The Reader on the 6.27

Guylain works at a job he hates, at a job any self-respecting reader worthy of the name would hate: Guylain destroys books. His one joy in life is reading aloud each day on the 6.27 train. And then he discovers a diary on the train, and he feels compelled to find the author of the diary.

A lovely little adventure containing all my favorite ingredients including books and France.

Really quirky and fun. “Similar in look and feel to Amélie” is a fair appraisal.

Playful and simple to read, but if you stop to think about it, it really covers some pretty deep topics. I must have read Guylain's monologue at the doctor's five times before finally accepting that he's not completely oblivious to the nature of his reality, having spent the rest of the book under the assumption he was deferent to the inevitability of the static, unfulfilled nature of his life.

“For all those fellow commuters, he was the reader, the bizarre character who each weekday would read out, in a loud, clear voice, from the handful of pages he extracted from his briefcase.”

I hated this book the first time I tried to read it, I dnf-ed it after 50 pages or so because I couldn't get into it at all, the writing and the main character felt unbearable. But I kept postponing giving it away and this week I felt the urge to give it another shot, probably because it had been on my radar for years before I bought it and I really wanted to see where the story would go.

This time it was like reading a completely different book. I thought it was very charming, very Amélie-esque. And I truly appreciated the writing on this occasion. I have to say, I think the translator did a wonderful job, it didn't feel like a translated work at all.