The Haunted Bookshop

By: Christopher Morley

Narrated by: Stefan Rudnicki

In 1917, Christopher Morley published Parnassus on Wheels, a love letter to the art of bookselling. Its suspenseful sequel, The Haunted Bookshop, finds his beloved characters married and still in love with both mystery and literature.

Set in a lovingly evoked Brooklyn just after the end of World War I, The Haunted Bookshop cleverly juxtaposes a pair of middle-aged bookshop owners and two young lovers with a nest of German saboteurs, complete with mysterious clues, red herrings, blushing romance, derring-do, a desperate race to the rescue, and an explosion. More important, the novel is an eloquent hymn to the bookseller’s trade and a fervent plea for the revivifying and redemptive power of literature. The unifying thread of this book, and indeed of the life and work of its author, is its passionate avowal: all that the world and everybody in it needs is a good book.

©2014 Christopher Morley (P)2014 Skyboat Media

Refreshing change from modern literature!

I so enjoyed listening to this book written in 1919! It was so refreshing to read a book without foul language without characters texting, Making phone calls or stealing information from computers. Refreshing to see a romance budding without sexual content. I enjoyed seeing the mystery develop And as always loving for the Gallant young man coming to rescue the Young woman in danger! The kind of story that is a good mystery and leaves you feeling good with a good ending! I appreciate the patriotic content

haunted bookshop

so enjoyed the twists and variety of language of a 1919 mystery. Please read you will enjoy!

Entertaining to the End

I thoughly enjoyed this book. The narration was perfect. It provided a fun romp through literature.

Adorable!

Plus, I learned so much about books I should already have read in my life, and which I will be reading ASAP.
I just loved the Book Man and his wife. If only everyone felt it their duty to teach others what they have learned!

Very very good.

I loved this second part of parnassus on wheels. As charming and as engaging as the first. The narrator is amazing.

Fun Little Msytery with a Side of Literature

This little mystery is set soon after WW I. It's not a ghost story. Some will find it quaint as it was written in its own time (1919), but that can be refreshing if you need a break from the graphic violence , sex and non-stop action in many current mystery/thrillers. It's a quick trip, but has good writing, well-drawn characters and a decent adventure. It also includes many references to great literature, several of which I bookmarked to look up later. Finally, if you come from the world of advertising, you'll get a kick out of one of the main characters, who is constantly translating his experience into concepts and slogans.

A book of essays with a story in the last 2 chapters

At the start this narration was only good for reading me to sleep. Sadly, the bulk of the story is just Roger Mifflin waxing on and on about the philosophical importance of literature without much glimpse of his lively character as seen in the Parnassus on Wheels. The only early evidence of author’s previous work is when Helen shows up to sparkle for a paragraph or two. Tatiana is also a well done character when she finally arrives. The “story” really doesn’t get going until the chapter 13 or 14 out of 16 - which is entertaining enough. The rest can be interesting for the purpose of hearing the contemplations of the author writing about his outlook on life and society at the end of WWI in 1918 (published in 1919) having come through the the old pandemic and common-man contemplations on statecraft. It’s interesting to hear how similar thoughts and life then are compared with 2022. Not a great book, though it got me through the last of my sweater crocheting!

Not thr sequel I was looking for...

3.75 stars.

This is the sequel to Parnassus On Wheels, but it felt nothing like a sequel.

The Haunted Bookshop (haunted by books and authors) was a strange tale about a bookseller and his wife doing a favor for a wealthy businessman man by hiring his daughter to teach her something about life and having a job. Then enter Aubrey, a representative from an advertising agency who wanted to represent The Haunted Bookshop. He is turned away but is so enchanted by the shop that he returns. Aubrey is instantly infatuated with the lovely Miss Tatania. After he is attacked on his way back from the bookshop, he thinks the neighborhood is much too dangerous for an unsoiled dove like Tatania. He then names himself her watcher/protector. In the end, he (stupidly) uncovers an insane plot and inadvertently foils it.

Aubrey was a most annoying character with his insane ideas and self-importance. A lot of the craziness could have been avoided if he had just gone to the police with his suspicions, which could have been proven by his attack. His ridiculousness kind of took me out of the rest of the narrative, which is why this got a much lower rating than Parnassus. Otherwise, it was a good mystery. And I always love hearing my home town (Philly) mentioned in books.

Better Off Imagining A Sequel...

Which came first? The chicken or the egg? Did poor narration make the sequel boring, or did writing that dragged and dragged and dragged give the narrator nothing to work with?
One of the problems is that "The Haunted Bookshop" seemed really conflicted about what it was trying to be. Charming? A tiny bit of that. Mystery? Tiny bit. Espionage? Tiny bit. Romance? Itty bit. SEVERAL bombastic lectures about many, many books, eras, authors, not even parsed out as discussions but vomited onto the page as diatribes? Oooooh, plenty, PLENTY of that! And keep in mind that Stefan Rudnicki's voice is that of an anchorman, or an historian. Considering that this novel takes place after World War I, I could easily hear Rudnicki narrating a lengthy historical work on the time period, and that would have been fine. This, however? What little charm there might have been was lost.
I would've missed Nadia May from "Parnassus On Wheels," but the characters were missing here, and she would've had nothing to work with. It was odd, really. In the last book, there was some scrapping that went on, but that just seemed like some hardheadedness. Here, I found individuals to be, quite simply, obnoxious and foul. Go figure.
I missed the characters, I guess.
Once again, I'll advise: If you do wish to listen to this: Get the kindle whispersync for cheap first, so you can get the special audible price. Trust me, you don't want to pay full price for this one...

Old fashioned adventure yarn.

This is a sweet story about a man and his love of literature and the people who support him and find love in the haunted bookstore.