Mr. Penumbra's 24-Hour Bookstore

Sloan, Robin

ISBN 10: 1611736099 ISBN 13: 9781611736090

Publisher: Center Point Pub, 2012

Synopsis

The Great Recession has shuffled Clay Jannon out of his life as a San Francisco web-design drone -- and serendipity, sheer curiosity, and the ability to climb a ladder like a monkey has landed him a new job working the night shift at Mr. Penumbra's 24-Hour Bookstore. After just a few days on the job, Clay finds that this store is even more curious than the name suggests.

There are only a few customers, but they come in repeatedly and never seem to actually buy anything, instead "checking out" impossibly obscure volumes from strange corners of the store. The store must be a front for something larger, Clay concludes, and soon he's embarked on a complex analysis of the customers' behavior and roped his friends into helping to figure out just what's going on.

With irresistible brio, Robin Sloan has crafted a literary adventure story for the twenty-first century. Mr. Penumbra's 24-Hour Bookstore is exactly what it sounds like: an establishment you have to enter and will never want to leave, a modern-day cabinet of wonders ready to give a jolt of energy to every curious reader.

About this title

Review

Fun and funny and just plain enjoyable. It has mysterious books and thievery and Google (the place!)... It celebrates both the old and the new in delightful ways... And it has the honour of being the first novel of 2013 to make me cry, completely unexpectedly. Happy tears of that good-book-sucker-punch-to-the-place-in-the-heart-where-the-booklove-lives sort. --Erin Morgenstern, author of The Night Circus

It's a proper novel. By which I mean, not that it has pages you actually turn that is optional with novels nowadays but pages that you actually want to turn, which is getting rarer and rarer.... Charming, gently comedic, sweetly nerdy and enthusiastic about media both old and new. --Irish Times

Think of this novel as part Haruki Murakami, part Dan Brown and part Joseph Cornell: a surreal adventure, an existential detective story and a cabinet of wonders at which to marvel. --Newsday
A clever and whimsical tale with a big heart. --The Economist

Delightful --Washington Post

Rollicking --New York Times

Irresistible, page-turning --Newsweek

A real tour de force, a beautiful fable... It's a lot of fun but it's also a powerful reading experience. --George Saunders

Cryptographic cults, vertical bookshops, hot geeks, theft, and the pursuit of immortality. I loved it. --Nick Harkaway

An utterly charming modern love-letter to reading, and Robin Sloan has affectionately mashed up tradition and technology in this delightful novel that reads like The Social Network meets The Da Vinci Code. --Stylist

Delightful... The protagonist is a tech nerd, but he's also a book nerd, so both those who crave shiny new technologies and those who relish the scent of paper will find room in these pages... Smart, hip and witty --Washington Post

Irresistible --Newsweek --Newsweek

Delightful... The protagonist is a tech nerd, but he's also a book nerd, so both those who crave shiny new technologies and those who relish the scent of paper will find room in these pages... Smart, hip and witty --Washington Post

Irresistible --Newsweek

Book Description

A New York Times bestseller, Mr Penumbra's 24-hour Bookstore is an entirely charming and lovable first novel of mysterious books and dusty bookshops; it is a witty and delightful love-letter to both the old book world and the new.

About this edition

• Publisher: Center Point Pub
• Publication date: 2012
• ISBN 10: 1611736099
• ISBN 13: 9781611736090
• Binding: Library Binding
• Number of pages: 383