Welcome to Night Vale

If you're a fan of the podcast, this will be right up your alley. Instead of following Cecil this time, you follow Jackie, the pawn shop owner, and Diane, the single mother of a shape-shifting kid, as they wind up trying to solve the same case of the mysterious man in the tan jacket.

The audiobook has the same narrator as the podcast, so you get the same voice and weird emphasis that adds to the story. I'm sure the book is ok on its own, but it always helps to have that extra oomph of vocal goodies. It is a little rough in the beginning as you're getting background on two different people, but they do come together more as the book goes on.

If you have not listened to the podcast, I would recommend giving an episode or two a listen to see if it's something you might find enjoyable because overall it is a little off-kilter.

Anyone who is into the podcast already knows this book is well-written and full of Night Vale in-jokes (if that's the right term?). It holds together well as a novel, which I was a little worried it might not do--not all great short story writers are also great novel writers.

For my part, I was disappointed at how little the voices beside's Cecil Baldwin's were featured in the audiobook. I mean, Cecil's voice is amazing, don't get me wrong, and he did a fantastic job narrating the story. It might just have been better to leave the other voice actors out altogether (which would only require a small rewrite), or to set expectations more accurately in some other way--I thought I was signing up for a full-cast production, and then I got distracted, waiting to hear (my favorite character) Carlos's voice, because Dylan Marron was credited.

But I hate to spend so much virtual ink on what is really just a minor problem with expectations, when the book itself is so well-done and enjoyable.

I am especially overjoyed that it has female protagonists, one of whom is a mother and is still a fantastic, relatable character. (I hate what fiction does to moms. It's part of why I've never wanted to be one, myself.)

I like that we get to find out about the Man in the Tan Jacket.

I like that we get to hear more about Science(!).

And I like--SPOILER--it takes listeners (or readers) into the Night Vale Public Library.

Ultimately, it fills in some gaps in the story, but doesn't really answer a lot of questions about Night Vale, which kind of adds to the fun.

I look forward to future Night Vale novels.

At the beginning the writing just felt kind of awkward instead of how the show presents it, and the story was fairly uninteresting, BUT getting past all of it for the last third or fourth of the book is definitely worth it! The plot picks up and the writing feels a lot better. I'm not sure if it's the case, but it's almost like Joseph Fink wrote the last bit of the book first and then spent the rest of the time writing the beginning just as buildup and explanation.

The story explains a lot about what's normal and what's not in Night Vale and how everything works, which was interesting, and the ending closes up a huge plot point in the show, so if you're a fan of the show, and you're willing to get through some less interesting stuff first, then definitely pick this book up!