We don’t have a great mechanism in publishing for stories that should not be their own books (physically printed) but are still interesting to read. The issue of course as an American is that there’s not a great tradition of American novellas as their are in other parts of the world. There’s still lots, but not as much as a field. And so, I am often quite harsh on short works that are published separately. As part of a collection of short fiction or collected novellas, I would be more generous to this book.
It’s written as a one sided conversation between a librarian and a library patron whom she has discovered was accidentally shut into the research basement of the library she works in. Truly a wish many of us could imagine happening. But as she apologizes, she begins to discuss the classification system of the library, other interesting tidbits about libraries and people who are contained within the library and other such topics.
So the narration is similar to that of Mohsin Hamid’s The Reluctant Fundamentalist, a book I like, but also think this narration style is the weakest element of that novel, and I don’t like it here either.
I am not quite so sure why this is a novel and not an essay. There’s an element of Oooooh, you didn’t know your mousy librarian had all this going on did you! But that’s not a novel concept. The writing itself is more interesting than the book that contains it.
(Photo: https://www.amazon.com/Library-Unrequited-Love-Sophie-Divry/dp/1623654033/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1549293696&sr=8-1&keywords=the+library+of+unrequited+love)