YMMV / The Great Library

• Heartwarming Moments:
  • How much does Dario love Khalila? When he's captured by the Library, the Artifex forces him to betray his friends not by threatening his own family, but by threatening Khalila's.
    • A chapter earlier, Khalila is discussing with Jess the possibility that the Library might punish their families for their desertion. Thomas comforts her by giving her a big hug and promising that if she loses her family, then he will be her family.
  • While sitting in the Burner's Philadelphia prison, Wolfe, Santi, and the Postulants declare themselves to be a Family of Choice.
  • Despite Jess and Brendan's sibling rivalry, they work well together.
  • Smoke and Iron reveals that when Dario proposed to Khalila at the end of Ash and Quill right before he and Jess put their Batman Gambit into action, it was genuine. And Khalila says yes later in the book.
  • A semi-dark example, but when Glain finds out about the proposal, she tells Khalila that if Dario breaks her heart, she will kill him for her.
• Nausea Fuel: Translation. It involves using a combination of alchemy, magic, and technology to tear you apart from the inside out and reconstitute you miles away somewhere else. It's described in just enough detail to make you queasy without being gratuitous, and Jess promptly empties the contents of his stomach as soon as he finishes reconstituting at his destination.
• Tear Jerker:
  • In Ash and Quill, Khalila is forced to watch the Library kill her cousin to send a message, and learns that her family is being held prisoner in Alexandria.
  • The ending of the third book, when Jess, Dario, Morgan, and Brendan deliberately invoke Party Scattering by allowing the Brightwells' father to ransom them off to different countries. Dario is going to be ransomed to his cousin, the king of Spain, Glain is being sent back to Wales to keep the Brightwells in the good graces of the Welsh king, Thomas, Santi, and Khalila are being taken by Anit Ibrahim to ransom to the library, while Morgan and Wolfe are sent back to Alexandria, and Jess has to pretend to be Brendan in order to remain by their side. Meanwhile, he has to trust Brendan to keep the books and the printing press safe from their father.
  • Neska's death in Smoke & Iron, especially when Brendan attempts to throw himself in front of the Automaton about to kill her.
    • Followed up by Brendan's death at the end of the same book, especially after how well he and Jess worked together in the last two.