Review of The Bookshop by Penelope Fitzgerald

My rating: 3 of 5 stars

📖 I decided last year to try to push myself to read more classic literature as although I read in quite a variety of genres, I do tend to stick with mostly modern writers (although To Kill a Mockingbird is still an all-time favourite, as is Rebecca). This little book was sitting in the library looking up at me and with a brief read of the cover, I thought I would give it a go.

Cover – The Bookshop

✍️ Penelope Fitzgerald was an English novelist, poet, essayist and biographer. In 2008, The Times included her in a list of “The 50 greatest British writers since 1945”. This book was Penelope Fitzgerald’s second novel, and was her first to be shortlisted for the Booker Prize.

🗣 I often think it’s useful to see an extract of a book to get an idea of the writing style. Here is a brief extract so that you can see a sample of the writing yourself:

She drove back one morning from Flintmarket to find the premises full of twelve- and thirteen-year-old boys in blue jerseys. They were Sea Scouts, they told her.
‘How did you get in?’
‘Mr Raven got the key from the plumber,’ said one of the children, square and reliable as a straw-bale.
‘He’s not your skipper, is he?’
‘No, but he told us to come over to yours. What do you want doing?’

👓 This book is primarily told from the point of Florence Green. A widow, who against the advice of most of those she knows, opens a bookshop in a small town. The town is virtually cut off from the outside world and Florence hopes that the bookshop will both bring the community together and bring a bit of worldview as she brings in books from published books from further afield.

👫 Initially Florence gains some support and even trains a young, streetwise girl to become her assistant but as is always the case with small towns, there are several busybodies but in Florence’s case, from the outset, there are those determined that her bookshop will not succeed.

💔 Any Negatives: I’m really perplexed reviewing this book. It has a bookshop (always a win), the writing evokes the time period and location very well, and I did like Florence. However the book itself feels very slow-moving (despite being a rather short book), and without giving any spoilers, I hated the ending which left me feeling very flat and as if I had trudged through the previous pages pointlessly. I am intrigued to see the movie and see if it brings more positivity to this story.

💭 Overall View: Perhaps I was expecting too much from this little book, sacrilege to all bookworms but I am holding out hope that the movie overshadows it.

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