My Reaction in a Nutshell: 
 What the fuck did I just read? 
 The Long Version: 
 This was literally the weirdest book I've ever read. And I've read some weird shit before. The first half of the book I had no idea what the fuck was even going on, but the second half at least sort of made sense. Even so, it was weird. The ending was strange too. Plus the rate at which humans just kind of accepted this weird supernatural/fantasy stuff was just plain odd. Perhaps it was partially my fault. I thought this was a book about librarians protecting their knowledge but instead it was a book about the world's shittiest teacher and what happens when you take your time to plot revenge. But Hawkins does have chapter titles that rival Rick Riordan's for creativity/length. 
 Honestly, I couldn't tell if I liked this book or not. There were many times when I almost DNF just because of how strange and confusing the plots was. I mean it had people talking with animals (like full on conversing with them), people being cooked to death in a BBQ thing (moral to the lesson: don't disobey the teacher), people being mauled to death my lions (that'll teach you to steal Simba), people being mauled by dogs (full on Cujo moment), people mauled by people (a new twist on zombies?), people turning into the sun (which surprisingly isn't a rare occurrence), people's arms being turned into tentacles (strangest disease I've ever heard of), this list goes on and on. The plot was strange. The writing wasn't bad, but I think the only reason why I finished was because this book is so weird I just wanted to see if the ending makes sense. And (view spoiler)[ spoiler alert: it fucking doesn't. Okay, well maybe if you squint it does, but that doesn't make it seem any less strange. The book was basically one huge teaching lesson. A 'you were always the chosen one' moment. (hide spoiler)] 
 Basically if you want to read a weird book with lots of people being mauled/tortured and becoming friends with large cats, then I suppose this is the book for you. If not, then avoid it like Barry O'Shea's reality virus (yes, that's a thing in this book. (view spoiler)[ Spoiler alert: it's bad (hide spoiler)]). 
 ***TRIGGER WARNINGS: abuse, suicide, R, victim blaming, murder, death, torture, burning alive, dog attack, mentions of war