Many slim Amazon packages come through my letterbox, mostly containing books. When I opened this particular one however I was slightly puzzled. I didn’t remember ordering this book, although it did look like something I would choose. Had my ordering finger clicked the button late one night? My buying does occasionally get rather random. Luckily I delved into the cardboard envelope and found a gift slip. A kind friend had sent a present and I’m not sure I even knew Amazon offered gift slips in this way.
The weather was awful and in my diary the days after Christmas were fairly empty so there was plenty of extra reading time.
I swallowed this book down in unseemly chunks. I loved it and although I finished it a few days ago I am still with those characters, living the story.
My friend said that this book was charming but not great literature. I agree, although I wouldn’t like to have to write down a definition of what constitutes ‘great literature!’
A small, old fashioned library on the Harrow Road in Wembley is in constant danger of being closed and this provides the centre that the characters, each with their own narrative, revolve around. There is a reading list that is found and this provides the mystery in the book. Who compiled it? Where did it come from? Does it have a hidden meaning?
The people whose stories we hear are a disparate group: old and young, lonely and lost, Hindu or not. I do not know Wembley well but I am aware it is a very cosmopolitan area with a large Hindu community served by the temple, or mandir, in nearby Neasden. I have visited with a class and it is amazing: a vast white, marble, palace like building surrounded incongruously by rows of suburban semis. I enjoyed the fact that this story is set within a very real, rather gritty, context.
However, you don’t need to have any knowledge of Wembley to enjoy this book. It is about the power of books and reading to make connections. These may be connections with other people ( and indeed how lovely it is to be able to share books with others and hear their views and thoughts). Or they are possibly connections with one’s own life, problems, dilemmas etc.
The barriers of age, class and culture are broken down here and people’s lives become entwined, to the benefit of everyone and the library community as a whole.
Looking up the author, as I usually do, I find that Sara Nisha Adams lives in London and has an Indian mother and English father. The idea for this book- her first- emanated from her grandfather who indeed lived in Wembley and connected with his granddaughter through books. Her second novel called: The Twilight Garden is due out in the summer of 2023. I will be buying it.
So, The Reading List is an absolute delight. Do read.
This is the reading list that runs through the book:
- To Kill a Mockingbird
- Rebecca
- The Kite Runner
- Life of Pi
- Pride and Prejudice
- Little Women
- Beloved
- A Suitable Boy
(You do not need to be familiar with any of these books to enjoy the novel.)
I have read them all except Beloved by Toni Morrison and I plan to fill that gap soon.
I may also have to go to the Harrow Road and see this little library. Google maps tells me it is still there. I hope they are right!