Like a modern retelling of Silas Marner — but our eponymous loner weaves with stories in a small bookshop on a Martha's Vineyard–style island instead of with a loom in a small English village.

I kinda loved Silas Marner and lord knows I love a retelling (whether it's meant to be one or not), and this is a generally beloved story that panders shamelessly to book lovers and insiders, so it should definitely be my jam. But I ended up being dissatisfied with it. Lots of clichés, which I'm not strongly opposed to when done well or subverted, and some other dicey choices, references, and what I think was dark humor that came off as super cringey (see content notes, but beware spoilers).



Topics & themes: community, family, reading, books, bookselling, writing, adoption, graduate school dropouts, connection, second chances, an expansive life
Partial list of tropes and types: grumpy-sunshine pairing, curmudgeonly man reconnects with community through precocious orphan girl, outsider in a small town, lost treasure, snobbish reader type, philandering artist type, embittered childless wife type, struggling Black single mom type, affable good-guy cop type, overbearing mother type
Content notes: deaths from illness, suicide, and car accidents; cancer, seizures, hospital scenes; unfaithfulness; strong language; closed door sex; alcoholism and drinking till passed out; intellectual snobbery; police misconduct (pulling guns on each other in a book club, not reporting theft); dicey LGBTQ rep (one white woman "slipping into bisexuality" in her 70s); dicey joking reference to looking like a terrorist; dicey joking rapey reference to having sex with your partner after they're in a vegetative state