Week 8 - Gentle Read Annotation

Author: Michiko Aoyama; Translated by Alison Watts
Title: What You Are Looking For Is in the Library
Genre: Literary Fiction; Gentle Read
Publication Date: Published in English - Sept. 5, 2023
Number of Pages: 223
Geographical Setting: Tokyo, Japan
Time Period: Contemporary
Series: none

Plot Summary: What you are looking for is in the library highlights the importance of public libraries through stories of five different patrons. Each patron is going through a change or challenge in life and all of them find themselves at the library. When pointed in the direction of the reference librarian, she asks each of them the same question, “What are you looking for?”. While they respond with answers like “books on Excel” or “books about Go”, using some really top tier reader’s advisory skills, the reference librarian is able to help them find what they asked for while also pointing them in the direction of what they are actually looking for. All the stories together really illustrate how important libraries are to the communities they serve and how much of an impact librarians can have on the patrons they interact with.

Subject Headings (per NoveList): Communities, Public libraries, Books and Reading, Epiphanies, Life changing events, Self-fulfillment, Japanese people

Appeal:

• Character
• Each story follows a different character at a different turning point in their lives. From a woman in her 20s contemplating a career change to a retiree trying to find a new direction for his life, there is at least one character that everyone can relate to. Over the course of each story more about the employees at the community house and the library are also revealed as each character interacts with them in different ways. The reader sees how lives can intersect without really overlapping.
• Pacing
• A slow pace is set early on in the book which allows the reader to develop more connection to the characters and what they are going through. The reader gets to experience, in real time, the epiphanies that each character has without being rushed. The slow pace also creates an organic feeling to the interactions and relationships between the characters.
• Mood
• Being a gentle read, it shouldn’t be a surprise that the overall mood is a positive and happy one. While reading about the lives of these characters, it’s easy to feel what they feel, whether that be anxiety about the future or joy at rediscovering an old passion. Each story ends on a positive note and leaves the reader with a sense of calm and peace.

3 terms that best describe this book: Calm, Relevant, Thought-provoking

Similar Authors and Works:

3 Relevant Non-Fiction Works and Authors

• How Do Worms Work? A Gardener’s Collection of Curious Questions and Astonishing Answers - By: Guy Barter
• This title was recommended to one of the patrons in the book and encouraged him to see things not as one or the other, or in competition, but as complementary.

• Evolution: A Visual Record - By: Robert Clark
• This title was recommended to one of the patrons in the book and led him to realize that things are not always as they seem and sometimes all you need is a change in perspective and environment.

• Reader’s Advisory Service in the Public Library - By: Joyce Saricks
• One of the most important aspects of this book is the reference librarian’s ability to suggest titles to her patrons that may not have been what they originally asked for, but that ended up helping them find what they were actually looking for.

3 Relevant Fiction Works and Authors

• Before the coffee gets cold - By: Toshikazu Kawaguchi
• Common elements: Japanese characters/setting, reevaluation of life, slow pace

• Days at the Morisaki Bookshop - By: Satoshi Yagisawa
• Common elements: Japanese characters, how books can change lives, importance of bookstores/libraries

• The Little Paris Bookshop - By: Nina George
• Common elements: Translations, reader’s advisory, the importance of books