Twelve Angry Librarians (Cat in the Stacks #8)
written by Miranda James
narrated by Erin Bennett
My Rating: 4 stars
Genre: Cozy Mystery
Age Category: Adult
Type of romance: m/f
Blurb:
Charlie Harris is stressed out. The Southern Academic Libraries Association is holding this year’s annual meeting at Athena College. Since Charlie is the interim library director, he must deliver the welcome speech to all the visiting librarians. And as if that weren’t bad enough, the keynote address will be delivered by Charlie’s old nemesis from library school.It’s been 30 years since Charlie has seen Gavin Fong, and he’s still an insufferable know-it-all capable of getting under everyone’s skin. In his keynote, Gavin puts forth a most unpopular opinion: that degreed librarians will be obsolete in the academic libraries of the future. So when Gavin drops dead, no one seems too upset…but Charlie, who was seen having a heated argument with Gavin the day before, has jumped to the top of the suspect list. Now Charlie and Diesel must check out every clue to refine their search for the real killer among them before the next book Charlie reads comes from a prison library….
My Review
I received a free copy from Tantor Audio and voluntarily reviewed it.
Twelve Angry Librarians is the eight book in this series and I am having a great time listening to this series. In this book Charlie in his role as interim director has to attend a librarian conference that the college library he works for is hosting. When someone who was despised by many dies Charlie gets involved to solve the mystery. Besides that he is offered the job as director and he has to decide whether to accept the job, while both of his children are both expecting their first baby soon and his daughter is considering a move to another state. So there’s plenty going on in this one.
The mystery in this one didn’t grip me as much as some of the earlier ones. I liked the library conference setting, I thought that was interesting event to center the mystery around. It was fun to read about the conference and see Charlie catch up with some old friends and make new acquaintances. The mystery involved a person whom many disliked and so there is no shortage of suspects. Something about it just didn’t fully grip me. There are some twists along the way that add some intrigue. Charlie is talking a lot to other people who know or have seen more than he did in this. I thought the reveal was quite clever and I thought it was a nice reveal with a great twist when everything fell on it’s place. I also liked how Charlie figured it out, but the police also do.
I like reading about Charlie and his cat Diesel and seeing how his life changes throughout the series. He is now considering whether he want the director job, which is a big life decision. He likes some things about this job, but also wonders if he wants to go back to working full time with two grandchildren on their way and it would mean even less time with his girlfriend too. Then there is his daughter who might move to another state. I liked seeing these threads play out and I like how these subplots play out throughout the series. I liked how these got resolved toward the end and look forward to seeing how these decisions influence future books.
To summarize: I enjoy this series and listening to the adventures of Charlie and his cat Diesel as they solve mysteries. This one has a mystery at a librarian conference, which made for an interesting setting. The mystery didn’t grip me as much for some reason, but I did think the reveal was quite clever and had an interesting twist and reveal. There is also a big decision Charlie has to make when he is offered the job as director for the library he works at and some other personal life plot lines that are evolving. I like seeing these personal life plot lines play out throughout the series and seeing how Charlie’s life changes. I look forward to the next book!
Love the title of this one as I know there are lots of angry librarians at the moment because of book banning, lol. But I would totally be angry about Gavin’s statement as well. Not to mention how I feel like my admin thinks I am just a secretary and that my degree doesn’t matter. Thanks for sharing your review of this!
This book made me think of you with the librarian conference setting and the focus on what librarians contribute. It sure was an interesting topic to read about. I am sorry to hear your admin sees you as just a secretary, that just isn’t right :(.
Charlie sounds like an interesting amateur detective figure and I think his life choices and that mystery together would interest me, too. Too bad it wasn’t quite up to the feeling you had from earlier books, but glad it was still an overall enjoyable read.
It’s been a solid series so far, Charlie is an interesting amateur detective and I like seeing his life develop throughout the series. Just a shame the mystery in this one wasn’t quite as gripping as some of the others.