Alcatraz Versus The Evil Librarians -- Brandon Sanderson

Alcatraz Smedry has lived in a lot of foster homes.  Twenty-seven of them, to be precise.  It isn't that he's a horrible person.  That's not to say that he's particularly lovable, either -- but he isn't violent or anything.  It's just that he breaks almost every single thing that he touches.  Literally.

On his thirteenth birthday, he receives his inheritance in the mail.

A bag of sand.

Within hours, the bag of sand has been stolen, he's met a grandfather he didn't know he had, been held at gunpoint, discovered that his talent for breaking things is an actual, honest-to-goodness Magical Talent, and that the world as we know it is controlled by Evil Librarians.

Alcatraz Versus The Evil Librarians wasn't actually written by Brandon Sanderson.  It was written by Alcatraz Smedry.  But because we live in the Librarian-controlled Hushlands, the book had to be published as fiction:

Hushlanders, I'd like to take this opportunity to commend you for reading this book.  I realize the difficulty you must have gone through to obtain it -- after all, no Librarian is likely to recommend it, considering the secrets it exposes about their kind.

Actually, my experience has been that people generally don't recommend this kind of book at all.  Perhaps you have had other kinds of books recommended to you.  Perhaps, even, you have been given books by friends, parents, or teachers, then told that these books are the type you "have to read."  Those books are invariably described as "important" -- which, in my experience, pretty much means that they're boring.  (Words like meaningful and thoughtful are other good clues.)

If there is a boy in these kinds of books, he will not go on an adventure to fight against Librarians, paper monsters, and one-eyed Dark Oculators.  In fact, the lad will not go on an adventure or fight against anything at all.  Instead, his dog will die.  Or, in some cases, his mother will die.  If it's a really meaningful book, both his dog and his mother will die.  (Apparently, most writers have something against dogs and mothers.)

Neither my mother nor my dog dies in this book.  I'm rather tired of those types of stories.  In my opinion, such fantastical, unrealistic books -- books in which boys live on mountains, families work on farms, or anyone has anything to do with the Great Depression -- have a tendency to rot the brain. To combat such silliness, I've written the volume you now hold -- a solid, true account.  Hopefully, it will help anchor you in reality.

I was a little shocked at how much I liked this book.  I'm usually not huge into silly (sorry Alcatraz -- I know that you're giving us The Real Truth here, but from my Hushlander perspective, silly is an apt description) and I'm usually not huge into humor that feels really self-aware (when I can picture the author giggling over his keyboard).  But it just WORKED for me.  It was funny.  There are cracks about everything from the Newbery Award to Harry Potter to Michael Crichton -- and while it's geared towards the middle-school boy crowd, I think there are a lot of adults who'll get a huge kick out of it.  Big Steve, THIS MEANS YOU.

Definitely try it on teen and tween fans of Artemis Fowl, Terry Pratchett and older fans of the Chet Gecko series.  I am TOTALLY looking forward to the next one.

Comments

[E_I]

Wait, this was written by the same guy who wrote Elantris and Mistborn? That ups my curiosity for this book.

[Brandon Sanderson]

Yup, I'm the same guy.

To be honest, I'm not usually one for the overly-silly books either. I do, however, like good humor--particularly when it's pointed at me. I wrote this book because I wanted to do something different from my epic fantasy novels. My Tor books are very, well, ponderous. The characters can crack jokes, but the world itself needs to take itself very seriously, otherwise the whole thing falls apart.

So, this book is partially doing a lighthearted, farcical version of one of my style of books. Essentially, it's me making fun of myself. And so, I figured I might as well make fun of Plato and Michael Crichton as well. (And yeah, that bringing a character back to life TOTALLY bugged me. Glad somebody noticed that joke.)

The problem I see with a lot of silly books and movies is that they don't take time to do the characters and setting right. The Toy Story movies were comedies, but unlike other animated farces, they took time to build characters and give us a world as well as making us laugh. I think that's why Pixar does so well, while some imitators fall apart and become forgettable.

Regardless, I’m glad you liked the book! As far as I’m aware, this is the first review of it on the net!

[Leila]

"So, this book is partially doing a lighthearted, farcical version of one of my style of books. Essentially, it's me making fun of myself."

That really, really came through -- and I think that's a big reason that it worked for me.

The 'silly' fantasy books that don't work for me are the ones that feel like the authors are very serious about being funny. Or something. It's a gut thing, so I'm pretty sure I won't be able to put it into words.