How Can I Help You

Joe Goldberg from You, you are not. Very slow pacing with minimal payoff, but I did enjoy the inclusion of day to day mundane minutia and attention to the 9-5 work cycle. But having worked for public and state libraries as well as currently being a university librarian, I did enjoy all the librarian jargon and environment.

As a librarian, of course I had to read this. A fun thriller that I read on vacation. A little slow in the beginning, but definitely worth pushing through. The story kept my attention with the protagonists just being nuts. I laughed a lot even though it's a dark tale. But us librarians tend to be a little odd to begin with ;)

3.5 stars

Too much dense writing, didn't like the long chapters and repetitive dual perspectives. 

This is a hard book to rate/explain, but here goes.

Margo and Patricia are both librarians at a small public library branch in the Chicago 'burbs. Margo arrived earlier in the year than Patricia, and was a nurse prior to her (forced) career change. You see, (and this is all in the first chapter, so not a spoiler), 'Margo' is not Margo at all, and is instead a persona she created to distance herself from all the patients she killed at previous jobs. Now she's a librarian trying not to draw attention to herself, trying to acclimate to a job where people don't come in sick and reliant upon her to keep them alive, trying and sort of failing at keeping these intrusive thoughts at bay. Patricia is a failed writer trying a career change into something more reliable, trying and failing to resist the urge to write, trying to appease her loser of a boyfriend she doesn't seem to like too much. But when Margo starts behaving strangely at the library, she starts writing this down, and unwittingly turning Margo into a character for one of her books. She starts watching Margo closely, and by extension, starts drawing closer to Margo's truth.

The story is told from each of their viewpoints, and both are unreliable narrators, and also pretty unlikeable. 'Margo' is unlikeable just by merit of being a serial killer, but also because she has some pretty savage things she thinks about the patrons who come into her library (and admittedly that hits close to home). Patricia is unlikeable for folding like a lawn chair when her boyfriend tells her that basically everything she does is terrible, for stringing said boyfriend along for so long, for being so adverse to the idea of writing, and for (late story spoilers here) never turning Margo in, despite all the things she discovers about her. But unlikeable characters are sort of the point of this story, as a feature, not a bug. Most of this story wouldn't work if people behaved as they should, because this is a story about two liars, not just one.

I think my only hangup about this book was the ending. (ending spoilers here) I thought, for all the buildup we got between Margo and Patricia, I was expecting more of an explosive finale. And while the building burning down is, by definition, explosive, the actual dispute was over so abruptly. I don't know, for all of the slow burn, I feel like the ending should have been a bit more satisfying. I did like how the author turned Patricia into another Margo at the end, though. That was a really nice twist.

So, a great story marred by not sticking the landing. It's a slow burn, not quite action-packed, but psychological enough that I was entertained throughout.

Solid, engaging read, kept me curious the whole time but slow paced for my liking. 
Not a super twisty dramatic kind of thriller which I do appreciate reading every once in a while. Characters are intentionally unlikeable, atleast i think so.

I was so torn throughout the whole book! Patricia and Margo were superb characters. I didn't know what to expect when I started reading and it was exactly what I was hoping for. It also made me feel like visiting the library!

This one was a generally pleasant read if a little repetitive at times, would have been a 4 stars read for me if style hadn't made the ending just sort of fizzle out.

Margo and Patricia two women who are both unlikeable characters but you can't look away either. So you read on to see who will be victorious because you know that the cat usually eats the mouse, and who is which?

“Kill your darlings” can have more than one meaning. So what? I really need to stop reading thrillers; they don't work for me emotionally.

Thanks to the publisher and Libro.fm for the ALC!

This was a trip! As a reference librarian and former circulation worker, some of the library interactions had me wanting to cry with laughter at the accuracy. Short and tense, this novel kept me hooked. I really enjoyed the narration as well. Worth the listen if you like psychological thrillers with a creepy edge.