Confessions of a Curious Bookseller

A Novel

By: Elizabeth Green

Narrated by: Susan Dalian

A heartening and uproariously funny novel of high hopes, bad choices, book love, and one woman’s best - and worst - intentions.

Without question, Fawn Birchill knows that her used bookstore is the heart of West Philadelphia, a cornerstone of culture for a community that, for the past twenty years, has found the quirkiness absolutely charming. When an amicable young indie bookseller invades her block, Fawn is convinced that his cushy couches, impressive selection, coffee bar, and knowledgeable staff are a neighborhood blight. Misguided yet blindly resilient, Fawn readies for battle.

But as she wages her war, Fawn is forced to reflect on a few unavoidable truths: the tribulations of online dating, a strained relationship with her family, and a devoted if not always law-abiding intern - not to mention what to do about a pen pal with whom she hasn’t been entirely honest and the litany of repairs her aging store requires.

Through emails, journal entries, combative online reviews, texts, and tweets, Fawn plans her next move. Now it’s time for her to dig deep and use every trick at her disposal if she’s to reclaim her beloved business - and her life.

©2020 Elizabeth Green (P)2020 Brilliance Publishing, Inc., all rights reserved.

Good story poor format

The diary/blog like format of the story was ambitious but left a lot to be desired.

I'm not sure what this was supposed to be about

I found Fawn annoying, the format annoying, and still an not sure what the point was. This might be a rare exception that some books do not lend themselves to being read aloud. I stuck with it and finished it hoping the point would be made clear, but was disappointed in the end.

Not a book for audio

99% of the book is written/read in email format so for instance read this outloud...To: Staff Sent: December 12,2018 From: Fawn Birchill Re: Decorations?... Now read that outloud roughly 39 times and that is only one snippet of one day.
The book was okay, I laughed out loud at several parts but if you removed the repetitive headers of each email exchange I feel this book would've been about 3 hours long. Definitely a book to read instead of listen to.

A book of emails?

So disappointed with the format of this promised to be a great, fun to read book. Especially with the social isolation and having such sterile communications these days, I just couldn’t stand to read another email! There’s no emotional connection with the characters just as there none in an email. Maybe without this time of isolation, this might be a fun read, but for now it just felt like work. I think the story would have been great in a more traditional format.

Just No

Tried to list to this as an audio book. impossible to follow the sequence since it's mostly strings of email communications read aloud.

Hated the email format!

The email format was tedious although the narrator handled it as well as she could. A lot of effort went into making the Fern very unlikeable, delusional and mentally ill. It turned around at the very end, but by then I was soooo tired of it.

Long book

Its a long book. The main character annoyed me. I didn't care for the letter exchange and diary entries.

Emails ugh

While I like the story that this book offers, personally I found the announcing of the emails to be annoying. I did push through and read to the end and it ends quite nicely.

Unlikable MC, not real plot

This book was... eh. The main character was unlikable and a chronic lier. The entire book was her finding herself while lying to everyone, ignoring or acting snobbish to her family and refusing to speak to her dying father. Meanwhile she is running a failing business... I was so board. If there was a big plot I missed it. This book just felt like a bunch if tiny annoying sub-plots.

The main character is so negative

The performance of this story was wonderful but I can’t see myself sitting through 3 more hours of a book whose main character is so full of herself. She’s like the annoying human I read books to get away from. Might be someone else’s fav, but definitely not my cup of tea.