The Secret Chapter

The Secret Chapter is the sixth book in Genevieve Cogman's Invisible Library series, which follows the adventures of Librarian Irene Winters (spy, book thief, alternate world traveler). When a world Irene holds dear is threatened, she ends up being recruited for a heist. She'll be given the book that can save it: if she and the team successfully steal a gargantuan painting from a museum with top-notch security.

This series is a lot of fun, and I felt that although this didn't quite have the same charm as the first four books, it also was better than the previous book. There's a villain lair, run-ins with criminals, a heist, and some dragon secrets...

3 1/2 stars (7/10)

Full Review on My Website

Every new book in the Invisible Library always brings me delight and it was no different since the time I got to know the series would be extended. And obviously receiving the ARC made me very happy. What a great way to have some fun on a weekend.

The one thing guaranteed in this series is that the story moves at a great pace, throwing one sticky situation after another at the characters, not giving them time to get complacent. This ensures that we as readers are always on our toes as well, worried what's gonna happen next and never wanting to keep the book down. As always, there is another heist this time but involving a larger crew and I enjoyed seeing the typical heist tropes used so effectively. We get a 80s style Bond villain who is the mastermind, a master thief, a muscle, a hacker and the one running the show on the ground. It felt like watching a movie with lots of twists, not being able to guess initially who might betray whom, but ultimately figuring it all out and delighting in the knowledge. We also get us a bit more allusion to the dragon's history which has been going on for the past couple of books now. And while I was enjoying an entertaining and predictable ride, the author completely blew my mind with the epilogue and I can only wonder what the long term consequences of those revelations are going to be.

Irene has always been a favorite character of mine and reading more about her only made me happy. While she is her smart, witty and resourceful self when trying to get out of tricky messes, I liked getting to know her a bit more personally this time around. Her dysfunctional relationship with her parents and being involved in a task which means something personal to her showed us a bit of introspective and vulnerable side to her, and it definitely made me appreciate her more for being the kind and loyal person she is.

We see that her relationship with Kai is going well but as we've come to expect, it's the slowest burn romance ever and I don't expect that to change anytime soon. We also get quite a few Fae and Dragon cameos from the previous books, so that was fun but I missed having Vale again. The rest of the heist crew was fun to follow as well, but mostly I enjoyed watching Irene try to work with such a diverse team and figure out how to handle each of their idiosyncrasies.

Finally, this is a thoroughly entertaining and sometimes predictable heist novel with an explosive ending and I promise you'll have fun reading it. If you're a fan of the series, then I would obviously recommend you to continue on this journey. If you have never read the Invisible Library series, but you love novels full of adventures and heists, supernatural creatures and an extremely smart Librarian protagonist, you should totally check this out. From the way the story ended, I hope we'll get to know a lot more about the Library's origins in the later books and I can't wait.

The Invisible Library series is truly something special. It has good mysteries to puzzle over, a sense of fun, likeable characters, great action scenes, and is aimed at those who appreciate the value of a good read. It also has universe-hopping book-collecting hero/spy librarians - which I view as always a good thing.

I was concerned whether the series could keep up the quality - especially considering the excellent mysteries and rip-roaring endings of the last few volumes - how to top that? Well the puzzles, humour and action shift in a fresh direction and from the very first few pages I was sucked in with a silly grin on my face.

Quality stuff. Bravo Ms Cogman!

Now the frustrating wait for Book Seven....