I have so many mixed feelings about this one.
I loved the premise, anything magical realism related that involves deals with gods is an automatic must read for me. However, this book is a hefty one and marketed as adult fiction which I'm not sure I agree with.
There are multiple characters and the main ones are very young. In my opinion the numerous bedroom scenes seemed unnecesary and didn't drive the plot in any meaningful way. I would have been very happy to sacrifice a few of them to help speed the story along.
That said, I feel like this one definitely won't be for everyone. There are a lot of characters to keep track off with rapidly switching POVs. But there is a lot of humor in the book and if you do give it a chance it is quite entertaining.
Overall - this wasn't a book that blew me away by any means and I wouldn't call it a must read but if you're in the mood for a longer story that goes quickly, is a bit unusual and enjoy authors like Alexis Hall and V.E. Schwab, it's worth giving a try.
Thank you to NetGalley, the author and the publisher for providing me with a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review!

This is a weird, complicated, fantastical door-stopper of a book, and although my enthusiasm waned at times, I ended up enjoying the ride.

Three (or four) teenagers died. But somehow they have escaped death and come back to the world of the living. The living world had to be somewhat altered, to fit them back in, but with the help of a few extraordinary "people", they are back. Now, it they want to continue to live they have to figure out what happened, why, and what to do about it.

For me, the best part of the book was the interplay between the teenage characters. Mo, Laura, Daniel and Susannah are angsty, stubborn, naive and worldly. They love each other and their families almost more than they can imagine. The mythical characters are godlike in their omnipotence and lack of concern for the petty human beings they have to use to achieve their goals.

The book is too long, yes. There are too many characters telling too many stories. But I respect Link's ambitious first novel attempt and look forward to more.

I voluntarily read and reviewed an advanced copy of this book. All thoughts and opinions are my own.

I realize that Kelly Link is award-winning and highly regarded, but I found this book an absolute slog, full of unlikable characters and a style that was like metal scraping over metal, only droning. I kept forcing myself forward, thinking it would get better; okay, cool, the characters are dead, interesting twist, but no, it just never got better, and I bailed at 60%

I typically shy away from fantasy; however, Kelly Link, the Pulitzer Prize finalist and McArthur Genuis grant recipient, urged me out of my comfort zone with her debut fiction effort. “The Book of Love” is a long novel, perhaps a bit too long if I were to level any criticism, but it is parsed into manageable chapters, such as “The Book of Daniel,” “The Book of Mo,” and “The Book of Laura,” which seem to reference some fanciful Bible. Three teenagers, Daniel, Mo, and Laura, return from the dead finding themselves in the glare of the fluorescent lights of a Lewis Latimer Public School classroom, almost a year after disappearing from the small seaside community of Lovesend, Massachusetts. With them is a fourth teen whom they do not know, Bowie, and their high school music teacher, Mr. Anabin, who seems to know something about their disappearance and what has brought them back again. Mr. Anabin charges them with performing a series of magical tasks; a competition, as it comes with the warning that “[t]wo stay and two return.”

The trio return to their respective homes where their bewitched families believe that they have been attending a music program in Ireland. They struggle with typical teen anxieties: Daniel must contend with his chaotic household and his many younger siblings; Mo must confront his grief when he learns that his guardian and grandmother, a Black author who wrote romance novels under the pseudonym, Caitlyn Hightower, and commissioned statutes of black artists, scientists, inventors which festooned the town of Lovesend, had died while he was gone; and Laura must reconcile with her “lamentably tall” sister, Susannah, who believed that she was “the baggage” that Laura had been hauling around and worry that she “hadn’t even made it out of school, to the good parts. For God’s sake, she hadn’t even had sex with a girl yet, which meant as far as she was concerned, she hadn’t really had sex at all.” Both Susannah and Laura must handle the return of their father who had abandoned the family years before.

In the meantime, the trio’s resurrection has attracted the notice of other supernatural figures, all with their own agendas. There are shape-shifters, tigers, missing persons, a ritual leading to immortality, centuries old scores that need to be settled, bargains made hundreds of years ago, and Malo Mogge, a woman so powerful and charming that when she and her servant squat in the beach house of a prosperous Boston couple, the couple beg them to stay, resign from their law practice, and send their young son to boarding school.

The “Book of Love” is populated by characters who are utterly real and undeniably appealing. Link takes the reader on a literary magical journey infused with the struggles of modern teens: wonderment, enchantment, vulnerability, loss, frustration, rage, warmth, intimacy, and, most importantly, love.

Kelly Link is one of those authors that seems to be regularly lauded as one of the greats in contemporary speculative fiction, but because she doesn’t regularly publish in the outlets I regularly read, I hadn’t tried much of her work. But what I had tried showed sufficient facility with prose and atmosphere that I was extremely intrigued when I saw she was releasing her debut novel, The Book of Love. 

The Book of Love primarily follows four teenagers returned from the dead under mysterious circumstances. As they return to their small coastal New England town, they’re tasked with learning magic and figuring out just how they died. But the more they learn, the more they’re pulled into a centuries-long power struggle among figures with tremendous power and uncertain motivations. 

If you’re not here for the words, The Book of Love will not be the book for you, as it spends the first third of the book not even hinting at a rush. Yes, the resurrection happens early, but in the aftermath, the main characters are mostly confused, going about their ordinary lives with little hints of the uncanny reminding them every now and again that there’s something bigger to figure out.

 A lot of reviews point to this slow start as a major flaw, but I didn’t see it that way. I found the descriptions of mundane life to be quietly beautiful, and there was enough promise of plot that I didn’t mind sitting with an extended setup. I understand that not everyone will respond the same way, but for readers who enjoy slower paced, literary-leaning sections, the first third of this book is a treat. 

In contrast to the other mixed reviews, it’s what came after that didn’t really grab me. The story opens up into a conflict between undying figures who range from mildly unsympathetic to absolutely horrible. And the main characters aren’t a whole lot better. One of the four very intentionally tries to focus on helping family and opting out of the entire magical conflict (with mixed success), but for the rest, there’s a lot of hookups, a dollop of family drama, and not a whole lot to generate a lot of reader investment in their fate. 

In a way, the focus on the mundane details that was such a strength early in the story turned into a weakness as it went on, because major events just blended into the mundane, and the fantasy plot with life-or-death stakes never really felt like it had life-or-death stakes, even when people were actively dying. And so overall, while there was a lot I liked here, the main story was a bit of a miss. The author is clearly immensely talented with prose and scene-building, but shaping a story at 600-page length is another skill entirely, and while there were flashes of brilliance, I didn’t think it was a story that improved with the extra length. 

Recommended if you like: literary-leaning descriptions of not-entirely-sympathetic characters in everyday life (but also big fantasy plots). 

Overall rating: 13 of Tar Vol's 20. Three stars on Goodreads.

Thanks to NetGalley and Random House for this eARC!

I discovered about Kelly Link not too long ago on Instagram and I found out that this would be Kelly's debut novel. Just after reading the synopsis, I was intrigued! And the book didn't let me down. I loved the supernatural elements that helped weave the various stories of the main characters as they find their way back to their place at home, among themselves, and in relation to their loved ones. This was my first experience reading anything by Kelly Link and I loved this book. I'll definitely be reading her previous works!

ARC | Dull, flat, overlong, trying too hard | It's difficult to be clear about how boring this book is, so I'll just start by mentioning that at around page 200, I put it down and scrubbed my kitchen counters. This was not an overdue chore, just seemed like a better use of my time. Around page 400, I thought "you know, I haven't dusted recently", got out the dustrag, and did that instead of reading for awhile. Because the book was so boring that I was desperately searching for things to do other than read it. The characters feel like they're being dragged through the book against their will, and given that every single thing they do or say is related in every minute detail, there is, to use Link's own words, a "tired reek" to the prose as the characters get pulled through it all. They're awful people, by the way. Whenever you say that in a review someone always snaps back that it's realistic, that the world is not made up of good people, but look, the world is also not exclusively made up of selfish bullying petty assholes (and one cardboard stage prop, Daniel, who has a couple supposed motivations slapped on in rough paint but was never fully developed as a person). People in the world have facets to their characters and reasons for the ways that they are disappointing. The characters in this book are just pricks, and all the Lovesend residents have fewer Adverse Childhood Experiences than the average pampered rich kid, so there's no reason for their personality disorders. There's a lot of 'how a white author thinks it feels to be Black' here, in ways that felt very patronizing. The writing is absolutely tortured, like Link is remembering all the awards she's won or been nominated for and so is trying super hard to prove what an amazing writer she is. And I've read some of her previous books, some of her writing has, in the past, been worthy of note. This is not. The construction, the scaffolding, the Work of it is so obvious all through. And then in some places it's just bad. I wouldn't expect sex scenes to be titillating in the context of this book, but please, Person A "pressed his cock into the well-lubricated asshole" of Person B? Person C, before performing oral sex, contemplates "the pad of fat above the pubic bone"? The language alternates throughout between trying with all its might to be florid and pretentious, and being absolutely flat and robotic. And then, the length. It seems like a cruelty to have named the editor in the acknowledgements. This is a 640 page book with about 135 pages of plot. This isn't just poorly edited, it has been force-fed, crammed with unnecessary lengthening until it's bloated up and choked on it, a beached whale full of bran. And the very tortured metaphor of the previous sentence is still not as bad as what I just spent a day and a half reading in The Book of Love.
Given a choice, I would simply have written a review that's a couple of sentences saying that this book needed better editing and that Link is out of her depth in long-form fiction. The length and detail of this review imply that I have actively antagonistic feelings toward it, when in truth it was so awful that I will never think about it again, but Advanced Review Copies of books require reviews, so here it is.


Free ARC provided by NetGalley which did not impact my review (obviously).

In Kelly Link's debut novel set in very contemporary times, four college-aged kids linked by music come back from a kind of limbo as part of a strategic game played by supernatural entities, including gatekeepers on either side of a door to Death, and the world-creating goddess who rules them. They are tasked with learning how to wield magic given to them, and then additional tasks, with the endgame that 2 will replace the immortal gatekeepers and 2 will get to return to the living world. While they fight with one another, and try to understand how they all died a year ago, where they've been since, and how they got back, they uncover magical secrets and powers and start to unravel the role another central figure close to them all has unwittingly played in the whole scheme. Dazzling, immersive writing kept me absorbed throughout the formidable 628 pages. I wasn't even ready for it to end when it did.

Kelly Link is as fine a novelist as she is at short form. The Book of Love puts her on equal footing with Neil Gaiman in terms of humor and worldbuilding. I fell in love with the young adult protagonists, all of them, and I loved how they discovered magic and how their feelings about it evolved and reflected their personas. I don't know how Link is so in tune with that age group! I completely bought all the characters, and appreciated their sensibilities and the authenticity of their emotional and sexual experiences. I was only a little bit confused, re: technicalities of the magical door(s), but, much like a Link character, I will shrug, accept that, and move on.

This will make an amazing miniseries one day, I expect. So grateful to Netgalley for the opportunity to read and honestly review this ARC by one of my favorite authors. Only downside is that, though I have it as an ebook, I loved it so much, I'm going to have to go buy the hardback when it is released to stores this week. But Link deserves every penny, and more.

The Book of Love by Kelly Link comes out tomorrow and I can’t wait for the world to experience it. Three friends mysteriously disappear, then one year later find themselves having to navigate a set of trials to remain in the world while grappling with how life has moved on, their changing and complex relationships, and what caused them to disappear in the first place. This book is a true ensemble cast, with tons of POV switches that bring the emotions of it all to life. Link includes all of my favorite ingredients: coming-of-age, a strong sense of place, precocious and brave young adults, a bit of magic, and gorgeous prose. It is long and it is slow (but only because I was savoring it) and it is strange and it is maybe not for everyone, but to me, it is worth it and will stick with me for a long time. Out tomorrow, 2/13, and pairs perfectly with a winter storm and a cup of tea.

Thanks @netgalley and @randomhouse for the chance to read it early so I can tell everyone I know that they need to pick this up immediately.

Thanks to Random House and NetGalley for an eARC of this lovely book. I’m sad that I’ve finished it. Recommended for fans of Link’s short stories (naturally) and Neil Gaiman.

I should like this. I really should because it has all the components that make me want to finish a book in one sitting. Unfortunately, I could not get through it. I thought the characters were bland, the plot was meandering, and the writing was just too "flowery" for me.

Thanks to NetGalley and Random House for the ARC.

There's always a weird sense of hype/worry when an author primarily known for short fiction finally gives you a novel. They're so good at small - what happens when they go big?

I've been a fan of Kelly Link's work for years, and it's delightful how much The Book of Love smashes it out of the park. It's long - possibly slightly too long - but it has a dreamlike languor that makes you feel like the prose is keeping you pleasantly on the edge of a dream. There's a care to its pace, and as the book teaches you what it's going to do. I can see a case for a slightly tighter edit, but there's so much to love here it's hard to tell at first glance what needs a trim. I devoured the bulk of this on a long plane ride.

There's some chapters here outside the scope of the main quartet of characters that feel like entirely composed short stories that could stand on their own, but are stronger for inclusion in this overarching narrative. There's perhaps one too many plates spinning, which makes things tricky as the book tries to wrap all of those relationships up as the book nears its end, but aren't the best dreams the ones that have a little too much going on for you to catch all at once?

Full disclosure: I did not finish this book. I could not. It was such a tedious affair and I could not keep myself glued to its web of torment any longer.

I’d read such high praise for Kelly Link’s work. As someone who greatly appreciates meaningful stories shown through a speculative lens, I was hopeful that I’d find great things within this novel. I’ll grant that it was full of beautiful lines, but it was, otherwise, sloppy and boring. I did not feel it was worth the time I invested, and I was sure it was not worth wasting more time on. Perhaps with fewer characters, as there were far too many branches, and significantly fewer pages, this could have been something great.

here’s the thing with this book: i like it as a concept. the plot and magic system are weird and therefore interesting in that way, the narration has a quirky style to it that manages to not be annoying (which i feel like can happen easily with that style) and works well with the intentional weirdness of the book, and the characters are good. my biggest gripe is that this book had absolutely no business being as long as it was. the same effect could’ve been accomplished with half as many pages - trying to get through this felt like a slog at times even as i was invested in the plot and in knowing what would happen at the end.

This is a difficult one to review. It was compelling and incredibly well-written, but it was overall far too long. A good 100 pages could have been trimmed off easily; a good editor could have brought this down to a reasonable length. The characters were all interesting and dynamic, but they had better be with the amount of description ascribed to them.

A weird, fantastical mystery, starting out with small questions and small stakes but growing epic in a way that sneaks up on you as more is revealed. Really beautifully written, with charming, funny characters who don't seem to fit at all with what is occurring around them—and that disjointed union is very striking. This will not be for everyone. But the contrast between the spoken dialogue of really normal, modern, irreverent, notably horny teens, in a lyrical, beautiful, timeless fantasy, really worked for me. I love a dichotomy!

i had to DNF this 😭 i REALLY wanted to love this. the writing style is very unique, but pretty off-putting. it was difficult understanding what was going on, as much as I tried to. this'll appeal to a lot of other readers though!!!!

To be quite honest I truly tried to get into this book but it was just too all over the place to comprehend. There were moments of clarity in Daniel’s book or even Laura’s but not enough overall to grasp what was going on. Maybe this book was abstract and I wasn’t the target audience?
I greatly appreciated this ARC but it just wasn’t for me…
This book will be published Feb 20th by Random House Publishing Group - thank you again for this copy of The Book of Love by Kelly Link

DNF around 30% - I love fantasy & I love literary fiction. This gave the illusion of mixing the two. Yet it just didn’t work for me. I love a slow burn as long as I feel entertained along the way… at the point I quit I didn’t quite understand why the point was and after reading other reviews I see that I was not alone in that.

Every time I put this down I picked it up again because I wanted to what would happen to the four teens at the center of this overly long fantasy novel. Laura, Daniel, Mo, and Susannah are at the heart of this tale of teens who come back from the dead (sort of). I was confused in spots as to what was happening and in others I was, honestly, overwhelmed by detail. I understand why this is a love or it hate it pick but I fall in the middle. It was intriguing enough to keep me turning the pages (albeit it skimming them in spots). Thanks to Netgalley for the ARC. It might be the perfect novel for a long plane flight.