This book, originally published in German, and very well translated into English by Melody Shaw, is a story set in an old bookshop in a small town in Germany. Like all bookshops that have persisted against the odds over the years, the City Gate bookshop, too, is in a state of transition. Its owner, the formidable Gustav Gruber, is in a care home.
His most beloved employee and trusted friend over so many years is Carl Kolhoff, now employed part-time with the limited responsibility of delivering a few books to particular customers. Sabine Gruber, the new owner and Gustav’s daughter has rung in sweeping changes, modernised the delivery with customers ordering online and preferring to attend to walk-ins herself. Carl has no place in her scheme of things.
She has done her best to marginalise Carl. The one thing she has not reckoned or perhaps can never reconcile to is Carl’s knowledge of books and of his customers. We see early evidence of this.
“Can you recommend a good book?” a stock question every bookseller has faced is asked by Ursel Schafer to Sabine Gruber. Sabine recommends a historical family saga with a green cover, a colour Ursel detests. Carl recommends the ideal book for bedtime reading, a romance set in Provence, which Ursel accepts happily.
Carl has a set of loyal customers whom he has named after characters in their favourite books. Christian von Hohenesch, a fabulously wealthy man, looks as if he had stepped out from the pages of Jane Austen’s . So, he i.