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The Book That Broke the World is the second in Lawrence's Library trilogy, continuing the story of Livira and Evar. We are reunited with many old faces, some of whom take more centre stage now with point of view chapters, such as Arpix. We are also introduced to some new characters, the most important of them being siblings, Hellet and Celcha, whose story slowly intertwines with the other strands.

I loved the first book of the series and had been very much anticipating its follow up, however, I am afraid to say that personally I was rather disappointed with this second offering.

It got off to a promising start as we are introduced to Celcha and Hellet, two Ganar, who have lived their lives as slaves on an excavation site, but suddenly find themselves being brought to work for the Library. Whilst I never connected to either Hellet or Celcha as much as I did Livira and Evar, finding both a bit dislikable to be honest, I will say that ultimately I thought their story was probably the strongest aspect of this second book, even if I didn't think it was perfectly executed.

Livira herself, who was the heart and soul of the first book, has far less to do here, and I think the book suffers for that. Whilst Evar has a far more prominent role throughout the book, and probably remains one of the most likable characters, I didn't really get much character development for him.

Indeed for me personally, too much of this book was repetitive action sequences and chase scenes that seemed to be just there for the sake of it. We barely get much time of Livira and Evar together, and whilst Lawrence does have a new Canith/human relationship that he sets up here, it felt rather forced, even if it did provide some humour.

The cast overall is too vast, such that I loose sight of Livira's various friends. Also whilst the first book had time-travel elements, here it just got far too confusing and the plot just felt convoluted. In all honesty a lot of this book felt like filler, with needless side quests that didn't really add anything to the story or further the characters' development.

The war between the Library's founder and his brother, remains an interesting aspect, and in indeed the wider ideology behind this remains an intriguing point of debate, in terms of the danger posed by knowledge that is not earned, and I liked how we see this occur first hand with Hellet. However, I will say that these ideas had already been firmly established in the first book, and that Lawrence perhaps rather hammers home the themes he is exploring a little too hard.

Perhaps Lawrence will turn it around in the final book of the series, though whether I will read it or not I'm uncertain. His world-building remains impressive, but it was the story itself and poor character development that let this instalment down for me personally. 2.5 stars