The Bookshop of Dust and Dreams

"I loved this book! Smart lead, some history in it, and had a lot of character development. Definitely worth it. As a writer, I even picked up a couple of things I want to incorporate into my writing. I can not recommend this enough!"

"This is a unique story and I don't think I've ever read anything quite like this before. I think I've read similar stories but something about this one and the way it's written is so different than anything I've heard or read before. This is both an enchanting, heartwarming tale and a heartwrenching emotional rollercoaster much like life can be sometimes when things happen.<br/>It's about a girl, Poppy, and her family that own a magical bookstore called Rhyme and Reason. This occurs in the time frame of WWII in 1944 and so their world is gray and hard with the war going on, but the shop helps make things better with customers from the past and future stopping by bringing their fun and different stories and such. Poppy wants to be the next shopkeeper after her father because of the connection and love she has for the shop plus she's good at it, but her older brother, Al, is next in line to be the next shopkeeper. She knows all of the rules and especially the important ones like the one that shopkeepers are not to use the magic for themselves. One day they receive news about her brother's friend, Carl, who left to serve in the war that he's died and Al doesn't know how to handle the grief and feels like something's not right about it all. So Al decides he wants to use the magic from the bookshop to try to go back in time to save Carl and Poppy is the one left trying to stop him since her father is sick in the hospital. <br/>Poppy is torn between love for her brother and knowing that they shouldn't break the rules and has to make some hard decisions about what to do. She has to learn to find herself, love herself, and have courage through it all. All the customers from the bookshop band together to help her and she learns about the strength and courage and love of family and friends too. It's definitely a rollercoaster ride especially toward the end of the story and worth the read. One of the things said in the story that I love is that "everyone has magic inside of them". This story is chock full of good quotes and sayings and teaching moments. It's an intense book dealing with somewhat weightier topics such as grief that's very well done.<br/>I would definitely recommend putting this on your list, going to get it and read it right now. You don't want to miss this magical tale about this amazing bookshop, family, and Poppy, who finds herself and her strength and learns to be even braver than she already was.<br/>Thanks so much to NetGalley and Penguin Group Penguin Young Readers Group for letting me read and review this magical read. All thoughts and opinions are my own."