SOPHIE Divry’s first novel is a conversation between a librarian and a reader who she finds has been locked inside the library overnight – except only the librarian’s dialogue is recorded.
The librarian loves her job but is bitter that she is running the geography section in the basement. She explains the Dewey system to her customer in detail and laments that regular library user Martin fails to respond to the fact she loves him – despite only having spoken to him once.
At 92 pages, this is easy to read. But it’s also easy to put down, as the librarian’s ramblings are annoying and her bizarre ideas are distracting rather than thought-provoking. This really could have worked but, unfortunately, it doesn’t.
4/10
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