Book Review: The Unraveling of Emlyn DuLaine

Book #50 for 2025: The Unraveling of Emlyn DuLaine by Lindsay Franklin, 3/5 ★
416 pages / published February 2025 / available here

Goodreads blurb: Emlyn DuLaine just wants to know what happened to her sister, Camille, seven years ago on the fateful day she vanished—literally. Emlyn witnessed Camille unravel and disappear, but no one believes her. … But Emlyn’s life is upended when she is pulled through a portal into the fantasyland of her childhood imaginings—a magical library holding the storyworlds of every story ever published. And trouble is brewing in the land of Rivenlea. Rogue characters threaten their plot lines, and broken classics are beginning to crumble, but Emlyn only wants to find Camille. As she searches for her sister, Emlyn begins to learn the reality of Rivenlea and her own origins. A nefarious plot is afoot, and the line between fact and fiction is becoming hopelessly blurred. The truth threatens the storyworlds, Rivenlea, and Earth—the fabric of creation, itself.

My review: This book was just okay; I’d recommend for fans of the Keeper of Lost Cities series. Honestly, I was really excited going in to this one as the blurb made it seem like it had everything I love most in a good fantasy, however, it just didn’t land for me. The MC reads much younger than she is and while I appreciated the references to book tropes, it also got old. Her propensity for expressing only the final thought after a string of internal monologue was fine the first couple times, less so after a dozen occurrences. The romance was a major eye-roll and some of her development/choices just felt discordant. There were also some big plot issues that just didn’t make sense to me, and while the whole system of Novems was intriguing, I felt like the world lacked real depth and color – it was just one quest/mission/adventure/conflict after another. I didn’t realize this was from a clean/Christian publisher, but it didn’t surprise me to learn after-the-fact. All in all, okay, but not hooked enough to continue the series. (PS – don’t expect any resolution in book one)