Review: The Bookstore

Cover Summary:

A witty, sharply observed debut novel about a young woman who finds unexpected salvation while working in a quirky used bookstore in Manhattan.Impressionable and idealistic, Esme Garland is a young British woman who finds herself studying art history in New York. She loves her apartment and is passionate about the city and her boyfriend; her future couldn’t look brighter. Until she finds out that she’s pregnant.

Esme’s boyfriend, Mitchell van Leuven, is old-money rich, handsome, successful, and irretrievably damaged. When he dumps Esme—just before she tries to tell him about the baby—she resolves to manage alone. She will keep the child and her scholarship, while finding a part-time job to make ends meet. But that is easier said than done, especially on a student visa.

The Owl is a shabby, second-hand bookstore on the Upper West Side, an all-day, all-night haven for a colorful crew of characters: handsome and taciturn guitar player Luke; Chester, who hyperventilates at the mention of Lolita; George, the owner, who lives on protein shakes and idealism; and a motley company of the timeless, the tactless, and the homeless. The Owl becomes a nexus of good in a difficult world for Esme—but will it be enough to sustain her? Even when Mitchell, repentant and charming, comes back on the scene?

A rousing celebration of books, of the shops where they are sold, and of the people who work, read, and live in them, The Bookstore is also a story about emotional discovery, the complex choices we all face, and the accidental inspirations that make a life worth the reading.

I am not sure whether I can do this book justice. I honestly believe that, a hundred years from now, professors will write theses about it and assign it to their students – and even if they don’t, they should.

Deborah Meyler is the twenty-first century’s Jane Austen and Charles Dickens all rolled into one. This may sound like an odd combination, but she has the dry wit, sharp observation, and feminine strength of the former, as well as the idealism, sense of social injustice and energetic descriptions of urban life of the latter. Also, like all the best authors, she is not afraid to bring up controversial topics – homelessness; prejudices based on class, race and sex; the abortion debate; emotional abuse – and present them in a natural, unforced, compassionate manner that takes into account more than one point of view.

Esme Garland is a heroine after my own heart. Not just because she loves books, or because we’re the same age, but because she is so real that I half expected her to be sitting across from me in the armchair when I looked up, smiling from under uneven bangs, teasing me in her gentle English voice for losing track of time. If this book were a movie (which it should be!) I would cast her as Emma Watson.

She has a timeless quality about her – the problem of an unexpected pregnancy and a faithless lover is timeless, after all – but at the same time, her way of coping with it is very much the way of a highly educated, feminist, modern woman with a promising career ahead of her. She thinks carefully about her options, and – with the blunt and sensible advice of her friend Stella – makes a decision that is right for her, without being in any way judgmental of the decisions of other women in similar situations. This is not to say that she’s cold or detached, though, quite the opposite. Her emotions run very deep, and not just the “acceptable” emotions either: much as she comes to love the baby, she does have moments of resenting it for its father’s cruelty and for the added complications to her life.

She is not perfect. She is initially very naïve, and I wanted to shake her sometimes for not being able to see through Mitchell as the selfish, soulless creature he really is. She is afraid of confrontation (which she blames on being English, but this German-Canadian reviewer often feels exactly the same), which makes it very satisfying to see her slowly learning to stand up for herself. She also has a lot to learn about privilege (money troubles or not, she is still a white, heterosexual Cambridge graduate), how it should not be taken for granted, and that being less privileged does not make anyone less worthy of respect. I especially liked the scenes in which DeeMo, a black homeless man, contrives to both keep up with her in intelligent wordplay and call her out on her own prejudices. Moments like this between Esme and the regulars at The Owl stand in sharp contrast to Mitchell and his family, who are perfectly aware of their privilege and use it to control and humiliate others.

Mitchell, the other main character, is another brilliant creation of Ms. Meyler’s – and unlike Esme, a terrifying one. While it is easy to see why she would be overwhelmed by him at first, with his dazzling good looks, formidable intelligence and powerful charisma, the ugliness beneath the surface comes slowly, but surely, to light. He is a man who always has to be in control: when she tries to initiate anything, even lovemaking, he shoots her down and makes her feel guilty for even trying. He cheats on her, and then expresses surprise when she is hurt by this, because he thought she knew that they weren’t “exclusive”. He was raised by a mother every bit as heartless and controlling as he is, and there are moments I even pitied him in that toxic environment. However, it eventually becomes clear to Esme – and the reader – that wanting to “save” an abuser is no reason to stay with him, and that no matter how much you love someone, it doesn’t make you entitled to be loved in return.

The third main character is New York itself. You might think there is nothing left to be said about it, but there always is, and Ms. Meyler says it exceptionally well. She has lived there herself, even worked in an independent book shop like The Owl, and it shows. The genius is in the details: how Esme wakes up around Christmastime to the sound of the Korean deli owner downstairs meticulously sawing Christmas trees into shape; how the rain falls through the subway grates; how her accent gives her trouble communicating with shopkeepers when she pronounces “butter” with a “t” or “tuna” with a “ch”; how she enjoys the intensity of the seasons and the speed of life compared to her home. It’s also interesting to see how her views of New York and of England both change according to her moods, and how artistically aware she is of this. A park she went to in the spring with Mitchell, blooming with roses and graceful statues, becomes a graveyard in the autumn when Mitchell breaks up with her. She has attacks of homesickness for a version of England that she knows is idealized and not quite real, but she can’t help feeling it. She is an art student, accustomed to stepping back from her own emotional response and analyzing it, in a clear and objective way, at the same time as she’s still caught up in its impact. This gives her first-person narrative voice a unique quality that is hard to describe, but impossible (for me at least) not to admire.

Finally, I loved all the references to works of art, especially books, in this story: what they mean to different characters, how to define their value. Esme’s friend Stella is a photographer who loves her work because it captures a moment long after it has passed. Esme herself swims against the current of modern art by preferring paintings that make her feel happy. She and Luke have a beautiful conversation about their respective passions, paintings and music, and how they change as your perception of them changes.

The owners of The Owl deal in secondhand books because of the history and emotional weight to them, and they struggle to keep the store going in the face of Amazon, e-readers, and big chains like Barnes and Noble. They believe in the importance of connecting with customers and allowing them to discover books by chance, instead of by automatic recommendation. In this sense, the story reminded me of the movie You’ve Got Mail starring Tom Hanks and Meg Ryan, and also of the bookstores, cafés and libraries I know and love in real life, where people know my face and chat with me of an afternoon. 

These are places worth holding on to, even and especially in our digital age, and with more authors like Ms. Meyler, I hope we will.