I loved this book until it turned supernatural in the last quarter to third of the book.

LaValle does a fabulous job building up an incredibly interesting character in Ricky Rice, and the incredibly gradual reveal of his childhood is gripping (though it’s totally ruined by the jacket description! Why do they do that??) I was immensely intrigued by Ricky, empathizing with him despite having nearly nothing in common with him, and the honesty with which LaValle described Ricky’s feelings of failure and frustration were refreshing.

Unfortunately, all of those amazing qualities were really ruined for me by the supernatural elements. The shift was so stark that I couldn’t even suspend disbelief and accept this other fantasy reality. There was no world-building, and absolutely nothing made sense to me; I could not get a grip on what was going on.

I liked Ricky throughout the novel, and the complex story of Adele Henry was a tragically beautiful one. Even Solomon Clay had a lot going for him as a character, and the interactions between all of these characters (and the rest of the workers at the Washburn Library—particularly Lake, whom I would have loved to understand better) were so interesting to read. It almost seemed that LaValle turned to the supernatural elements as a crutch, a way to move the story and plot along without having to do much else, which was especially disappointing because of his evident skill of character-building, bringing to life these realistic, complicated, somewhat unlikeable but still enjoyable characters whose relationships could have been the whole story.