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ldickol's review
2.0
The setting of a used bookstore was the part I was most interested in. The characters were pretty bland. Pearl the protective motherhen, singer, and kindest friend was the only character I'd want to share some wine with. Most of the characters were clearly used as plot devices. The book took itself pretty seriously in the search for MEANING, and I was hoping for a more whimsical novel.
bookgirl4ever's review
3.0
Very different book. Intriguing, quirky characters but I didn't like the direction the book went. Well written.
beth_diiorio's review against another edition
4.0
I really enjoyed this story...I am surprised it has received low ratings from other GoodReaders. I thought the characters and the "mystery" were great! Go figure...
bibliocat08's review against another edition
4.0
I didn't think I would enjoy this book but I thought it was a really interesting story. As someone who also works in a bookstore I could really relate to the characters.
constantreader314's review
1.0
I tried for a hundred pages to like this book and couldn't manage it so I stopped.
thehappybooker's review
4.0
The Arcade book store is full of dysfunctional people and fascinating rare-book treasures, arcane knowledge and obsessive detail. The focus is myopic and claustrophobic, set in the perfect ambiance of that haunting bookstore, where the shelves absorb every sound, block the view, and choke the life out of its employees. It got a little too bleak for me and was hard to stick with because of the pervasive sense of people hiding out from life. Its vivid descriptions and evocative atmosphere stick with me.
jennifermreads's review
2.0
Publisher's Weekly review said "The three narratives--intrigue, Melville, Tasmannia--prove so different, however, that recurring themes of loss and abandonment fail to tie them together." This encapsulated exactly how I felt: that the story had great pieces that never fit as one. The lost Melville story was never the center of the tale; it was more about the relationships of those who worked at the store.
All-in-all: Decent but not fabulous
2022: As I add this from my print journal to my GR shelves I wonder (like really am questioning) why on earth I read a book with Melville anywhere near it. I so loathe Moby-Dick (the only book I will use the word "hate" to describe my feelings for it) that I cannot fathom why on earth I even picked this up to begin with!
All-in-all: Decent but not fabulous
2022: As I add this from my print journal to my GR shelves I wonder (like really am questioning) why on earth I read a book with Melville anywhere near it. I so loathe Moby-Dick (the only book I will use the word "hate" to describe my feelings for it) that I cannot fathom why on earth I even picked this up to begin with!
karieh13's review against another edition
3.0
“The Secret of Lost Things” is the latest in a long-ish list of books about characters that love books. This year I’ve enjoyed “The Thirteenth Tale”, “The Shadow of the Wind” and the latest by Jasper Fforde…all more than I enjoyed this book by Sheridan Hay.
The plot elements intrigued me…a sheltered girl from Tasmania moves to New York following the death of her mother, is drawn to an begins work at a “emporium of used and rare books called the Arcade”, a possible lost then found manuscript of Herman Melville’s…
And yet…after the first few chapters…I found myself drifting off. The pace of the book was too slow, tempting me to skim over parts of the book. The characters of the novel, while colorful, were not very compelling. And at times, the colorful bits just seemed too “over the top”.
“In fact, as I walked behind him, Geist’s white ears reminded me of delicate sea creatures suddenly exposed to light, vulnerable and nude. There was a shrinking quality to him, a retraction from attention like an instinctual retreat from exposure. I was fascinated and repulsed by equal measure, a contradiction that was never to leave me.”
On one hand, I appreciate the Dickensian creatures that inhabit The Arcade, and I suppose they are all the more mysterious and interesting to a young girl who was discouraged from meeting other people by her mother…but at the end of the day, I just didn’t believe in them.
I love bookstores. I love the smell of the paper and ink, the smell of dust, the possibility that I will discover a hidden treasure…I could spend hours in a good bookstore. And yet? Maybe I am too old to be enchanted by a description like this.
“Try to see this place for what it is.” “And what’s that, Arthur?” “Well, a bookstore, but also a reliquary for the bones of strange creatures. Mermaids’ tails, unicorn horns…that sort of thing. You’re looking at natural history in this place.”
There were, however, small treasures to be found in “The Secret of Lost Things”. There are moments of genuine emotion that pour out of two of the characters that have let life pass them by, who mourn for that which never was. A sentence here, a paragraph there drew me back in enough so that I finished the book. (And a small bit of applause for Hay, who seems to think about giving the reader the ending that s/he expects...the one the book has been hinting at all along…and instead...takes a better route.)
And here and there – I find something that reminds me of my love of books.
“No doubt my fondness for the Rare Book Room came in part from a sense of familiarity. It was a version of Foy’s hat workroom from childhood visits to Sydney. There were no piles of skins, no wall of drawers filled with bric-a-brac, but each old volume amounted to something like the same thing. A book was like a drawer: one opened it and notions flew out.”
In “The Secret of Lost Things” – the drawer that I opened yielded only bits of sparkle instead of a treasure.
The plot elements intrigued me…a sheltered girl from Tasmania moves to New York following the death of her mother, is drawn to an begins work at a “emporium of used and rare books called the Arcade”, a possible lost then found manuscript of Herman Melville’s…
And yet…after the first few chapters…I found myself drifting off. The pace of the book was too slow, tempting me to skim over parts of the book. The characters of the novel, while colorful, were not very compelling. And at times, the colorful bits just seemed too “over the top”.
“In fact, as I walked behind him, Geist’s white ears reminded me of delicate sea creatures suddenly exposed to light, vulnerable and nude. There was a shrinking quality to him, a retraction from attention like an instinctual retreat from exposure. I was fascinated and repulsed by equal measure, a contradiction that was never to leave me.”
On one hand, I appreciate the Dickensian creatures that inhabit The Arcade, and I suppose they are all the more mysterious and interesting to a young girl who was discouraged from meeting other people by her mother…but at the end of the day, I just didn’t believe in them.
I love bookstores. I love the smell of the paper and ink, the smell of dust, the possibility that I will discover a hidden treasure…I could spend hours in a good bookstore. And yet? Maybe I am too old to be enchanted by a description like this.
“Try to see this place for what it is.” “And what’s that, Arthur?” “Well, a bookstore, but also a reliquary for the bones of strange creatures. Mermaids’ tails, unicorn horns…that sort of thing. You’re looking at natural history in this place.”
There were, however, small treasures to be found in “The Secret of Lost Things”. There are moments of genuine emotion that pour out of two of the characters that have let life pass them by, who mourn for that which never was. A sentence here, a paragraph there drew me back in enough so that I finished the book. (And a small bit of applause for Hay, who seems to think about giving the reader the ending that s/he expects...the one the book has been hinting at all along…and instead...takes a better route.)
And here and there – I find something that reminds me of my love of books.
“No doubt my fondness for the Rare Book Room came in part from a sense of familiarity. It was a version of Foy’s hat workroom from childhood visits to Sydney. There were no piles of skins, no wall of drawers filled with bric-a-brac, but each old volume amounted to something like the same thing. A book was like a drawer: one opened it and notions flew out.”
In “The Secret of Lost Things” – the drawer that I opened yielded only bits of sparkle instead of a treasure.