The Library

The two protagonists are 'invisible' teenager Tom, who suffers from the loss of his mother and has to deal with his alcoholic father, and ex-flower-child Maggie, now in her 70s and running a small farm with sheep and chicken all by herself. Not the most typical representative of their age group, they are still portrayed very authentic. Tom and Maggie meet at the local library, which is for both the only place they don't feel lonely - and an unusual friendship ensues. One of their projects: saving the library from imminent closure. I absolutely enjoyed this book and its poignant story. Life is not full of roses, and neither is this story. There are some serious topics tackled here, and sometimes it was nearly heartbreaking. But at the same time it is also quite uplifting, and just as Tom and Maggie both get a lot out of their mutual friendship so does the reader. And last but not least it is a declaration of love to reading books!

Ist there a genre like cozy family drama? Imho that's a description this book would fit into. There's Tom, a self-conscious teenager who prefers to go through life unnoticed. After his mother died, his father got in the habit of drinking and there's not much left of the happy family they used to be. Then meet Maggie: a sturdy old widow who lives on a farm, does yoga and martial arts and seems unafraid of anything. When by coincidence Tom and Maggie meet at the library, an unusual friendship starts to blossom, and soon Maggie takes Tom under her wing. Tom starts opening up and becoming the boy he could have been all along. When the local library is threatened by closure, Tom and Maggie start a campaign to save one of their favorite places. While there were a lot of dramatic issues touched in this story, it never lost its cozy charm which made it a comfortable, at times even funny book to read. While some coincidences felt overly convenient, the plot developed easily and the characters appeared well-drawn, though I got the impression that Tom sometimes behaved much too grown-up for the teenager he still was. Overall, I very much enjoyed reading this book which revealed itself to be much more substantial than I first expected.

Ist there a genre like cozy family drama? Imho that's a description this book would fit into. There's Tom, a self-conscious teenager who prefers to go through life unnoticed. After his mother died, his father got in the habit of drinking and there's not much left of the happy family they used to be. Then meet Maggie: a sturdy old widow who lives on a farm, does yoga and martial arts and seems unafraid of anything. When by coincidence Tom and Maggie meet at the library, an unusual friendship starts to blossom, and soon Maggie takes Tom under her wing. Tom starts opening up and becoming the boy he could have been all along. When the local library is threatened by closure, Tom and Maggie start a campaign to save one of their favorite places. While there were a lot of dramatic issues touched in this story, it never lost its cozy charm which made it a comfortable, at times even funny book to read. While some coincidences felt overly convenient, the plot developed easily and the characters appeared well-drawn, though I got the impression that Tom sometimes behaved much too grown-up for the teenager he still was. Overall, I very much enjoyed reading this book which revealed itself to be much more substantial than I first expected. (thanks to netgalley, the author, and the publisher for a copy of the book, all opinions are my own)