This is Gene Wolfe’s last book as he passed away in 2019. This is a sequel of sorts to “A Borrowed Man” (published in 2015). I just want to say here how sorry I am that he's passed; he wrote some of the more unique SF I've had the pleasure to read, e.g., “The Claw of the Concilliator.” Fabulous series.

“InterLibrary Loan” is based on Wolfe's world where Reclones are shelved in the local library. They are live copies of human authors stored in their niches and are the sum total of the books they've written. They are completely individualized colorful personalities, spiffy clothes and all. Though they are completely human and eat, drink, have sex - their only home is their own personal spot among the regular books.  But, the world at large does not considered them human and reclones can be destroyed if they are not checked out frequently enough.

Ern A Smithe, mystery writer, is stored at the Spice Grove Public Library. And one day he, and two other authors (a romance author and a cook book author) are pulled for an interlibaray loan to The Polly's Cove Public Library; and the mystery ensues. A bedridden, depressed woman gets her teenaged daughter to check out Ern and cohorts because she wants to find out if her long-missing husband, Dr. Barry Fevre is really missing or dead and there's an old book with a mysterious map in it that needs interpreting…the other two are borrowed because she likes romances and cooking.

Smithe and friends go on an adventure to Lichholm otherwise known as Corpse Island. A place where the villagers stack their frozen dead in a huge ice cavern and whose dead loved ones were being used by Dr. Fevre for cadaver studies. And they weren't happy about it.

This is such a quirky tale that hops about like a flea on a hot griddle. First you have two characters talking on a ship and then you're back to the depressed mom and her teenaged daughter and there's a break and a backflip to another part of the story.

It is a small, flavorful bit of novel. It ends peculiarly. And I am not really sure what we have learned from the tale. But as an eccentric end to a very talented author's oeuvre, it works. ~~ Sue Martin

For more titles by Gene Wolfe click here