This is the story of a middle-aged bookseller,Jean Perdu who has a book barge moored on the River Seine.He calls it the 'Literary Apothecary' because he doesn't just sell books but prescribes them to his customers like a physician would dispense medication for various illnesses after an exact diagnoses of the persons state of mind.But he is unable to treat his own depression caused by the sudden disappearance of his great love twenty years ago.Her name is 'Manon',she comes from Provence and believes in living life in the moment.
Perdu lives in an apartment complex shared by an eclectic group of people.What triggers Perdu to re-examine his life and choices so far is prompted by the arrival of Catherine ,a woman who is abandoned by her husband for a younger woman.When she moves in a flat opposite Perdus,he offers to give her a table as a kind neighbourly gesture because she is in need of furniture for her apartment.Perdu has kept the table in a room locked since Manon's disappearance along with his memories of their time together and opening that room brings back a deluge of memories.Moreover Catherine finds an unopened letter from Manon in the
drawer of the table and hands it over to Perdu.The letter and its contents sets everything in motion as Perdu grapples with guilt,loss and past memories.
He decides to unmoor his book barge and go and find Manon's village and put the past to rest.He is accompanied on this journey by an author facing a writers block after an unexpected first novel success.He is dealing with his own memories of a dysfuctional childhood.They in turn pick up two more passengers along the way,a Neapolitan cook who whips up the most delectable meals and an eccentric bookseller.
What happens on this journey?Is it possible to correct the past after decades?Is redemption even possible?
My Views:
I was hit harder by the year-end blues this time around and was in a particularly grouchy mood when I picked up this book. I under-estimated it a bit.I thought it would be similar to 'The storied life of A J Fikry',another book I had read at the beginning of the year and which spoke about a bookseller and books but the similarities ended there.This one turned out to be very emotionally demanding and took me longer than most books to read.What I didnt like about it was that it got too sentimental after a point,cloyingly so in parts and began to seem too fiction like and unreal.I couldnt connect too much with the characters,I had conflicting opinions regarding certain things but of course you can put that down to bias and I struggled a bit with the story.The emotional quotient was so high that I wanted to get it done with after a point.Now maybe that had something to do with the frame of mind I was in at the time but I find myself unable to deal with too much mush or sentimentality after a point.I really wanted to like this book more than I did.
Now lets come to the good part.I loved the lyrical prose and the language.It was sheer poetry in parts,I loved the book barge and the fact that Perdu could do a literary psychoanalysis and dispense books like medication.Read 200 pages of this book every night for the next three nights and you'll be cured.How cool is that!I loved it when he said that books are the only fixed point in an otherwise unpredictable world.In life,in love,after death.Books keep stupidity at bay!and of course I totally agreed with him when he said that 'Its well known that reading makes people impudent and tomorrows world is going to need some people who arent shy to speak their minds'.
I could empathize with him when he struggled to let go.I could understand the feeling that washes over you when you recognise that you havent got your whole life left to find out where you belong.What better time than the end of the year to mull over such thoughts!It pushed me a bit further down the abyss.But it also got me thinking.Dont we all have the sudden overwhelming inner thirst to seize life with both hands before time speeds past even faster.The futility of lost time.Of things we should have done because ultimately we really only regret the things that we didnt do.Did I tell you that this book is not as simple as it seems.It has the capacity to unsettle and overwhelm you.After all the talk about time passing us by these were some words which offered succour:
'All of us preserve time.We preserve the old versions of the people who have left us.And under our skin,under the layer of wrinkles and experience and laughter,we too are old versions of ourselves.Directly below the surface,we are our own former selves,the former child,the former lover,the former daughter'.
If you can get past the emotional aspect,this story is for those who believe in undying romance,second chances and who arent too shocked to discover that love doesnt need to be restricted to one person to be true.And of course the fact that everybody has an inner room where demons lurk.Only when we open it and face up to it are we truly free.
Read it if you are emotionally equipped to read it.
I rate it a 3 and a half out of 5.
and even though Ive started reading my next book,I think this one is the last for 2015 :)