Review
by Deb Czajkowski
True
or false: Loveday Carlew has spent the
better part of the last seven years hiding in the lost for words bookshop. If
you are defining hiding as being
concealed or hidden from sight, then false.
Okay, it is true that, occasionally,
Loveday does try to hide amongst the bookshelves during her work day (she loves
books; people, not so much). But the truest part of that statement is metaphoric:
Loveday has spent the better part of the last seven years in the lost for words bookshop hiding from life ─ her past, her present, and her future.
And this is the Loveday we meet today ─apprehensive
and introspective.
True
or false: Archie Brodie has lived many lives.
If you are defining lived like
reincarnation, than false. To hear him tell it, he has traveled the world,
associated with royalty of all kinds, lived a lifetime of wild, weird, and
wonderful adventures, being whomever he wanted to be in the moment. The true part is, again, metaphoric. Now he is the owner and proprietor of the lost for words bookshop. Archie is also Loveday’s boss (he is the owner), her friend (unspoken),
and her guardian (secretly).
True
or false: Nathan Avebury enters the lost
for words bookshop to reclaim his lost (and found by Loveday) copy of Grinning Jack by Brian Patten. You know
this cannot be as simple as just true or false, right? So yes, it is true that the
Brian Patten book is Nathan’s. He did accidentally drop it on the sidewalk, and
he does want it back. But it is Loveday’s pithy ‘lost and found’ sign in the
window that really draws him into the
bookshop ─and to Loveday herself.
To
quote Harper Lee, “You can choose your friends but you sho’ can’t choose your
family, and they’re still kin to you no matter whether you acknowledge ‘em or not.” You also can’t choose your childhood. Given
these two statements, I propose one more true or false statement: Despite your
family and/or your childhood, you can, as an adult, choose your own future.
Trick,
right? That statement does not ─cannot!─ have a “one size fits all” answer. It is personal to each person, to each life.
Every person, thus every story, is different. Author Stephanie Butland uses unique
and quirky Loveday’s narrative in lost
for words bookshop to skillfully illustrate one path, one life, one answer. Using the present to move the Loveday’s story
forward, Butland alternatively takes us back in time to live with Loveday the
events of her past that accumulate to shape the twenty-five-year-old woman we
meet at the beginning of Butland’s book.
When
Butland ends her telling of Loveday’s life, where does she stop? Is Loveday
still hiding amongst the books and bookshelves in the lost for words bookshop? Has
Loveday found a way to navigate people
─Customers? Friends? Family? ─ into
her solitary life of books?
I
can suggest two ways to find out: 1.
Stop by the lost for words bookshop (fyi… it’s in London) and ask for
Loveday; or 2. Read Stephanie Butland’s lost
for words bookshop. Either way, I
can assure you that you will enjoy meeting captivating, intriguing, inquisitive
Loveday.
Purchase the book at:
About the author:
Stephanie
Butland is a writer, who is thriving after breast cancer. (She used to say she
was a survivor, but that was a bit lacking in joie de vivre.)
Although she’d never have chosen it, her dance with cancer has changed her life in many positive ways. Now she is happier, healthier, and more careful with her precious life and the precious people and things in it.
Her writing career began with her dance with cancer, and now she is a novelist.
Aside from writing, she works as a speaker and trainer, and she works with charities to help raise awareness and money in the hope that cancer will soon be about as scary as a wart.
She lives in Northumberland.
Although she’d never have chosen it, her dance with cancer has changed her life in many positive ways. Now she is happier, healthier, and more careful with her precious life and the precious people and things in it.
Her writing career began with her dance with cancer, and now she is a novelist.
Aside from writing, she works as a speaker and trainer, and she works with charities to help raise awareness and money in the hope that cancer will soon be about as scary as a wart.
She lives in Northumberland.
Connect with the author at:
Facebook* Twitter * Goodreads
St.Martin’s Press is giving
1 lucky
winner a print copy of
The
Lost For Words Bookshop
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