Lezersrecensie
Privilege om mee te mogen lezen.
Have you ever finished a book thinking, what a pity the writer isn't alive anymore? I was feeling that when I just finished 84, Charring Cross road. Since I received it as a spontaneous gift on Wednesday evening, I have not let it get too far from me. A good book is for me one which you don't want to leave your hands, so when my partner came back from a night shift this morning and said: I left yesterday evening and you were reading the book, I come back this morning and I find you reading the book.
Charring Cross road is very well known to me, but not the book and I might not have bought it myself. But I have been turning page after page loving the twenty year long correspondence between Helene Hanff, living in New York, and mainly Frank Doel from the secondhand bookstore in Charring Cross road, London. They never meet, are completely different people, different cultures, ... but Helene creates over two decennia a relationship with the people working in the bookshop and their families. I loved reading about the books Helene wanted and why, laughed loudly because of what she says and even more how she says it. You feel privileged to be allowed to be part of this correspondence and the lives in it. Helene made her dream to visit the London of her books reality when she traveled to London in the early seventies and by then I was also ready to follow her further, even without letters, because I completely loved her by then!
Emptying the washing machine, thinking about dinner or whatever else I do during the day, had to wait... because I just had to keep reading till the end. What a pity Helene Hanff isn't alive anymore, she would bring wittiness to our lives, so hopefully people keep reading this book!
Charring Cross road is very well known to me, but not the book and I might not have bought it myself. But I have been turning page after page loving the twenty year long correspondence between Helene Hanff, living in New York, and mainly Frank Doel from the secondhand bookstore in Charring Cross road, London. They never meet, are completely different people, different cultures, ... but Helene creates over two decennia a relationship with the people working in the bookshop and their families. I loved reading about the books Helene wanted and why, laughed loudly because of what she says and even more how she says it. You feel privileged to be allowed to be part of this correspondence and the lives in it. Helene made her dream to visit the London of her books reality when she traveled to London in the early seventies and by then I was also ready to follow her further, even without letters, because I completely loved her by then!
Emptying the washing machine, thinking about dinner or whatever else I do during the day, had to wait... because I just had to keep reading till the end. What a pity Helene Hanff isn't alive anymore, she would bring wittiness to our lives, so hopefully people keep reading this book!
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