Burned Book Review Novels & Stories

He stared down at it, then at me, shock flickering across his features before the fight dragged his focus back to the next threat. “NEW FUNCTION DETECTED,” the librarian snarled, voice crackling. “CORRUPTED AUTHOR. ILLEGAL EDIT.” A volley of books arced toward us. I didn’t have time to parse titles. Burn, I thought, flinging the idea like a shield. Flame licked the edges of a chunk of them mid‑flight.

Don read the review and said: "He reviewed a different book." Ernest read it. "Yes," he said. "He reviewed the book about cities and missed the argument about persons." "He reviewed the book he would have written," Don said. "Not the book I wrote." He set the review aside. He looked at the fire. The fire was burning at the March intensity—the fire that knew winter was ending but was not yet ready to yield to spring. Don said: "The inside account requires the inside. He read from the outside." He paused. "The outside reading of a book about inside accounts is a legitimate response. He is not wrong to read from outside. He has simply produced the outside account of a book that argues for the i

"This is not good." Jacquard felt something clutch in his chest. He tried to confirm what he saw one more time. It was a little different from the earlier vids. This time the Slizzard dumped some kind of chemical on chemical on the book and ignited it. The entire book was consumed in seconds. It could have been a fake, too. But in retrospect, the fire in this vid looked much more convincing than had in the other ones. Jacquard replayed it twice. There was an odd hitch in the vid, a sort of stutter in the image of the book ignited.

she said firmly, her voice taking a chastising tone. "No, this is exactly the time," I interjected stubbornly. "I saw fire today. Once you light a fire, it has to burn and it doesn't care if this is the time or place. Fire either burns brightly or it fizzles into nothingness and smoke. Without the fire, there is no light. So, are you two burning or fizzling?" I demanded. I wanted an answer. Andrew looked at me, and I shrugged. I might be confused from the drugs, but it had sounded poetic in my head.

I cut her off before she could say a word after she took my words as offense. “Touche,” she replied, her voice steady but laced with a hint of defensiveness. “What kind of help will you offer?” she questioned. “A help that you won’t be able to resist,” I muttered smugly as I brought out an old and worn-out book from my coat pocket and showed it to her. It is the book that I acquired from Beta Alek, the one that he entrusted me to burn. However, after reading its contents, how could I bring myself to burn a valuable book such as this?

Although I had no hope it would say anything I didn't already know, I flipped through the pages nevertheless. It took all but a few minutes to realize, I had been right. The book had nothing to offer. My search was still far from over, frustrated, I sighed flipping quickly through the pages. “You look like you’re about to rip that book in half.” I turned to see Zara leaning against a shelf, her arms crossed and a knowing smirk on her face. I hadn't heard her coming. “I just might,” I muttered, closing the book with a thud. “It’s a useless book, filled with lies and propaganda. Burning it would do it more justice.” letting my anger flow.

A handful of volumes wore painstaking repairs where burnt pages had been reinforced with impossibly thin sheets of parchment. She drifted towards one such shelf almost unconsciously. The nearest book looked as though someone had snatched it from a fire moments before it was lost forever. Its spine had split, the edges of its pages darkened to deep brown, while careful stitches held the binding together with remarkable precision. She looked back at Arkael. "I thought..." Her words faltered. Apollo's voice echoed unexpectedly through her memory. I burnt every Emberborn history. Her fingers hovered just above the damaged cover. "I thought they were destroyed."

I took Ava and ran. We had seconds. Fire alarms screamed. Men shouted. The house went into a frenzy, and in that chaos we found the service exit we needed. Metal clanged. Feet pounded. I shoved Ava into the car and slammed the door. The engine roared. The shadow in the doorway watched us leave. Isabella lay on the floor, the files scattered like a cemetery. She looked up. The bullet had not killed her. It had cut deep. Her eyes were steady now. “Burn it,” she told me, voice thin. “Burn it all.”

Damon I went back home immediately, my mind racing with several thoughts and ideas. Mrs Romano told me there indeed had been a book, containing what our actual duties were. It was fascinating that I hadn't heard of it all. Dad hadn't said anything about it in all the years and I knew for sure he knew about it. Then the story of the book getting burned, it was quite convenient if you asked me. The book getting burned and this increase in hunting vampires. Why hadn't we been taught about it in all the years they had been teaching and showing us? I knew there was no way I could ask dad, especially with the warning Mrs Romano had given me.

This time, I was ready for the pain that I didn’t even blink when it started burning. It felt like the times when my father made me hold hot coals so I could grow resistance to them. He was a sick and depraved bastard. The book feels old. The pages are crusty and seconds from falling apart. I bet they only have one more read left in them. And I’ll be glad to offer it.