Three very different women at different stages of their lives come in close contact with each other when the owner of a beloved bookshop dies and leaves it to a relative. It’s initially hard to be around one another but eventually they use each other’s strengths to work through their own personal issues and develop a strong friendship.

I like books about bookshops. Bookshops are comfortable places and books are comfortable things so there’s a pleasant softness to a book like this.

My least favorite trope in any book is tension built through a lack of communication. It feels cheap in most cases, but when it’s (sparingly) used in this book, it actually makes sense.

My SECOND least favorite trope is the gorgeous jerk that eventually gets cracked to reveal a heart of gold. I think pretty people get too much benefit of the doubt and this stems solely from a green place of jealousy, but I doubt people would try so hard with normal-looking people.

That said, the jerk in this book is a gardener who was an Army doctor in Afghanistan. He saw too much and needed a break. His fiancée keeps pressing him to go back into medicine but he’s working through his own stuff.

While the book didn’t dwell on this, I do like the angle. Too often military stuff is mentioned as a shorthand for manliness and it’s almost always a celebratory rah-rah kind of affair. To try to deal with the repercussions of seeing the horrors of war without exploiting it was VERY refreshing and welcome.

This was a nice book. I knew going into it that it wasn’t going to be a thrill-ride and took my time easing into the pace and story and, soon enough, started caring about the characters.

If you’re looking for a warm read, this one’s for you.

#printedletterbookshop #katherinereay #bookshopbooks #books #bookrecommendation #booktok #bookstagram #bookstagrammer #booksky #readersofpixelfed #read #readinglog