Janet Skeslien Charles’ novel, The Paris Library, tells of the life of Odile in Paris, 1939–44, and in Montana, 1983–88, where we see how wartime experiences shaped her into the wise woman who befriended lonely teen, Lily. During the Nazi Occupation, Odile worked in the American Library in Paris (ALP), where she bravely saved books and defended Jews from destruction. Forty years later, nurturing and encouraging Lily during her tumultuous high school years, she “saved” Lily. This novel is an uplifting story.

The Paris Library, a work of historical fiction, interested me on several levels. I am a Francophile who hungers for stories of the French Résistance during World War II. So, entering Odile’s Parisian life appealed to me, and I felt great admiration for everyday sacrifices (rutabagas, anyone?) of Odile, her family, and coworkers. Letters from her soldier brother from the Eastern front and then from a prison camp showed his realities. Glimpses into Odile’s police chief father’s job showed Nazi-ordered changes in his duties. Forty years later, when Odile teaches French to her young Montana neighbor, Lily eats it up like a sucrerie (sweet), and so did I.

 

I’m also a bibliophile, so I identified with Odile’s and her coworkers’ shared passion for reading. Their name-dropping of titles piqued my curiosity, too. The American Library in Paris employees not only kept the library open but also heroically delivered books to troops and Jews for solace, comfort, escape, mental privacy, edification. Librarians are considered “part psychologist, bartender, bouncer, and detective.” [page 249] Susan Orlean’s nonfiction The Library Book, also offering insights into libraries’ many functions, underscores this wide scope of librarian roles. Both books give surprising examples of patrons’ actual inquiries.

 

Last, but certainly not least, The Paris Library is an honest human story. Young Odile and Lily are smart, feisty young women feeling their way into adulthood. They test their parents’ limits, learn to appreciate their parents’ protective instincts, learn to accept responsibility, learn whom to invest their love in, and whom to not waste hope on. Both girls are sensitively observant of human nature. Their crushes, insecurities, and questions are simply real and quite relatable. Another parallel between the two women is that they both benefited from mentoring by mature women, Lily by middle-aged Odile, and young Odile by the ALP’s directress.

 

Finally, Charles’ writing is lovely, from the symbolism of crows and pearls/nooses to apt descriptions like “a crane wearing a paisley bow tie,” to picturesque similes like brows raised, “curled like question marks” [page 264], and metaphors, such as Lily’s rebellious thought about her dad’s not letting her get her learner’s permit to drive as she’s about to rebelliously snoop in Odile’s closet: “I wanted to tell him he couldn’t keep me hermetically sealed in this house forever. Mary Louise had taught me to drive on the dirt road that led to the dump. It wasn’t that hard.” [page 260]

 

Upon finishing this book, I remained curious about the fates of several characters, but my questions do not qualify as loose ends in the plot. Perhaps I would just like to be invited in to the main characters’ future lives. Sequel, Ms. Charles? In The Paris Library, love triumphs over evil, not in a syrupy way, rather more in the way most people hope love will win when you do the right things for the right reasons in difficult circumstances.

 

The Library Book by Susan Orlean ~ my review

 With the central theme of carefully researched facts about the disastrous April 29, 1986, fire at the Los Angeles Public Library, Susan Orlean presents colorful, eclectic stories about that library’s history and libraries in general. At the time, news of the fire went largely unnoticed, eclipsed by news of the Chernobyl nuclear disaster, which had happened just three days before. Orlean writes The Library Book as homage to libraries everywhere.

 

The curious thread of the arson investigation kept me intrigued, as if reading a mystery novel. Complicating the inquiry and trial was the only provable fact: Harry Peak, the alleged arsonist, was a pathological liar. Orlean’s interviews with Peak’s family, friends, colleagues, fire department officials, and library workers on duty the day of the fire are fascinating.

 

Orlean includes details of the cleanup and emotions felt by some library staff. One librarian, Jill Crane, wrote a poem that began: “We held charred and watersoaked chunks of books in our hands. History, imagination, knowledge crumbling in our fingers. We packed what was left.”

 

A number of Orlean’s library-related rabbit trails touched me, but none so much as the timeless importance of books. I could read pages 92 and 93 again and again. She speaks tenderly of the love-of-libraries connection she had with her mother whose dementia now prevents her from sharing those memories with her daughter. Books can set bleakness and chaos in order and harmony. We take our memories with us when we die—unless they are written down. “In Senegal, the polite expression for saying someone died is to say his or her library has burned.” Because of books, “You know that you are a part of a larger story that has shape and purpose …”

 

Orlean’s other rabbit trails include history of Carnegie libraries, gender bias in library administration, and the office politics victories of flamboyant Charles Lummis at the turn of the century. The Library Book also includes interesting tidbits about the wide, surprising range of patrons’ reference-desk questions, and librarians’ duties, including refereeing chess and checkers games.