Village Books

Rating: 3.5* of five

The Publisher Says: Village Books is a local institution…which is good, because most of the staff probably belong in one.

There’s the manager, Dante Andolini, who’s hiding more than just his hypochondria from his overbearing mother…Sebastian Donleavy, whose hedonistic lifestyle is two rails short of being on the rails…Aldous Swinghammer, whose philosophical eccentricities have not been the biggest hit with the ladies…Ebeneezer Chipping, whose crotchety exterior hides a burning passion for the Spanish émigré next door…Mina Bovary, whose crazy husband may have just gone AWOL with an arsenal of fragmentary explosive devices…and the store’s long-suffering assistant manager, who is spinning his wheels show more in retail while he waits for something better to come along.

That something better may be new assistant manager Leah Dashwood, an aspiring actress with an ambitious plan to transform the store and its staff in a way that will turn their carefully disordered world on its head. Will the store survive? Will it be bought over by its evil corporate competition? All questions will be answered (but not necessarily in that order) in this hilarious debut novel.

My Review: The Doubleday UK meme, a book a day for July 2014, is the goad I'm using to get through my snit-based unwritten reviews. Today's prompt, the thirtieth, was a "double-dip" and frankly I don't care what they picked, I was ready for this game to be over last week.

This is a first novel, and it's not too awful terrible well-constructed on a plot level. Too many things are dropped, then re-appear; too many people are shuffled from pillar to post and then needed back at pillar so whoopsie-daisy there they are. Motivations are, to put it mildly, unclear.

But you know what? I liked the characters. I liked the crazy bookstore people. I laughed out loud several times:

Trying to make her angry is like trying to find a corner on a bowling ball.
***
He went to India to "find himself" last year, but evidently he wasn't there, and he came back empty-handed.

Most of the humor isn't pull-quotable because it requires some familiarity with the situation. No matter, it was amusing, and several things rang very true. The Irish publican who served a drink called "the Englishman's Tits" to people he doesn't like. It's a shuddersome decoction. It involves beets.

So I meandered through the plot holes, I skipped over the male fantasy-fulfillment stuff, I sighed in mild annoyance at the pat ending. And I enjoyed a few hours of uncomplicated pleasantries exchanged among people I thought needed a swift kick. I'm not going to tell you to break your thumbs one-clicking it, but believe me it's got a little something extra to reward the tired, smile-hunting Kindle reader.


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More like 4.5 stars. I am always worried when I read books told in the First Person because sometimes the voice is not clear & also becomes a bit of a turn off. And sometimes, it takes a while to fall into the story if it's told by a narrator that doesn't have an engaging tone. None of that was the case for me while I read this book. I really liked the narrator & thought he was quite witty. The story was told colorfully & I felt a connection with the characters he related in the telling. I must admit that I've not read too many books where you never learn the narrator's name but it is a refreshing device when done well, as it is here. After the opening, I realized that I didn't know it & kept an eye out for it until the end. I cared show more about him so much, I still want to know this dude's name! I can only say that I find that a good character portrayal.

The story isn't so much about any one thing than a telling of a time in the narrator's life and what events took place that propelled him to the next stage in life. That happens for all the characters & some locations in the story and it happens in believable ways. I must admit that I worried for a long time how his relationship with Leah would resolve. Dante was great & I was happy for his ending. Sebastian & Aldous made me laugh a lot. Lolita, Mother Teresa & Miroslav had smaller parts but I felt that those were integral to the story & enjoyed them. I completely loved how the brick found in the back of the book shop was brought back into the story & tied to one of the characters & the unexpected twist that led to. Well done!

There were too many highlight worthy, quotable bits in this book and this will definitely be one of the best books I've read in 2012 (I've read more than a few). Don't let its being an indie deter from the opportunity to sit down and read it. I saw two typos but I've seen that many in professionally published works. Everything else is pristine. Especially the prose. I look forward to reading more from McLay. show less

Fun and interesting setting and characters (though the names were more caricatures than I liked and almost had me reject the story at the start). Alas, the random nature of events and a seeming lack of a coherent plot prevented this from truly coming together to be a solid book. The characters kept me reading to the end, but I can't grade it higher than 3 stars because the core story was as meandering and undirected as the POV character.

One subsection of fiction I’ve become enamored with is books about bookstores. Village Books is a dinosaur in 5his electronic age of ereaders- an independent bookstore. Staffed by an unforgettable group of quirky bibliophiles, Village Books has an interesting mix of drama, comedy and a sweet love story. Written with humor and an appreciation of the bookstore,this is a wonderful read.

I thought this book was sort of cute. I guess maybe I just didn't get it? Other reviewers have described this book as "laugh out loud funny." I may have smiled to myself once or twice, but that was about it. I started reading this book on my Kindle, about 75% of the way through when I finally caved and looked up the book description. I got that far and STILL couldn't figure out what the book was supposed to be about. The ending seemed sort of thrown together, like the author got through so many pages and then realized that he had to wrap this up somehow. All that said, the writing was clever, and I did care about the characters, so I might still recommend it.

This is a witty, cleverly written book about a book store in Toronto. It is filled with quirky characters and is very entertaining; lots of book, author, and movie references. I would recommend this book to bibliophiles everywhere!

Book is about a bookstore, Village Books in Canada and the people who work there. The best moments in the book are when the author writes about the characters who are a quirky, funny, sometimes psychotic psyhcotic group of people. I gave it 2 stars because it parts it was too slow slow but the ending seemed rushed as if the author felt like he had rambled enough and should end the story.