I am quite pleased I managed to get to the end of this book. The characterisation is brilliant and I really wanted to know the story arcs for them but what a beast! At 600+ pages this book rambles, what it needed was a really good edit. I'm usually quite happy with long books, especially well-written ones like this but the stories were so disparate and hard to follow, that I have no idea if things were left unfinished or unsaid as there were simply too many threads to keep hold of.

Characters and story 'moments' were never referred to again which made me think they were surplus to requirements.

The book has a lot to say about nature and our place in the world but it's like a road block, clunky and grating to the story, it could have been so much smoother whilst not losing it's important point.

But as I've said I got to the end caring about the characters, I wanted to know how it finished so I stuck with it but was ultimately left disappointed.

A richly imaginative literary adventure that defies categorisation

Sisters Beatrice and Taryn Cornick are avid readers and lovers of libraries, especially the library at Princes Gate, their grandparents’ debt-ridden manor house. When their grandfather James Northover dies, the house and the contents of his library are sold. Among the library’s precious items is an ancient scroll box known as ‘The Fire-starter’, known for having survived several fires in famous libraries, though no one knows for sure whether the box has been sold or if it was hidden during the war in a dry cave system on the estate. When the sisters reach adulthood, tragedy strikes and 20-year-old Taryn shuts down, suppressing all her grief and rage. Three years later, she marries a kind, wealthy man whom she does not love. On a group trip with her husband to Canada, a meeting with their master guide – a huntsman known only as ‘the Muleskinner’ – will prove both fateful and fatal.

Seven years on, Taryn is divorced and suffering from extended lapses of memory. She is promoting her first book, The Feverish Library, which started as her PhD dissertation about the history of libraries, the threats to them, the importance of what they house, and the losses of priceless books and artefacts through library fires. During her book’s publicity campaign, she receives ominous silent phone calls and loses control of her speech as if experiencing severe dissociative identity disorder, all the while being wracked with guilt and haunted by the past. Coming onto the radar of both the police and MI5 – the former for the silent phone calls and the latter because two fans of her book turn out to be cyberterrorists – Taryn accepts an invitation from the collections’ manager of the Bibliothèque Méjanes in Aix-en-Provence to discuss her grandfather’s scroll box. Little does she realise that this visit will not only change her life forever but upend her entire world…

Impossible to summarise in just two paragraphs, the above text merely outlines the bare bones of the beginning of this novel and does not even come close to conveying the broad sweep of its subsequent narrative and themes. Murder mystery, revenge thriller, quest adventure, detective story, conspiracy plot, and odyssey across supernatural worlds, The Absolute Book is a heady mix of hard-hitting modern realism and sumptuous epic fantasy. Creating an intricately complex universe of parallel worlds encompassing Christian theology, pagan mythology, ancient legends, folk tales, and science fiction, the novel takes its reader on an exciting journey through vividly evoked multiple dimensions - the contemporary modern world, the eternal realm of the fairies, even Purgatory and Hell themselves (the modern version of Purgatory is a particular highlight).

One of the main delights of The Absolute Book is the interweaving of literary references and allusions throughout, reflecting the novel’s own premise and motifs. The story is wonderfully imaginative and keeps you guessing – the twists and turns are often unexpected, startling, and enjoyably bizarre. With its roots in folklore and legend lending it depth and resonance, and as an extraordinary maelstrom of blended genres, for the most part the novel works extremely well. Taryn is a terrific heroine, and the wealth of supporting characters both human and fae are well-drawn, sympathetic, and believable in the context of the fantastical setting.

Beautifully written, expansive, erudite, and in parts intensely gripping though it is, at times, however, The Absolute Book feels almost too rich, perhaps over-stuffed, as if there is too much going on and too many wildly diverse elements to ease into a coherent whole. With the dizzying back and forth between worlds and the seemingly innumerable different plot strands, the flow of the story is occasionally interrupted and feels a little disjointed. But maybe that is the point. As the reader, we share Taryn’s frequent confusion, frustration, shock, and sometimes even fear as to what is going on, what she is witnessing, and what is happening to her. And while the story ends on what some would see as a disturbing note, it ties in effectively with the dark and unsettling nature of the universe envisioned in the book.

Jo-Anne Blanco / Arwen Evenstar
Elite Group received a copy of the book to review.

I really wanted to love this book as the reviews mentioned comparisons with many of my favourites. Unfortunately I didn't engage at all, finding the story confusing.

What starts off as a murder mystery, soon flows into a magical fantasy with Gods, gates and the dead. It’s a wonderfully strange mix of Norse mythology, magic and reality and I’m not sure I totally understood it.
Taryn is a beautifully described flawed character - hugely affected by her sister‘s death - who has an affinity with books, stories and libraries.
This whole book is a journey of discovery and having finished it, I definitely need to reread at some stage to understand and appreciate the complexity of the writing.

Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher for this ARC.

I was quite intimidated by the size of this book, but once I got past the first 100 pages I was hooked. Knox has created a potent mix of fantasy mythology, spanning from the faerie world of Lud in the Mist to the Arthurian fantasy of Mallory. I really enjoyed the way so many older works were referenced, directly or indirectly, in the text, and the synthesis of various key plot points. Knox also ties this in with the very current issues of climate change and global unrest. It is very dense in places so not for the faint-hearted, but if you love fantasy, books and libraries, you will enjoy this book.

I found The Absolute Book to be a pleasantly challenging read. The blend of magical realism mingling with portals to fantastical worlds, hitchhiking demons and a dazzlingly curious box named ‘The Firestarter’ gave me a lot to get my head around.

The main characters had enigmatic secrets leading my brain to try and stretch to reach for what was actually unfolding between the lines. Each part of the story was full of gradual reveals; things happened which I only fully understood afterwards when other characters discussed and explained the events to each other.

Taryn’s ongoing suffering over the death of her sister and the repercussions which follow, prove to be a key driving force behind the actions and events within the novel. This provided a mysterious whodunnit feel adding suspense and intrigue into the plot.
The shiftiness of Shift (puns aplenty!) created a conundrum of unreliability which was brilliantly perplexing for the characters as well as the readers who were trying to keep up with them.

The interweaving of fairytale and folklore from different mythologies generated a multidimensional world complementing the complexities of the storyline incredibly well. From the Celtic Sidhe faerieland, the presence of shapeshifters and Norse talking birds, to the alluded references to Merlin, portal gates on ley lines and influences from the most notable of the ‘stories-about-stories’ genre, this book is jampacked with an epic range of fantasy motifs and themes to command your attention.

Tolkein-esque expositions pepper the narrative appealing to those of us who enjoy our world-building on the lavishly rich side. The homage to libraries and guardianship of books and memories speaks out to our bookish afflictions.

From Heaven to Hell and all of the human or faerie purgatories in-between, The Absolute Book is entirely deserving of its high acclaim from professional reviewers and critics.

When I read this book, I was trying to fit to a NetGalley deadline. Global pandemic aside, there was a lot of background noise which stymied me from giving it the attention it deserved. It also made this review quite difficult to write. In that respect, I feel like I let The Absolute Book down.

Netting in at over 600 pages, this is not your light-hearted beach-read or just something to provide a meaningless distraction to everyday life. The Absolute Book is a tale which deserves an almost essay-like dissection to reveal its multitude of wonders and the exquisite depth and breadth of its writing. It’s exactly the type of book that warrants a reread and I feel I need to give this novel another chance to discover all of the hidden gems and fantasy Easter eggs which have been lovingly crafted into its pages.

Absolute Book

Taryn of the Northovers, we soon learn, lost her sister many years before when she was murdered. Fuelled by grief, Taryn is now determined to find out who killed her.

Determined to now seek revenge on her sister’s killer, she meets the detective, Jacob Berger when she finds herself on the wrong side of the law.

But Taryn is not like others, she’s a demon, one unlike any other demons. The demons are either body or spirit but Taryn is both.

When someone is after Taryn and Jacob, they soon find themselves in danger.

Taryn also meets the last child of the blood and grandson of a gate maker of the Sidhe who is also a shapeshifter but who is he and what is his motive?

‘The Absolute Book’ is beautifully described. Full of fairies and other fantastical beings, the author has done a wonderful job of some world-building here.

It’s one of those ones that I believe definitely deserves a reread to fully understand what is happening.

It’s a fantastical book of epic proportions.

I got about half way through with this. There were lots of things I really liked about it - the writing was really beautiful and at times I was intrigued to know what it was all about but I just never felt that strong compulsion to return to the story when I'd put it down.

The Absolute Book is at it's heart is a love song to the art of storytelling and perhaps this is where it suffers most. The story is effectively two separate narratives that switch between the 'real' modern world and the 'ancient' world of the Sidhe (fairies). As such, transitions between the two, from realistic to fantastical, can be jarring and occasionally difficult to comprehend. Knox's love for books, libraries, librarians and the concept of narrative history shines through and drives what is at times a painstakingly long read. The writer manages to conjure up the magical Sidhe world with it's gates into different realms so exactly that at times it feels that some more editing may have improved the readers enjoyment. Similarly at times the modern day 'crime' story is neglected or rushed as Knox focusses on the magical. I personally am not a fan of the fantasy genre so devotees may well appreciate the detail and world conjuring more. The art of the writer is without question, but just not my cup of tea.

In theory I should love this book - it ticks all my literary boxes. Unfortunately, it just doesn't work for me and I abandoned it at 61%. There's no doubt it is original and astoundingly imaginative, full of great ideas and gorgeous turns of phrase but it's all just too much. I found it lacking in cohesion and the world building was patchy. I wasn't engaged at all and somewhat bored so I put it aside.

There's also a line about the main character's ex-husband's, er, "anatomy" that made me throw up in my mouth a little! Literary, not figuratively.

I'm sure this book is going to be hugely popular - I'm just disappointed that it wasn't for me.

The Absolute Book by Elizabeth Knox, deals, through the use of fairies from a parallel universe, with some huge human dilemmas. You want a demanding book to provoke thought, force you to reconsider big themes of life. Ms. Knox's tome succeeds in that area.
The tale meanders through this world, and the alternative world following a group of key characters all of whom are following various private agendas, that are never fully clear. None of the characters are particularly sympathetic, no real heroes.. Contradictory to the feel of this review, I was drawn to follow all the stories to there conclusions, and found the whole thing very satisfactory.

The Absolute Book is an imaginative complex fantasy novel.
A woman is deliberately knocked down and killed. The driver is charged with manslaughter as it cannot be proven that it wasn’t an accident. The woman’s sister, our human protagonist, Taryn is obviously deeply affected by the incident and, when on a hunting trip with her husband, discusses it with a mysterious character known as Muleskinner. Her sisters killer is found dead shortly after he is released from jail. Taryn and her association with Muleskinner has now set off a chain of events that leads us away from a conventional novel into gateways to worlds with demons, talking ravens and a shapeshifter.
The absolute Book is an extremely ambitious epic action packed fantasy which at over 600 pages requires devotion from the reader. However; I was lost at times with so much going on and felt that with some editing the characters and plot would have felt more immediate. A second read may be in order for me to fully appreciate a novel where there so much going on,

Well I have to say I found this book hard work.. It's an epic read, long and intricate, and if you don't commit yourself to it you may struggle. I fought with it for the first quarter, trying my best to engage with the characters and story, but there was such a lot going on that I did find it difficult. Saying that, it then suddenly clicked and I couldn't put it down - so very much rewarded for sticking with it!

Taryn is a young lady who has a troubled past - her sister was murdered, and her links to the subsequent death of the killer are complicated. This wound stays with her for the rest of her life - a life which becomes part of mythology, linked with demons, other worlds, and witchery. Themes of murder, revenge, family, and literature thread the story together cleverly.

I went into this book not really knowing what to expect, so i was surprised by the brilliant and beautiful writing. The descriptions, settings and vagueness of the book stood out to me and i was fascinated. I did find myself being slightly confused by the time jumps and a few other things, but overall i enjoyed the mystique of the book. Definitely unique.

I just couldn't get into this book at all...it appeared to flit from one scene to another, introducing new characters with little or no reference. Just not for me, although I understand others might be suited to this genre better. Many thanks to NetGalley and the publishers for the opportunity to red an ARC of the book.

My thanks to Penguin Michael Joseph U.K. for an eARC of ‘The Absolute Book’ by Elizabeth Knox.

This is an extraordinary novel that almost defies description. Taryn Cornick’s life changed forever when her older sister, Beatrice, was deliberately run down and killed. The man arrested for the crime was convicted of manslaughter. Yet Taryn was not satisfied and allows a man called the Muleskinner to exact the justice that she feels Bea was denied. An eye for an eye. Yet this act has far reaching consequences for Taryn and others.

Seven years pass and Taryn has written a bestselling work of nonfiction about past and current threats to libraries. Then D.I. Jacob Berger, who previously had interviewed Taryn and her then husband, resurfaces. He is aware that Taryn has been receiving mysterious silent phone calls. Oh and MI5 also are interested in Taryn.

While that sounds fairly straightforward, this is much more than a mystery or conspiracy thriller; its real world aspects intersect with epic fantasy that includes encounters with the Sidhe (Faerie), gods, angels and demons, magical creatures, hidden libraries, forbidden books, and Arthurian lore.

I found it glorious though there is no doubt that it is a complex, esoteric narrative. I feel that it is a novel that like similar long genre-spanning novels I will benefit from rereading to appreciate its multiple layers.

I immediately ordered its beautifully presented hardback edition for my library.

This is one of my top reads of 2021 and is highly recommended to those looking for something different. Personally I feel that ‘The Absolute Book’ is a masterpiece.

I think this is a case of it's not the book, it's me. I had read so many positive reviews for this book, but I just couldn't get myself into the story. I think a large part of that was the writing style and 'Jump's in time I just couldn't get a grasp of where the story was going, and didn't find myself bonding with the characters.

Once I finished reading this book I found that I needed a pause just to ruminate on my thoughts before I wrote anything about it because it was a big read, in both size and ideas and I needed the space to formulate what I would say.

This is the first Elizabeth Knox book I have read and I have to say it did take me a while to get used to her writing style, it is eloquent and atmospheric and full of wonderful descriptions, but I did also spend a fair portion of the beginning of the story in a bit of a confused state, always feeling like I’d missed a part of the story. As I got into the rhythm of the writing I found I understood it a lot better but there were still times that something would happen that wouldn’t have enough context to make sense and sometimes it would be explained later but sometimes it wouldn’t. I also at points started to get a little frustrated at some of the language used, I’m fairly well-read and any words I don’t know I can usually surmise from the rest of the sentence but there were often times I had to stop to look up a word just to see what I was dealing with. Doing this a couple of times is fine but the more I have to do this the more I start to feel like a book is beyond me and with a book that is already quite a lot to take in I started to feel like The Absolute Book was just inching too far over the line.

I think it’s safe to say that you need to go into this book with a very open mind when it comes to the story because it has elements of a few genres and I think if you go into it thinking its one or the other you’ll be disappointed. I personally loved getting swept away on this mesmerising journey through many lands and places and with some beguiling characters, I enjoyed the contrast between our world and the Sidhe’s world and then also between the utopia that it projects and the sacrifices that have to be made to keep it. Maybe it’s the bibliophile in me but I also loved the thread of the story about libraries, the curated knowledge of books and how that shapes our histories, I found it fascinating and as a sparking off point for the quest for “the firestarter” it was brilliant. I do wish I could go into more detail but The Absolute Book is unlike any story I have read before and there’s no way I could successfully summarise anything more, it’s best just to experience it for yourself.

There are some quite fantastical characters in this story, most steeped in myth or legend, but none quite as interesting as Shift, an oddity from the second he shows up in the story but the kind that I felt immediately curious about, I found the story of his life so interesting and the more I found out the more I wanted to know. I wouldn’t say I was drawn to Taryn, she is a difficult character to get to know, we find out a lot about what has happened to her but not always much deeper than that but since she is so intrinsic to the story and because of the loyalty she showed to both Shift and Jacob she did start to grow on me. Jacob was another character that I immediately warmed to, the police officer that needs the answers to his questions and ends up unwittingly embroiled in Shift and Taryn’s quest, and even though he is suspicious of Taryn, he still can’t help but help her.

In my opinion the pacing was unhurried, mainly due to the amount of rich description, and since there is so much within this story I think it does suit it, however, there were times that this meant that some scenes that warranted a little bit more suspense were a little bit too drawn out. I also wasn’t sure how I felt about the ending, I liked the idea just not the entirety of the execution, it felt like a very different atmosphere to the rest of the story, maybe that is the point and it didn’t spoil the rest of the experience but it was a little jarring.

The Absolute Book is an epic achievement of a story and you can tell there has been a lot of care and thought poured into it and whilst it does leave me with the feeling that I almost have to be otherworldly to understand its full potential, I definitely adored the adventure that it took me on.

I very rarely give up on a book but unfortunately I found this so difficult to read. Obviously there are others who have totally engaged with it, but I found the writing very dense and I just could not find the motivation to pick this up and read it. I got about 40% of the way through the book, and it was making me not want to read so for me that was a clear sign that it isn't the right book for me.

The language is heavy, I struggled to understand who was sidh and who was not. I was intrigued by the story but couldn't engage with it enough to perservere. Unfortunately just not for me this time.

I started this book weeks ago, it has taken me a long time to finish and accept it just wasn't for me. To me, the book was just trying too hard to be some kind of everything, to suit everyone. I ended up feeling overwhelmed and lost. I do think those who love intricate plots with random happenings will enjoy this mash-up of fantasy and mystery, with layers of mythology. I will say, there is some beautiful writing within its pages, there was just too much of everything else going on for me to appreciate and enjoy it.

Thanks go to the author, publisher and NetGalley for the opportunity to read this book.