On a quiet street in Dublin, a lost bookshop is waiting to be found…

For too long, Opaline, Martha and Henry have been the side characters in their own lives.

But when a vanishing bookshop casts its spell, these three unsuspecting strangers will discover that their own stories are every bit as extraordinary as the ones found in the pages of their beloved books. And by unlocking the secrets of the shelves, they find themselves transported to a world of wonder… where nothing is as it seems.

My Review

I love this book so much. It’s gone straight to the top of my favourite books of the year – maybe even the decade. I kept thinking it reminded me of the books of another author, but it was only towards the end that I remembered who that was – Menna Van Praag.

Magical realism is one of my favourite genres, though occasionally it disappoints, because there are books which fall too much into the fantasy genre. The Lost Bookshop, however, is perfect.

The story is told in two timelines with three different narrators. It begins in 1921, after the 1st World War, and our narrator is Opaline Carlisle. Her much older brother Lyndon wants to marry her off, but she escapes to Paris and finds a job in a bookshop. I loved Opaline so much that on one occasion, when her story was particularly harrowing, I jumped two chapters to find out what happened to her. Then of course I went back to whoever should have come next.

In the present, we alternate between Irish girl Martha and English scholar Henry. Martha has just escaped an abusive marriage to Shane and found a job as housekeeper to the very elderly actress, Madame Bowden. Her job comes with a basement flat. Henry is writing a thesis on a lost bookshop, which he has stumbled upon, but then it appears to have vanished. He knows it was somewhere by the house where Martha now lives. Or is it the house?

As we jump back and forth from Opaline to Martha and Henry, and back again, we begin to see the connections. And we start to ask whether it’s all just coincidence or was it somehow meant to be. I just can’t enthuse enough about this book. I never want to erase its beauty from my memory. I cried (in a good way) so many times – it’s breathtaking, mystical, magical and bewitching – I’m running out of words to describe it. Oh yes – extraordinary.

About the Author

Evie Woods is the pseudonym of Evie Gaughan, bestselling author of The Story Collector, The Heirloom and The Mysterious Bakery On Rue De Paris. Living on the West Coast of Ireland, Evie escapes the inclement weather by writing her stories in a converted attic, where she dreams of underfloor heating. Her books tread the intriguing line between the everyday and the otherworldly, revealing the magic that exists in our ordinary lives.