Publisher: 6th June 2023 by Sourcebooks Landmark
Pages: 384 pages
Genre: historical fiction
My Rating: 4 cups
Synopsis:
Massachusetts, 1954. With bags packed alongside her heavy heart, Alice Campbell escaped halfway across the country and found herself in front of a derelict building tucked among the cobblestone streets of Cambridge. She turns it into the enchanting bookshop of her dreams, knowing firsthand the power of books to comfort the brokenhearted.
The Cambridge Bookshop soon becomes a haven for Tess, Caroline, Evie, and Merritt, who are all navigating the struggles of being newly independent college women in a world that seems to want to keep them in the kitchen. But when a member of the group finds herself shattered, everything they know about themselves will be called into question.
From the author of For Those Who Are Lost comes an extraordinary love letter to books and friendship, a story that is at once heart-wrenching, strengthening, and inspiring.
My Thoughts
‘Brewing a cup of tea, she took it to the chaise and sat down with her book. It lay unopened on her lap as she contemplated the silence. It was good to have a space to oneself where one could think and dream and plan.’
The Radcliffe Ladies' Reading Club is a worthy read for people who love books about books. Set in 1954 it details the lives of four girls from varying socio-economic backgrounds who are struggling to meld their own dreams with those of family and society. When the local bookshop owner starts up a classic book club, it becomes the avenue, through the use of classic literature, to analyse their own lives. This is a coming-of-age story of young friendships and fallouts.
‘…. through books we can find out more about the world and see where our imaginations take us.’
There are alternating chapters between daily life and the monthly book club discussions. Alice selects a range of classic books including F.Scott Fitzgerald, Tolstoy, Brontë, Austen, Woolf - and uses the issues raised to insightfully discuss and then somewhat apply the lessons to the lives and challenges these young women of the 1950s face. There are stereotypical class levels and incidents, many of which readers have seen before. I did have a couple of doubts about how certain aspects played out, but I let that go for my overall enjoyment of joining classic literature as a vehicle to steer these young women onto bigger and better things. It was the combination of literature to fuel the proverbial fire for these young females and the various paths they would find themselves on that appealed to me the most. With issues raised including sexual violence and domestic abuse, the author does a solid job of sensitively addressing them.
‘Women weren’t china dolls for men to pamper and care for with the caveat that they never speak their minds. They were living, breathing human beings with thoughts and feelings and emotions that were meant to be expressed however they chose to do it.’
If you love books about books with a special focus on the impact of classic literature on 1950s female societal evolution, you are sure to enjoy this book. The list of books are specifically curated (it even had me rushing to read one that I had not come across before) with the discussions lively and engaging.
‘All four of them were probably only delaying the marriage process by a few months, a couple of years at most, and then, if they weren’t careful, many avenues of thought would close to them. How likely would they be as young women to read books that challenged or interested them when there was a household to run and pregnancies to endure?’
This review is based on a complimentary copy from the publisher in exchange for an honest review. Opinions expressed in this review are completely my own. The quoted material may have changed in the final release.
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