The Librarianist

 The Librarianist by Patrick deWitt

Bob Comet, retired librarian, steps into a convenience store where the clerk tells him a woman has been standing staring at the beverage cooler for the last 45 minutes. Bob stands next to her and asks if she's alright but gets no response, then notices the tag she's wearing that identifies her as a resident of a local senior's home.

He helps her back to the home and then wonders if he might be of some use as a volunteer there. Having no family or friends it might be good for him to be around other people.

"Bob had long given up on the notion of knowing anyone, or of being known. He communicated with the world partly by walking through it, but mainly by reading about it."

He asks Maria, the woman in charge, if he may come and read stories to the residents, but when his first book selection proves so dull it drives listeners from the room, she tells him to forget the books and just mingle and chat. Being neither a mingler nor a chatter, Bob is unsure, but he gives it a try and begins to make friends.

Then the wandering lady goes missing again, on page 83, and we don't get back to that story until page 379. Instead we move into Bob's past - his growing up years, finding a best friend - the only one he ever had, and meeting, marrying, and losing his wife, Connie. Then we go even further back to an incident in his childhood when he ran away from home and spent four somewhat unlikely days in the company of two actresses preparing for a play. When we finally do get back to the missing senior, it's close to the end of the book. 

The intervening stories are good - so interesting that when the first story picked up again on 397 I had almost forgotten about the wandering lady. I don't know why it's structured the way it is, but in the end it all does come together.

And the writing! I paused often to appreciate the phrasing. He has a way of articulating his thoughts with simplicity and accuracy that makes what he's saying easily relatable. An enviable gift. I would sigh and think 'I wish I could have said that'.

"There had been evidence of an odd-shaped fate running through the day, and both Linus and Bob were taken by unspoken potentiality." 

"It felt paranoiac, by also commonsensible..."

"It was a very small post office with a single employee sitting behind the counter wearing the somber look of a man wondering where the magic had gone."

"An hour and a half passed, and he paused, looking out to sea and having looking-out-to-sea thoughts.

The story was great but the ending felt vague - more like a pause in the middle of a continuing story - so I'm wondering if there will be more. I would like to get better acquainted with some of those quirky residents. 

In any event, this one is very good on its own.