The Left-Handed Booksellers of London

Name: The Left-Handed Booksellers of London
SKU: 174579
Availability: InStock

4.4 | 5,159 ratings

Price: 21.66

Last update: 02-24-2025

About this item

A girl's quest to find her father leads her to an extended family of magical fighting booksellers who police the mythical Old World of England when it intrudes on the modern world. From the best-selling master of teen fantasy, Garth Nix.

In a slightly alternate London in 1983, Susan Arkshaw is looking for her father, a man she has never met. Crime boss Frank Thringley might be able to help her, but Susan doesn't get time to ask Frank any questions before he is turned to dust by the prick of a silver hatpin in the hands of the outrageously attractive Merlin.

Merlin is a young left-handed bookseller (one of the fighting ones), who with the right-handed booksellers (the intellectual ones) are an extended family of magical beings who police the mythic and legendary Old World when it intrudes on the modern world, in addition to running several bookshops.

Susan's search for her father begins with her mother's possibly misremembered or misspelt surnames, a reading room ticket, and a silver cigarette case engraved with something that might be a coat of arms.

Merlin has a quest of his own, to find the Old World entity who used ordinary criminals to kill his mother. As he and his sister, the right-handed bookseller Vivien, tread in the path of a botched or covered-up police investigation from years past, they find this quest strangely overlaps with Susan's. Who or what was her father? Susan, Merlin, and Vivien must find out, as the Old World erupts dangerously into the New.

Another splendid fantasy from Garth Nix

Reviewed in the United States on February 9, 2025

I read the Abhorsen Trilogy years ago, and really enjoyed it. This newer series has (I believe) no overlap at all with the world and characters Nix created in earlier works, but it has many of the wonderful elements that I appreciate in his writing - above all a genuinely different approach to thinking about how magic could work. And I also really loved his Merlin character, who is a deft nod to Diana Wynne Jones’s Wizard Howl. This was a fun, engrossing adventure!

V. Jones

Intriguing premise with no payoff

Reviewed in the United States on January 15, 2022

I am a huge fan of Mr Nix’s Old Kingdom series so when this book popped up on my recommended list, I didn’t hesitate to hit the ‘Buy Now’ button. Whilst it has been several years since I read anything by Mr Nix, his rich and detailed writing style plus intriguing characters and storylines has always stuck with me so I eagerly settled in to enjoy his latest offering. However, as much as I tried, I really struggled to be fully captivated in ‘The Left-Handed Booksellers of London’.

Before I talk about my issues with the book, I want to mention that I think the cover art and title are fantastic! I mean we are all here because we like to read so to have a book declaring right above the title that the booksellers are ‘Authorised to kill… and sell books’ is extremely intriguing.

The book is set in a slightly alternative 1983 London. Our main narrator is Susan Arkshaw, an 18 year old who is moving to London to study art and also look for her absentee father who left before she was born. On her first night in London, she meets Merlin right after he kills her ‘Uncle’ Frank, one of the titular left-handed booksellers. Mind you, this is an uncle that Susan has never met but sent her Christmas presents every year. I still don’t understand the point of introducing us to Uncle Frank as Susan didn’t really care about his death and therefore it lacked any significance to the story.

Susan, in general, seems to take everything in her stride. She is indifferent to learning about the booksellers and the greater supernatural community plus the shenanigans that occur through the book. Whether its an introduction to ghosts, goblins, vampires (called sippers), giant bugs and ancient malevolent beings it doesn’t really matter. Susan is unperturbed. Because Susan doesn’t become excited about what’s happening, me as the reader struggled to get excited about what was happening as well. I don’t mean I needed her screeching and fainting at every new development, but some enthusiasm about what was happening would have helped to engage me in the story.

The other main character is Merlin. He is young, mysterious, vain, eccentric and used to his looks and charms helping him glide through life unhindered. He is a left-handed bookseller with his sister Vivien a right-handed bookseller. I was a little baffled by Merlin at times as I didn’t always understand his motivations. I liked his sister, Vivien, a little more as she seemed more competent and adept at getting them out of the different problems encountered.

Throughout the book I found there was no real depth to any of the characters which meant I didn’t invest in them. What you learn of them in the first few chapters feels like all you end up knowing them at the end of the book. I had no real sense of who they were and what really motivated them. It all felt a little disconnected. Like someone telling you a story whilst you’re facing a different direction. You hear the person speaking but can’t see the body language or gesticulations for the story to be more than just the words.

I also found the pacing of the book to be all over the place. At times, it felt like things were moving along nicely and then they would stop to deliver huge chunks of exposition. Rather than entwining the lore and the story together, you would be jolted out of the adventure to be lectured at about the booksellers and supernatural community. The narration also occasionally jumped from Susan’s POV to someone else without any real break in the sentence structure. This may have been a formatting issue but in any case, it again took me out of the story as I tried to figure out whose POV I was now reading.

Overall, the story was ok but nothing special. It read’s as a very young adult fantasy book. I do wish I liked it more, but this will be added to my one and done pile.

3.5 stars out of 5 stars! Rounded to 4 stars.

Constant Reader

Creative, Fast-Paced, Entertaining

Reviewed in the United States on January 14, 2021

All Susan wants to do is find her dad before she begins her first year at art school. But it turns out that she also must save the world (or at least England). This is a predominately fun, urban fantasy adventure story set in London. The time is the early 1980s which allows for fun fashion and music references, and it removes cell phones from the plot. With no cell phones, there is room for dramatic tension created by an inability to instantly communicate or access information from anywhere. Susan knew nothing of the Old World until she becomes the target of malevolent Old World forces. Fortunately, she is not on her own. She finds herself on the run with Merlin, a young bookseller. Merlin is not an ordinary bookseller of course. He is a left-handed bookseller, which in this case makes him a magical, special-forces type operative, policing the interaction between the Old World and the new. His twin sister, Vivian, a right-handed bookseller, is the other member of the featured team. Right-handed booksellers are intuitive, intelligent, great with puzzles, with magical no-contact skills that can temporarily maintain virtual invisibility or put people to sleep. Her kills are mental not physical. It is a fun premise. There is not much explanatory material, so the reader learns about the fantasy world, its rules, its weapons, its inhabitants and places as Susan does. This structure makes for a more interesting book as you keep turning the pages just to figure out what is happening. This book is the first book that I have read by this author, but it will not be the last. The book is suitable for young adult readers if you do not have strict views about language, fantasy violence, or gender roles. The language is nothing that young adults do not know, the violence is less real than what is on the nightly news, and the gender role aspects are also on broadcast television and worth talking about if you haven’t already. The book is also complex enough to hold an adult’s interest. They don’t know who they can trust even among the booksellers and who is trying to kill them or why. The writing is fluent, and the pacing is fast, so the pages turn very quickly. Five stars minus

Chas

Another great Garth Mix book

Reviewed in the United States on September 11, 2024

Neat story with interesting characters, seems like it’s to be a two story series. Majority of main characters are female, something Nix does well. Main male character has some subtle gender fluidity and a flirting style that disguises a more serious personality. Well worth the read. My granddaughter introduced me to Garth Nix’s works and despite being considered the wrong age for these stories find them interesting, complex narratives worth reading. Cheers

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