This post was originally published at Novelicious.com and is now at WritingTipsOasis.com. WritingTipsOasis.com acquired Novelicious.com in June 2022.
Reviewed by Susan Lobban
“To all those men and women who will always find a place for themselves in a library more easily than in society, I dedicate this entertainment.”
One morning a librarian finds a reader who has been locked in overnight. She knows him as she does all her regulars, but she is used to being invisible to everyone. Now she has a captive audience (finally), she unloads her views on everything from the Dewey Decimal System – a library classification system – to the unappreciative public.
The poor, unsuspecting interloper will leave in no doubt where the librarian’s passions lie and nobody will look at a library in the same way again.
This is a French story that has been translated into English, which could probably be read one sitting. I am not a big fan of shorter novels as I often find they stop too abruptly and leave remaining questions, but this story has natural progression as it is simply a librarian’s one sided conversation with someone she finds asleep in the library one morning.
To be honest, if this had been a much longer book, I probably would have given it up. As much as I love libraries, there is only so much I want to read about the Dewey Decimal System. There is intrigue with the librarian's character as she makes mention of the researcher, Martin, but it is lost within the continuing rant. It is obvious that the librarian has nobody close to her and, as such, is bursting to vent her frustrations to anyone who will listen. I have never read a book quite like this; there are no chapters and only one contributing character.This book is suited to book lovers who need a light read in between heavier tomes. If nothing else, it gives us a glimpse behind the scenes at every book lover’s favourite place, which can't be bad.
5/10