84, Charing Cross Road by Helene Hanff

Our book club chose 84, Charing Cross Road by Helene Hanff to read for January. I'd never heard of it. 

Unfortunately, I think I got the wrong version. The one I picked up from the library was a play version, "Adapted for the Stage."I think, however, I got the gist of it.

One thing I didn't understand initially is that it is based on actual letters between the author, Helene Hanff, and a bookstore in London. The play opens with Frank Doel, the procurer of books for the "antiquarian bookseller" reading a letter from Hanff, a poor struggling writer living in New York. The first letter is dated October 5, 1949. She is requesting "three Hazlitt essays" as well as a Latin Bible. He promises to do his best to fulfill her order and ship them out.

What follows is the slow, and all-too-real, development of a transatlantic friendship centered on the appreciation of fine, largely out-of-print, books. Not realizing the letters were real, I expected the story to go in certain directions. Surely a love story would develop or some major crisis would erupt, or each book requested by Helene would either foreshadow or relate to some circumstance in her life. None of that happened. Real life simply doesn't happen that way.

Throughout the book, Helene expresses a desire to cross the ocean and meet those who share her love for fine literature. Alas, it is not to be. As Helene journeys through life, becoming increasingly successful, she is also thrown expensive curveballs, which constantly frustrate her ability to visit. As the years pass, she remains single, moves and changes jobs, various clerks at the bookshop marry and move on, some die, and finally, Frank Doel passes away. The last letter is from his wife, dated January 8, 1969. The twenty-year correspondence is ended. The final moments of the play depict Helene on a plane to London. 

It is certainly a charming book, told in a lovely manner. My only criticism is that I wish it had a bit more of a story. I would love someone to write a similar book, but include a plot. However, watching two people develop a long-term, platonic friendship over a shared love of beautiful literature is also a worthy endeavor.