So far this could be some sort of dystopian social commentary on a future-teenage wasteland. Having given up on school, but independent enough to realise that she needs to educate herself, Ropa spends much of her time each month trying to scrape the money together to pay for their rent and get her Gran her much-needed meds. (In some sort of creepy Prisoner-like way the traditional greeting seems to be “God save the king” to which the respondent reply is “Long may he reign.”) Her background seems rather typical of many in this future. She lives with her Gran and her younger sister on a caravan park in some sort of alternative or future Edinburgh. TL Huchu’s debut novel not only has a secret library as a place in its pages but is proud enough to have it as the book’s title. (Which makes me think: there might be an article in there somewhere…) What that also means, I guess, is that a book with a library as a setting already starts with an advantage for me, and I suspect for some others. Because, you know: books! Untapped knowledge, things to discover, to educate, to entertain, all in one place. Are you one of those people who enter a library almost with a sigh of relief, with a feeling of “coming home”? Even now, when much of my reading is done digitally and with my own physical copies, walking through the doors of such a place makes me smile.
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