The Librarianist

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Overall, ‘The Librarianist’ presents us with a rather interesting character in Bob Comet. He embodies an unspoken sadness that infuses the majority of the novel. However, some of that was buried in the next section. Bob runs away and meets a bunch of random characters that I didn’t connect with. This section seemed to drag on and on. The Canadian author of this novel was shortlisted for the Booker Prize in 2011 for his second novel “The Sisters Brothers” (which also won two Canadian literary prizes and some other nominations) - an offbeat, eccentric-character-populated Western-based novel which to me read more like a Coen brothers film script. Behind Bob Comet's straight man facade is the story of an unhappy child's runaway adventure during the last days of the Second World War, of true love won and stolen away, of the purpose and pride found in the librarian's vocation, and the pleasures of a life lived to the side of the masses. Comet's experiences are imbued with melancholy but also a bright, sustained comedy; he has a talent for locating bizarre and outsized players to welcome onto the stage of his life. The final third is another time jump to Bob’s childhood where he meets a pair of travelling actors and he sort of helps them in their local production. Again: what’s the point? No idea. And this is by far the most boring part of the story too and the easiest cut because it has the least to do with anything. But we get it all for no reason. What a boring waste of time!

Is it a spoiler if there’s no plot to be spoiled? Anyway, I won’t reveal the character’s identity but deWitt could’ve ended the story there because nothing that follows adds to what we already know of Bob’s life and the entire final third is completely irrelevant.DeWitt does this, he has a simple story, a life, to some it might be quite a mediocre life, but it isn't. He examines that life and highlights and weaves and sees and while he is seeing he shows us because that is what we want with stories, we want to see, to understand, to connect and while connecting we feel seen too and that is the ultimate goal. We are seen, we exist. About another librarian, "She spoke of a world without children in the same way others spoke of a world without hunger or disease." Bob Comet is the non-humorous Leslie Jordan of a Wes Anderson film, and I was determined to give this book five stars based on the first half of the book alone. Sadly, the third part of the story saw my enthusiasm falter, and the last part ended with my expectations battling the reality of life and fiction.

Three woman who join together to rent a large space along the beach in Los Angeles for their stores—a gift shop, a bakery, and a bookstore—become fast friends as they each experience the highs, and lows, of love.Now, deWitt has published an exceedingly gentle novel about the hushed life of a retired librarian in Portland, Ore. Readers waiting for another book as irrepressible and strange as “The Sisters Brothers” will have to keep waiting. Which is not to say that “The Librarianist” is without charm, only that it presumes a reservoir of goodwill and patience. When and how Bob meets Connie (and her freaky Priest-hating father) and Ethan - really the only two people with who he ever forms a close bond – and how the dynamics of that off-the-wall set of relationships develop; Having written a Western (The Sisters Brothers, 2011, made into a not very good film starring Joaquin Phoenix), a mother-son mystery (French Exit, 2018, made into an excellent film starring Michelle Pfeiffer, for which deWitt also wrote the screenplay), a work of gothic fantasy (Undermajordomo Minor, 2015), and a second-person narrative about a bunch of Hollywood barflies (Ablutions, 2009), the new book is all about a journey of discovery for a retired librarian named Bob.

For me, Bob's relationships with Connie and Ethan were the most interesting portions of the book. I also liked reading about his volunteer work (at age 71) with the residents of an assisted living center. Unfortunately, there is a long chapter about when Bob ran away from home as a kid that bogged the story down. I don’t know!” the cashier said. He was happy the woman was gone but also happy that something interesting had happened. As readers we are introduced to his ex-wife, Connie, and his best friend, Ethan, a fast-talking playboy who ends up stealing Connie away from him. We also see him in his job at the library, and meet the character of Miss Ogilvie, Bob’s first boss. Some of the excitement that takes place in this section remains peripheral to Bob and to the plot.In contrast to them all is Bob, a “steady, hand-on-the-tiller type”, a man possessed of a “natural enjoyment of modest accomplishment”, a man firmly set at a midpoint between extremes. The Librarianist, among other things, is an exploration of how a man might end up so determinedly mild and middling: “Bob had not been ­particularly good or bad in his life. Like many, like most, he rode the center line, going out of his way to perform damage against the un­deserving but never arcing toward helping the deserving, either.” DeWitt’s great gift lies in his ability to depict the Everyman in extremis – heroism hidden in plain sight. An angry, powerful book seething with love and outrage for a community too often stereotyped or ignored. Behind Bob Comet’s straight-man façade is the story of an unhappy child’s runaway adventure during the last days of the Second World War, of true love won and stolen away, of the purpose and pride found in the librarian’s vocation, and of the pleasures of a life lived to the side of the masses. Bob’s experiences are imbued with melancholy but also a bright, sustained comedy; he has a talent for locating bizarre and outsize players to welcome onto the stage of his life. That international success set expectations high, but deWitt, who seems as unflappable as his deadpan assassins, has shown no signs of feeling boxed in. His next novel, “Undermajordomo Minor,” was a gothic adventure, and then, in another course change, came a brittle comedy of manners called “French Exit.”

This is his fifth and latest novel – and the only other I have read – and it retains something of the same offbeat humour and eccentric cast list (even including a Sheriff), but is a far more introspective novel and in fact is even blurbed as “a wide-ranging and ambitious document of the introvert’s condition”.Bob had long given up on the notion of knowing anyone, or of being known. He communicated with the world partly by walking through it, but mainly by reading about it." If you want a summary of the book, there are a million places to read that over and over again. Therefore, I will not put it in my "review." I just want to spew my thoughts as they come... A for the most part enjoyable read, somewhat different story than I'd expected, but enjoyable nonetheless. From the best-selling author of Atonement and Saturday comes the epic and intimate story of one man's life across generations and historical upheavals. From the Suez Crisis to the Cuban Missile Crisis, the fall of the Berlin Wall to the current pandemic, Roland Baines sometimes rides with the tide of history, but more often struggles against it. How a nice quiet librarianist, who starts off helping a person, and then volunteers, and then becomes a part of something greater than himself, can actually be a sweet yet flawed imperfect, but readable story.