I picked this book up a few years ago, when I transferred from community college to a university in pursuit of my bachelor's in library science and media. It's incredibly fitting that I finish it during my last week of my last class of the program. I have to say, I didn't have high expectations. I thought it would be funny and cute.

I also didn't think much of the author because I didn't know who she was (sorry Michelle). When I looked her up, I was shocked. I've read many of her books to my younger patrons when I was a library paraprofessional (Library Lion was one of the most popular).

First, let's talk about the cover and atmosphere of the book. The cover of Evil Librarian is overlapped with a different book cover. The spine even has a different title and author, which is blocked out by Evil Librarian's marks. The spine has a spine label on it and the front inside cover even has a printed card slot, with a card inside with the main character names scrawled on it. Five stars on presentation.

Knudsen's humor reminds me of Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Strong and believable (for a fantasy novel) plot, littered with intellectual humor. I hate to agree with Stephenie Meyer, but it does have a great balance of romance, drama, and... yes, evil. I laughed out loud so many times while reading this book.

I loved Cyn's character. She's sarcastic and quippy, but she changes and grows like a character should throughout the novel. Despite it being satirical and making fun of the genre, it was well developed on all accounts. I could picture the settings clearly (amazing descriptions), the plot had twists and turns to reduce predictability, and there's an apparent theme. The characters, I feel, were not as well developed as I like in my novels. I'm a big character person--I need to feel as though I know these people and love them, best friend status. I didn't get that from this book and it's disappointing because everything else was amazing.

I also want to touch on the musical theater bit. I loved how the book centered around a high school production of Sweeny Todd. Let that sink in there for a second. Beautiful choice of musical. It's difficult to write scenes that involve the arts because of the descriptions. It's not easy to describe the way someone's voice sounds. Knudsen does it gracefully and allows us to get sucked into the production with Cyn.

I admit that was worried about the writing when I purchased this book and I can promise you that the writing is top-notch. She's an amazing writer and I do plan on reading the sequel.