The Reading List

Aleisha, a teenage librarian with an attitude and recent widower Mukesh bond over reading books off a reading list of unknown origin. Both are dealing with family issues. They meet when Mukesh decides he wants to read fiction to feel closer to his wife, so he goes to the local library and asks Aleisha for recs.

She is uninterested and unwilling at first but then she finds the reading list at a propitious moment, starts reading the first book (To Kill a Mockingbird) and passes it on to Mukesh. They form a two-person book club and read each book as Aleisha goes down the list and then recommends it to Mukesh. The rest of the story is seeing them deal with their individual family issues.

Mukesh is treated like a child by his three daughters who think he can't handle life without his wife. Aleisha is a child (teenager) but her and her twenty-something year-old brother Aidan are not allowed to be young because their mother is in the middle of a mental health crisis. Since their father is off with a new family, it falls to Aleisha and her brother to look after Mom.

The connection with Mukesh in Aleisha should be found with neither of them being allowed to act as their true age because of family dynamics/recent tragedy and the isolation this has created. The books are a form of escape as well as a way toward broadening their view points. Adams doesn't go deeply into any of this.

It is handled in a shallow, obvious way. Much of the dialogue reads like commercials for the books and told in such a way that a child could grasp it. “I learned so much from Atticus.” “This is just like when Jo was grieving for Beth.” It's stilted and not believable as two real people talking.

It is a very easy read, no challenging ideas and little plot. The sudden dark turn it takes is out of place in such a soft, mushy book. Adams didn't handle it or lead up to it very well. We didn't explore Aidan or his troubles enough to have his suicide mean much to me so it just seems melodramatic and just a device to give the book some plot or big event.

Adams could have taken another few passes at this book to add more depth and connection. Seems like a first draft rushed to publish.