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What Members Thought
A great, fun, consistently enjoyable book. You don't have to be a library lover to enjoy it...but it sure helps.
The overall arson-investigation throughline was a wee bit slender but the description of the LA Library fire itself was every bit as mesmerizing as actually watching fire. That section was as good and gripping and fascinating as anything I've ever read. Utterly and completely worth the price of admission.
Anyway, there's also lots of kooky library history that was a blast (spoiler alert ...more
The overall arson-investigation throughline was a wee bit slender but the description of the LA Library fire itself was every bit as mesmerizing as actually watching fire. That section was as good and gripping and fascinating as anything I've ever read. Utterly and completely worth the price of admission.
Anyway, there's also lots of kooky library history that was a blast (spoiler alert ...more
9-9-19: I'm putting this aside, at least for now. I'm listening to the audio on my commute, and the number of threads this book follows and the way they are presented is just incompatible with the length and timing of my commute. I did learn some really interesting facts -- I didn't know anything about the terrible fire in the Los Angeles Public Library before this book, and there was also an interesting aside that provided a little bit of the history of the Atlanta library system, which I didn'
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Probably closer to 3.5 stars. It was interesting, but meandered a bit in directions that I didn't always enjoy. (But I *did* enjoy some of the other meanderings, sooooooooo take it with a grain of salt.)
It goes way beyond just "The LA Central Library Fire" and its surrounding mystery - it goes very deep into the history of the LA Library in general, including biographies of some of its more famous directors (City Librarians) and other important figures. ...more
It goes way beyond just "The LA Central Library Fire" and its surrounding mystery - it goes very deep into the history of the LA Library in general, including biographies of some of its more famous directors (City Librarians) and other important figures. ...more
Part arson investigation, part history of the Los Angeles Central Library, part love letter to all libraries. I loved this book, and if you love books and libraries too, you might also.
Nov 02, 2018
Meghan
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Nov 03, 2018
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Dec 20, 2018
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Sarah McKenna
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Dec 22, 2018
Elizabeth
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Jan 03, 2019
Jon Wills
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Jan 06, 2019
taeli
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Jan 07, 2019
Lori
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Jan 10, 2019
Cathy
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Jan 26, 2019
Brooke Williams
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Apr 16, 2019
Rebecca Fumia Patel
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May 13, 2019
Steph S
marked it as tbr-nonfiction
