Author: Audrey Nifeneggar
Publisher: Abrams
Rating: WORTHY!
This is the second of two posts today reviewing books by Audrey Niffeneggar. This one is really an excerpt from a longer work The library, so I understand, but I found it intriguing and interesting, but not stunning or brilliant. It was serialised in the British newspaper The Guardian. It's about a mature woman, Alexandra, who leads a very quiet life (some would argue: too quiet!) and adores books.
She's out quite late one night walking the streets in her neighborhood in Chicago, lost in thought after an exchange of words with her rather less than ideal boyfriend, when she comes across a Winnebago camper truck and discovers that it's the night bookmobile.
Like the TARDIS, it's bigger on the inside, but that's not even the most fascinating thing about it. On inspecting the books along the shelves, she discovers that it's really a record of everything she's ever read: all the books she has read - and only ones she has read - plus aassorted signs, cereal boxes, and so on, that she's read, too.
She eventually leaves, but when she returns later, the night bookmobile has gone. She doesn't see it again for a long time and when she does, she asks to be employed there, but she's turned down. The driver/owner/manager/librarian suggests that she find a job as a librarian in her own life, which she does, and becomes very successful in her chosen profession.
Later, she discovers that there is a way to work at the bookmobile, but it's not quite what she had expected. I liked this book. It's not the kind of book that has a beginning, a middle, and an end; it's more like a conversation with an old friend or a partner about a topic (in this case your reading experiences) which doesn't really start anywhere or go anywhere, but leaves you feeling a bit better about life afterwards anyway.
