2011 was a great year for new authors, and to that list of wonderful new voices I’d like to add Rebecca Makkai. I read The Borrower in one day, it keeping me company while tonsillitis kept me in bed and solitary confinement. It is the story of a librarian who kidnaps the most loyal reader in the library, a ten-year old named Ian Drake. Raised by bullish, evangelical parents trying to ‘un-gay’ him by sending him to youth groups, Ian gravitates towards Lucy Hull, the librarian raised on stories of her Russian family’s revolution. They drive across America, telling stories and stealing restaurant breath mints in their hundreds while Lucy is forced to confront her own falsified past and failures. Lucy is infinitely relatable in her hot-headed way and personal vendetta against creepy evangelical pastors. Well, to me at least. But the author shows a remarkable knowledge of literature, and many of the chapter titles are gleeful literary references for unbearable bookworms like me. Ian runs and turns through the pages, a remarkably clever, funny kid with a dry sense of humour and a penchant for dramatics. Throughout the story there are characters from all walks of life, Tim the actor being one of my very favourites. Throughout, issues like gay rights, the Patriot Act and Iraq pop up (the book is set during the presidency of George W Bush) are quietly mentioned, and I adore that it is worked in without being preachy. The Borrower isn’t as heavy going as many of the books I try to read are, but it is lovely when a book is an easy read without sacrificing depth. This is something I’d definitely recommend for everyone from the bookish university student to the beach readers. I especially recommend it for sections like this:
I knew that books could save him because I knew they had so far, and because I knew the people books had saved. They were college professors and actors and scientists and poets. They got to college and sat on dorm floors drinking coffee, amazed they’d finally found their soul mates. They always dressed a little out of season. Their names were enshrined on the pink cards in the pockets of all the forgotten hardbacks in every library basement. If the librarians were lazy enough or nostalgic enough or smart enough, those names would stay there forever.
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