Brenda H. (booksinvt) -
The Broken Spine is the debut of the A Beloved Bookroom Mystery series set in the small town of Cypress, South Carolina and featuring assistant librarian Trudell "Tru" Becket. Much to Tru's dismay, the town's Mayor Goodvale and town manager Duggar Hargrove have decided to make the library bookless - only high tech computers, tablets and printers. They are hoping this new type of library will help turn Cypress into the Silicon Valley of the South and will bring a new group of people to the struggling town.
Tru is beside herself, the library has been her home away from home since early childhood. The books are scheduled to be taken to the landfill so she decides to sneak into the library at night and pick out the best books and open a secret library in the unused vault in the library basement. Added by her two friends Tori and Flossie and Tori's mysterious boyfriend Charlie, Tru manages to get most of the books moved downstairs before daybreak. A loud noise from above sends her running to not only discover that the library has opened and other employees are already at work but Duggar Hargrove has been killed by a falling bookshelf. Someone had unbolted the shelf from the floor and the police immediately suspect Tru since she'd had a very public fight with Duggar a day earlier. In an effort to keep her new library a secret and clear her name, Tru sets out to catch a killer.
I had been looking forward to reading this book based upon the description but, part way through I found myself questioning whether I was truly enjoying the read or just trying to get to the end because I rarely give up on a book. The characters (especially Tru) were hard to warm up to, the idea of a secret library in the basement with people coming and going and nobody upstairs hearing the noise was a little far fetched and left me often thinking wow, must be one heck of a big basement vault. And didn't anybody upstairs notice that Tru was constantly downstairs in a supposed empty basement? For me sadly, the best part of the book was the stray cat, Dewey who adopts Tru. I did start feeling a little better by the end and will definitely give the next installment a try before giving up the series.
Tru is beside herself, the library has been her home away from home since early childhood. The books are scheduled to be taken to the landfill so she decides to sneak into the library at night and pick out the best books and open a secret library in the unused vault in the library basement. Added by her two friends Tori and Flossie and Tori's mysterious boyfriend Charlie, Tru manages to get most of the books moved downstairs before daybreak. A loud noise from above sends her running to not only discover that the library has opened and other employees are already at work but Duggar Hargrove has been killed by a falling bookshelf. Someone had unbolted the shelf from the floor and the police immediately suspect Tru since she'd had a very public fight with Duggar a day earlier. In an effort to keep her new library a secret and clear her name, Tru sets out to catch a killer.
I had been looking forward to reading this book based upon the description but, part way through I found myself questioning whether I was truly enjoying the read or just trying to get to the end because I rarely give up on a book. The characters (especially Tru) were hard to warm up to, the idea of a secret library in the basement with people coming and going and nobody upstairs hearing the noise was a little far fetched and left me often thinking wow, must be one heck of a big basement vault. And didn't anybody upstairs notice that Tru was constantly downstairs in a supposed empty basement? For me sadly, the best part of the book was the stray cat, Dewey who adopts Tru. I did start feeling a little better by the end and will definitely give the next installment a try before giving up the series.
