A world without books sounds terrible. Who would ever want to live like that.  I know there are people in this world who can read but choose not and it’s baffling but that has nothing to do with this book.  Books can really change a life.  For Sefia, her life was simple until her father is murdered and she is forced to go on the run with her Aunt Nin.  For years, her parents have been hiding a mysteriously item and people are hunting down Sefia and Nin for it.  When Nin gets kidnapped, Sefia finally decides it’s time to find out what she’s carrying and why people murdered her father and how she can get Nin back.  It is a book. It tells her.  In Sefia’s journey she is joined by another orphan, Archer and pirates.  Meanwhile there are dual narratives of Lon, an apprentice to the Master Librarian.  A secret society that is tasked with gathering all the knowledge of the world and controlling it.  They spend their time recopying texts from one manuscript to another and learning to see people’s pasts in vision.  Lon proves to be a fast learner and with the help of the Second, a assassin apprentice he begins to see things are not as they seem.  We also meet Captain Reed and his crew first in Sefia’s book and then for real.  At first it was confusing with all these story lines going on at the same time.  I could tell that they were all meant to tie together but it just didn’t jive.  I started to guess that one of the story lines wasn’t happening at the same time as the others and then things started to make sense for me.  It was an exciting first book to a new series.  Sefia is strong and resourceful.  She is resolute in finding the ones she loves.  She teaches herself how to read and discovers the secret of the book.  Archer has an equally tragic backstory.  Taken from his family at a young age, he is raised in violence and forced to fight to the death.  It’s all mixed with tension and intrigued.  I can’t wait to read the next one.