In the House of the Seven Librarians

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The Carnegie Library in the story is obsolete, replaced by a new town library. The new library has "fluorescent lights, much better for the children's eyes"; it's equipped with "automated systems" and "ergonomic plastic chairs" p.

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The seven librarians at the Carnegie Library are having none of this spotless, soulless future. They've locked themselves into the old building, allowed a forest to hide them from the world, and built a cozy paradise of tea, biscuits, and rubber stamps. Their life is set to continue in an endless round of pleasant, orderly tasks, until a person unknown returns a very overdue copy of Fairy Tales of the Brothers Grimm , and pays the normal fairytale fine: That child, Dinsy, grows up in the library, cared for by seven quirky librarian mothers.

Her story revisits a familiar dilemma of utopian tales, which is that perfect worlds become boring pretty quickly. As a little girl, Dinsy loves exploring the Library, and even gets it to work some magic for her; as an adolescent, she finds that she wants more than this limited setting, wonderful as it is. What's outside the Library?

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Everything's always changing, and not in any way you can predict. This doesn't mean the Library is dull. There's magic and mystery in the stacks, and Dinsy's mothers have their own secrets. These seven librarians are characterized briefly, often in just a couple of sentences, but each emerges as a distinct character.

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Among the most memorable are Dorothy, who looks like the Wicked Witch of the West and is fond of horrible puns, and the formidable Marian, who runs the front desk, wears trouser suits and silk shirts, and used to be blond. Ruth and Harriet, the reference librarians, are "like a set of salt-and-pepper shakers from two different yard sales" p.

Olive, the children's librarian, is a tiny woman, shrunken by design rather than old age: In the House of the Seven Librarians grows up and down at the same time: This combination of "up" and "down" gives the story much of its sweetness. Dinsy draws with crayons in special library colors: Card catalogs have passed away as surely as Dinsy's childhood will, but that doesn't affect the charm of Dinsy's crayons, or keep them from serving as tools for her expanding imagination.

Throughout the story, a passion for the gloomy stacks of old libraries is balanced by Dinsy's desire to experience the world, and to find the future her librarian mothers have rejected. In the House of the Seven Librarians has the feel of a secret, or maybe a talisman—something you'd take with you to college to remind you that home is still there.

It's unfortunate that the cover design is so cluttered; something more muted and evocative of the past would have suited the story better.

Cover art aside, In the House of the Seven Librarians is a charming little book, full of the simple magic real librarians work every day. Book review , carnegie library , delightful , ellen klages , fairytale , in the house of the seven librarians , librarian , libraries , meredith debonnaire. Once upon a time, the Carnegie Library sat on a wooded bluff on the east side of town: What an absolute delight this book is! A love-letter to libraries written like a fairytale. It is short at a mere 74 pages, however it is candid and warm and shot through with humour.

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When the library is closed, the seven librarians of the title stock up on tea and biscuits and close the doors from the inside. They stay there, continuing to do their jobs, while around the building the wood grows ever thicker.

in the house of the seven librarians by ellen klages

There is a certain magic at work in them, as there is with anyone who spends their life among books, and perhaps they would have simply gone on forever. Except, one day, there is a baby. So the seven librarians find themselves raising a little girl, among books and the stacks and the break room. As I said, it is a short book.

And it is beautiful. The attention to detail is wonderful; should the kitchen condiments be organised alphabetically? By the Dewey Decimal system? The characters are tangible and a little reminiscent of the books to which they tend. You are commenting using your WordPress.

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