Ummmm no. Like so many before me, I was greatly disappointed by this disjointed graphic … novel? It held promise. Such promise was, alas, dashed. ⭐️⭐️ because promise ain’t nothin’. ( )

I expected a much more avant-garde graphic novel that what I got; a fairly standard formatted graphic novel with some philosophical discussion, meta inter-textual interplay, and an extremely abrupt ending (that I actually liked). For something advertised as "play[ing] with the graphic medium," I expected a lot of interesting formatting and interplay between the images and text, and instead got a graphic novel that sometimes (once, I think) switched to prose.

Some of the stories, in particular the quasi-Pinocchio encounter and the fly leading to the bird to the spider to the pig to the farmer and his wife, were really interesting and thought-provoking (I very much appreciated that the emotion conveyed by the latter story was without words, and that Pinocchio was a coward but his refusal to accept the truth turned him into the furthest thing he wanted to be), and I enjoyed the story of Marigold. I was just expecting more.

The ending was a little groan-worthy with the self-insertion, but the abruptness of him leaving the Librarian, with all his loneliness and unhappiness, mid-sentence was somehow fitting. ( )

A man inhabits a mystical library where the stories come to life, but not always quite as you'd expect.

This book seemed neat as a concept. The art work is fantastic, including the cover art designed to look an old-fashioned library card record.

The story itself is rather slight and intentionally vague/open-ended. To me, it came off as a bit overly pretentious, as if it is trying very hard to be high-art literature (but not quite making it).

Reading it wasn't exactly enjoyable, although it wasn't exactly not enjoyable either. I'm not sure I'd recommend it, except for a very specific audience who likes books about books, fractured fairytales, etc. ( )

Meta-joy :D ( )

I thought this was an interesting idea for a graphic novel. The individual stories were interesting and for the most part were a fresh take on old tales. I was left wanting a bit more in the end though, but it was good enough that I will look for more from the author. *** ( )