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.
Claire is in charge of Hell’s Library of the Unwritten, a place where books that haven’t had a chance to be written down reside until they have a chance to make it to the page. With her assistant, a Muse named Brevity, Claire is responsible for ensuring the books are protected, even when they sometimes jump from their pages and attempt to meet their own authors. However, when Claire and Brevity attempt to retrieve the escaped character Hero, they get attacked by a fallen angel, Ramiel. Soon, the Library of the Unwritten is in a race to find Hell’s Bible, a weapon of unimaginable power that in the wrong hands could launch a war between Heaven and Hell, with Earth caught in the middle.
The Library of the Unwritten by A.J. Hackwith is the first book in a series focused on the power of stories. The premise of the story – that Hell possesses a library of stories yet to be written that need protecting and chasing down when they escape their pages – is a unique one in that it delves head-first into some of the ideas behind myth and religion without being overly critical of any particular set of beliefs. This structure ultimately creates a unique kind of meditation on how stories, a common thread through all of the worlds created through the centuries, have an impact on the lives of those who have ascribed to particular schools of thought.
As a novel, The Library of the Unwritten has all the same style that Hackwith brought to Toto: there’s a compelling cast of characters with clear motivations, a plot that keeps the reader engaged, a healthy dose of humor to point out the absurdity of a particular event, and, at the end of it all, a feeling of closure and satisfaction that made reading the novel enjoyable enough to warrant continuing the series. Claire, as a curmudgeonly head librarian, is unique in that her character straddles the lines between the archetype of an elderly curmudgeon that’s simply done with everything around them and the kind of bitter professional who has lost all perspective on what their work so that they’re more focused on getting their tasks done without thinking about what it actually means. While Claire may come off as hardened and indifferent to some, it’s clear that she has a deep well of concern for the library and those around her, which can feel refreshing, depending on what corner of the literary world one looks in.
For casual readers, Hackwith’s novel can appeal to those who enjoy a strong female protagonist, and has elements of found family. As a book whose story is fundamentally about stories, the novel is also likely to appeal to readers who are interested in novels that deal with these kinds of themes. It may also appeal to those who are looking for something that can be funny without truly being a lighthearted novel, as Hackwith’s style injects humor in unique ways.
For writers, the novel would likely appeal to anyone looking to deal with themes of religion, myth, hell, found family, or similar topics. Hackwith’s The Library of the Unwritten has similar lessons to those presented by Toto, but it broadens them to encompass a greater development of LGBTQ+ themes without making them the primary focus of the story, which could provide a valuable template for normalizing related topics if writers wish to introduce them in their own works. However, one of the largest lessons the book may introduce is how to write a strong female protagonist who leans more academic without alienating them from the audience enough to become unlikeable.
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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 Liz Moore’s The Good of the Woods!
The Writerly Review 