Monday, November 28, 2022

Adult Assembly Required by Abbi Waxman

 



Reviewed by Kristin

Laura Costello is having a very bad day. She’s soaking wet, a newcomer to L.A., and her apartment building has just burned to the ground. When she stumbles into Knight’s indie bookstore, Liz the manager is kind enough to offer her a towel, as soon as she can find where that towel went. (Oh yeah, it’s under the cat.) In the middle of her very bad day in a brand new town, Laura is suddenly surrounded by several people who are ready and even willing to help.

Laura has come to L.A. for a physical therapy graduate degree, which her extremely highbrow academic parents and brothers barely think is a thing. She can still hear the echoes in her mind…But you have so much potential, Laura! The move from New York to the West coast was a big enough deal, but now having to find a new place to live and buy clothes and…a toothbrush? Polly, one of the bookstore employees, impulsively invites Laura back to talk to her landlady who just happens to have a freshly vacated room.

 It almost seems too good to be true, but Laura starts to find her way amidst this group of welcoming strangers. The shared meals are loud and friendly, her room is lovely, and she’s sharing a bathroom with a man known by the other women in the house as Impossibly Handsome Bob. Bob is indeed handsome, but he keeps to himself and tends to the roses in the garden.

Of course there are always a few bumps in the road, as Laura deals with issues from her past and tries to figure out how she will move forward. Striking out on your own is always a bit scary, but Laura is finding a lot of help in assembling her new life.

After finishing this book, I discovered that it’s a follow-up to The Bookish Life of Nina Hill, which makes sense considering that Nina is a co-owner of the bookstore which the soaked Laura tumbles into on the first page. Now I’ll have to go back and happily read that one, since I’ve had a taste of the delightful world these characters inhabit.

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