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Allison's Reviews > The Cartographers
The Cartographers
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This is a perfect example of why librarians should not read books set in or about libraries.
I DNF'd this book after chapter three because of the wild inaccuracies about special collections, i.e. the map department at the NYPL where the book is set. As someone who works in special collections I could not stomach the absolutely ridiculous practices stated in this book. Some examples from just the first three chapters:
1. The main character is constantly misusing the word cartographer. She does not make the maps herself so she is not a cartographer. She is some combination of curator/scholar/maybe conservator (I didn't read far enough to really tell).
2. She states that nothing has ever been stolen from the NYPL, when in fact, it has. In the map department no less! (I realize this may be a liberty Shepherd is taking for the sake of the story, but it's still wrong).
3. No one who is trained in the care and handling of rare materials would use DISH GLOVES to handle a rare item!
4. No way in hell would her father have been allowed to TAKE MAPS HOME FROM THE LIBRARY!!!! This is where the book lost me. No special collection library would allow such a horrific practice and no self-respecting scholar would do such a thing.
I realize that this is a magical fiction novel but there is no need for these inaccuracies to be included. Even just a little bit of research would show the author how these things would not occur in any special collection repository and it breaks my heart that these false claims are being perpetuated in such a high profile book.
I DNF'd this book after chapter three because of the wild inaccuracies about special collections, i.e. the map department at the NYPL where the book is set. As someone who works in special collections I could not stomach the absolutely ridiculous practices stated in this book. Some examples from just the first three chapters:
1. The main character is constantly misusing the word cartographer. She does not make the maps herself so she is not a cartographer. She is some combination of curator/scholar/maybe conservator (I didn't read far enough to really tell).
2. She states that nothing has ever been stolen from the NYPL, when in fact, it has. In the map department no less! (I realize this may be a liberty Shepherd is taking for the sake of the story, but it's still wrong).
3. No one who is trained in the care and handling of rare materials would use DISH GLOVES to handle a rare item!
4. No way in hell would her father have been allowed to TAKE MAPS HOME FROM THE LIBRARY!!!! This is where the book lost me. No special collection library would allow such a horrific practice and no self-respecting scholar would do such a thing.
I realize that this is a magical fiction novel but there is no need for these inaccuracies to be included. Even just a little bit of research would show the author how these things would not occur in any special collection repository and it breaks my heart that these false claims are being perpetuated in such a high profile book.
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Reading Progress
Started Reading
March 14, 2022
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Finished Reading
March 15, 2022
– Shelved
March 15, 2022
– Shelved as:
dnf
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Mar 25, 2022 10:41AM
Great review, thanks for pointing out all those things! Will skip this one.. But would you know to recommend any other fictional books where maps / cartography are playing central role? Other than Paper towns by John Green.
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It lost me on page seven when she asks for her coffee "Just black with a little cream."
Thank you. I can draw a big red line through this one and move on.
Thank you for saying all of these things. I’m a map librarian and it is difficult to push through this. I feel like I have to though because it will be a topic of discussion in professional circles!
Marcy wrote: "Thank you for saying all of these things. I’m a map librarian and it is difficult to push through this. I feel like I have to though because it will be a topic of discussion in professional circles!"Let me know what you end up thinking about it! I'd be interested to hear what an actual map librarian thinks :)
Former special collections cataloger here. Was so excited about the premise but, as you were, I was sorely disappointed at the inaccuracies of special collections curating. In case you were wondering, you didn't miss much by DNFing; the plot is hackneyed and the denouement is just nonsensical.
Or how she’s seemingly doing some kind of quick cataloging at home? I missed how she even logged into their cataloging system. With her old credentials that would absolutely not exist anymore?
I'm not a librarian, but my understanding is that libraries embrace technology. So I thought it was so odd how the main character (and her father, we later learn) thinks bringing technology into the NYPL is sacrilegious and rolls her eyes over even using technology for security! It's as if the author hasn't been inside a library since the 1990s.
I was surprised at the use of dish gloves.
As a professional cartographer for over 35 years, I agree with your first comment. Nell isn't a cartographer, nor is her father. Neither character creates maps. I'd consider them map historians or map librarians. I read the entire book because I wanted it to get better. Alas, it was not to be. I found at least one technical error on page 152. One of the "cartographers" incorrectly describes ..."small-scale maps, which depict buildings and floor plans..." As any well-versed cartographer knows, large-scale maps show smaller areas of the earth in greater detail. Small-scale maps, on the other hand, show larger areas of the earth with less detail. A map showing buildings and floor plans is large-scale.
An interesting note, Robert Krulwich wrote a story about the phantom town of Agloe for NPR back in March of 2014. Google "An Imaginary Town Becomes Real, Then Not. True Story."
I’m quitting about the same point as this reviewer, for similar reasons. This book desperately needed a good copy editor. I felt like the author hadn’t moved beyond this-is-how-you-write-description class. I quit the second time Nell went “clamoring” up the stairs. Baffled by the good reviews in mainstream press.
I'm in the same position. I can't figure out what these people actually do. Are they archivists or conservators? They're definitely not cartographers. And why do they despise the apparently rare and valuable highway map? Mass produced things become valuable all the time! Even if I didn't have specialized knowledge (I'm an archivist), the decisions the main character is making are inexplicable and why doesn't she have a funeral to plan?
Some of the questions in the comments about the highway map and computers are actually answered by the plot (and, indeed, are key elements of the plot)
I can't get over the fact that the offense wasn't just wearing gloves like the tried and true cotton white gloves, but freaking DISH gloves!
It didn't get better - it just got worse. My poor librarian heart about died multiple times. A major plot point is based on a private tech company coming in to scan every single item in the NYPL AND tag every single item so that they can all be tracked. Oh, and this all happens in just a few days. So much for patron privacy and the laws of reality. And then a geographer becomes head of the NYPL by the end. Omg....
Oh, they're not cartographers, librarians, or conservators. The people who work in the map library, including the interns, are doing academic research and nothing else. They have to bring in some tech firm because cataloguing is somehow beneath them and beyond them at the same time. When Nell was digging through the donation boxes looking for a great find that would make her career, I kept thinking, "You're an intern. If you want brownie points, just organize and catalogue stuff. That would be way more useful to the library."
I quit at the dish gloves and wine scene. It would have taken an hour to watch a few videos on archives, how to handle manuscripts, and map collections. It felt like she did 0 research on any aspect of the field or the NYPL.
Jamie, I laughed at the not black coffe, too. If it is black coffee, it has nothing else in it.
Yeah, gloves… taking things home and also my favourite: a secret desk drawer to keep important/rare maps while working on them instead of returning them to the stores, that only two people knew about. They would be safer on top of the desk.
As an academic who studies geography at UW Madison (the SAME EXACT university and subject where the cartographers did their academic work), literally nothing about the description of doing a PhD was accurate. This could easily have been fixed by doing research….urrrghhhh
I was annoyed at the idea that the security guard once allowed her to take more books home than she should have been allowed to as a child. That's not even specialized library/archival knowledge! Someone at a circ desk would be the one to make that decision! Security guard would have nothing to do with it! Did young Nell steal books away without checking them out as a child?!
Thank you; I am not in any of the fields related to libraries or maps, but I thought the dish gloves were inappropriate and was horrified that she had food near this supposedly important map! And previous commenter Hilary has confirmed my suspicion that the grad school depiction was very inaccurate. You didn’t miss anything by DNF’ing.
