those thoughts on Fridays on a weekly basis. Check back next week for a discussion of A.J. Hackwith’s The Library of the Unwritten!
The Writerly Review 