I did not really like the beginning of this book, so I’m glad I stuck with it. Our main character, A.J. Fikry, is not in a very good place at first. You find out why he’s so nasty and bitter, although he’s never really all rainbows and sunshine. But the story gets better. Much better.
Shortly after we begin, A.J. is robbed of a valuable book, Tamerlane, which is a very rare edition of a poem by Edgar Allen Poe. (It really exists. Thanks, Wikipedia!) A few weeks after that, he finds Mya, an abandoned toddler in the children’s section of his bookstore. This is where things start to turn around.
The presence of Mya seems to improve everyone’s life, not in the least A.J.’s. She seems to be a bit too perfect, though. We never really learn of any of her flaws, at least none that stand out in my memory. She’s really smart, and likes to read. At some point she becomes a teenager, but that’s not really a flaw. Everyone else has flaws, just not her.
As a child, Mya is obsessed with The Monster at the End of this Book, which I was 
already familiar with, so yay! A.J. also gives her a book called Little Pea, a story about a little pea who has to eat his sweets before he’s allowed to have his spinach as dessert. I had not heard of this previously, so it is now in the mail on the way to my house, along with its compatriots, a tale of a neat pig and a sleepy owl. Just because he’s fictional doesn’t mean A.J. is an ineffective bookseller!
(Update – Little Pea, Little Hoot, and Little Oink came in the mail, and they are absolutely adorable!)
I had theories in the beginning, but then completely forgot about them by the time they became relevant. As that part of the story was no longer in the forefront of the characters’ minds, neither was it in mine. “If a gun appears in act one, that gun had better go off by act three.” Or you forget about the gun entirely and are mildly surprised by the gunshot!
Chapters start with the titles of books, so it takes a little getting used to with the audiobook. There is a book or story title and then a little bit about it, basically why A.J. chose it, ending with his initials. As you go through the book, it eventually makes more sense.
There are little pieces of the puzzle that are left unsolved, and perhaps it is best that way. Mya doesn’t get all of her answers, and neither do we. You don’t always know every part of your story in real life either. And some of the best moments come in the in-between parts, in the transitions or the pauses. “We agree to be disappointed sometimes so that we can be exhilarated every now and again.”