"The Night Bookmobile" by Audrey Niffenegger

40 pages

In this graphic novel, Alexandra discovers an unusual bookmobile on one of her middle-of-the-night walks around Chicago. It's a mobile library that contains every book, magazine, newspaper, letter, form, and scrap of paper that Alexandra has ever read. But she can't check anything out, and when she returns to the spot where she found the library the next night, it's gone. She searches for it every night and soon it becomes an obsession. For years, she occasionally finds the bookmobile, only to lose it again. It inspires her to go to library school and find a career that she loves, but ultimately her obsession with books and the bookmobile is more harmful than helpful.

This book seems to be saying two things to me: one, that our relationship to books is powerful and the things we read shape who we are; and two, that there is danger in putting more effort into reading than our real lives and relationships with real people (and I expand this to include not only books but also any kind of escape from reality, like television, movies, and video games). It seems strange that a best-selling author would write a book about the dangers of reading, but I think she basically wants to encourage people to enjoy books but not to take them too seriously and forget to live in the real world. It's an interesting concept that I haven't read about in any other books. The illustrations are plain and the book left me with a sad feeling, but I recommend it for anyone who loves to read, as it made me think about the way that books impact my life.