Alcatraz Versus the Evil Librarians

Alcatraz Versus the Evil Librarians

Cover of Alcatraz Versus the Evil Librarians, Brandon Sanderson's first juvenile fiction novel.
Author	Brandon Sanderson
Cover artist	Marc Tauss
Country	United States
Language	English
Series	Alcatraz Versus
Genre	Fantasy novel
Publisher	Scholastic Press
Publication date	October 1, 2007 (first edition, hardback)
Media type	Print (Hardback)
Pages	320 (first edition, hardback)
ISBN	0-439-92550-9 (first edition, hardback)
OCLC	78771100
LC Class	PZ7.S19797 Alc 2007
Followed by	Alcatraz Versus the Scrivener's Bones

Alcatraz Versus the Evil Librarians is a juvenile fiction novel by Brandon Sanderson, published in October 2007 by Scholastic Press. The book is named after its main character, Alcatraz Smedry.

Plot summary

Alcatraz Versus the Evil Librarians is a young adult novel about Alcatraz Smedry, a young teen who is always breaking things. After receiving a bag of sand for his thirteenth birthday, he is involved in a strange set of events which begins with a group of librarians stealing his bag of sand, which turns out to have rather unusual properties.

The book starts with Alcatraz setting fire to his foster parents' kitchen. It is revealed that he has been in countless foster homes, always ending up with Alcatraz "destroying" things precious to the people taking care of him. Ms. Fletcher, Alcatraz's personal caseworker, arrives and scolds him for destroying his foster parent's kitchen.

The next day an old man arrives at the house and claims to be his grandfather, telling Alcatraz that he has a special, powerful talent for breaking things. He later finds out that there is a secret society called the Librarians, whose purpose is to conquer the remaining Free Kingdomers and rule the world.

Characters

The plot of the book revolves around the title character and a small group of freedom fighters operating against the cult of evil librarians that secretly rule the world. These freedom fighters include Alcatraz's grandfather, Leavenworth, usually just referred to as "Grandpa Smedry"; Bastille, Grandpa's bodyguard and a Crystin Knight; Sing Sing - Sing for short - Alcatraz's Polynesian cousin; and Quentin, another cousin. The Librarians include Shasta / Ms. Fletcher, Alcatraz's case worker, who turns out to also be Alcatraz's mother, and Radrian Blackburn, a Dark Oculator.

Smedry Talents

In the course of the book, it is revealed that Alcatraz's biological family, the Smedries, all are born with amazing talents that they use to combat the evil cult of librarians.

Alcatraz has the talent of breaking things.

Grandpa Smedry, Alcatraz's grandfather, has the power to arrive late. As such, he is always running behind the clock. But his power also allows him to arrive late to other things, like bullets, which always miss him, and his blood can arrive late to wounds so that he doesn't bleed to death. In his own words "I've been arriving late to my own death for years now."

Sing, Alcatraz's cousin's talent is the ability to trip and fall to the ground.

Quentin, another cousin, has the talent to speak gibberish or nonsensical phrases. His talent was beneficial after being captured by the librarians, as they could not understand him and thus could not gain important information from him, even through torture. It was through some of Quentin's supposed gibberish that Alcatraz was prompted to know what to do in future events.

Smedrys from ancient days had grand talents, though relatively unexplained. One could get unbelievable amounts of water on the ground when she spilled something, which allowed her to end a drought. Another could make rude noises at inappropriate moments, breaking enemies' concentration so they could not use weapons.

If people that aren't related to the Smedrys and marry a Smedry, the person marrying into the family gets their spouse's Talent.

Sequels

Alcatraz Versus the Scrivener's Bones was released in the United States November 1, 2008. A third Alcatraz called Alcatraz Versus the Knights of Crystallia was released on October 1, 2009. The fourth book's title is Alcatraz Versus the Shattered Lens and was released on December 1, 2010.^[1] Brandon Sanderson has revealed that he intends to write five Alcatraz books. In early 2013, because Scholastic only commissioned the first four books, and was unwilling to publish the fifth book, Sanderson purchased the rights to the series back.^[2] He later sold the series to Tor Books who will republish the series. Brandon has also revealed that he is working on the fifth and final book of the series "The Dark Talent"^[3] which is scheduled for a summer 2016 release.

Film adaptations

DreamWorks Animation acquired the film rights to Alcatraz Versus the Evil Librarians in June 2008.^[4] On January 3, 2011, Brandon Sanderson, the author of the novel, tweeted that DreamWorks did not renew the rights.^[5]

References