The Reading List - Book Review

Book Blurb:

Widower Mukesh lives a quiet life in the London Borough of Ealing after losing his beloved wife. He shops every Wednesday, goes to Temple, and worries about his granddaughter, Priya, who hides in her room reading while he spends his evenings watching nature documentaries. 

Aleisha is a bright but anxious teenager working at the local library for the summer when she discovers a crumpled-up piece of paper in the back of To Kill a Mockingbird. It’s a list of novels that she’s never heard of before. Intrigued, and a little bored with her slow job at the checkout desk, she impulsively decides to read every book on the list, one after the other. As each story gives up its magic, the books transport Aleisha from the painful realities she’s facing at home.

When Mukesh arrives at the library, desperate to forge a connection with his bookworm granddaughter, Aleisha passes along the reading list… hoping that it will be a lifeline for him too. Slowly, the shared books create a connection between two lonely souls, as fiction helps them escape their grief and everyday troubles and find joy again.

My Thoughts

Anybody who is reading this must have read books and would agree that they could remarkably influence/impact us. Sara Nisha Adams The Reading List reiterates that fact. Book heals heart. It becomes the companions for loners. It could be a great advisor. It would allow us to see places that we have never been to and feel for people we have never seen. Books can also bring people together. Spread across 380 odd pages, the book explores loneliness felt due to absence of certain people as well as the loneliness felt despite the presence of people. The books beautifully bind an octogenarian Mr. Patel and teenager Aleisha together as they learn to navigate through their feelings and the sufferings.  There is a mysterious reading list that becomes the hero of the story and the lovely way in which it binds people.

It is a heartwarming book that makes us miss libraries. The library books had a distinct smell, didn’t they? The despair that seeps in when we learn that the book we were looking for is not available. The joy of finding the books we want. The freedom to explore as many books as we want. Those days! The Reading list is surely going to evoke nostalgia. Highly recommend this book.

PS: It is beautifully categorized by book names and those books are discussed extensively. The author has included her reading list and I thought of including mine. Here is the list of my most favorite books of all time that I recommend you read, if you haven’t already!

(In no specific order)

• -        Forty Rules of Love
• -        Tuesdays with Morrie
• -        I am the Messenger
• -        The Fountainhead
• -        Catcher in the Rye
• -        Red, White and Royal Blue
• -        The Subtle Art of Not Giving F*uck
• -        Ichigo Ichie

This was more tough than I thought. But at least I tried 😊