We’re giving away a 1-year subscription to Kindle Unlimited courtesy of Early Bird Books! Early Bird Books brings you free and bargain eBooks that match your interests. You can sign up for free, read the books on any device, and the books are yours to keep. Click to enter! If Rebecca Makkai’s name sounds familiar, it’s likely because you’ve read—or heard buzz around—her latest novel, The Great Believers, which won a Carnegie Medal and was a Pulitzer Prize finalist, among many other awards. The Borrower was Rebecca Makkai’s debut, and Richard Russo called it when he blurbed it: “Rarely is a first novel as smart and engaging and learned and funny and moving as The Borrower. Rebecca Makkai is a writer to watch, as sneakily ambitious as she is unpretentious.” The novel tells the story of their whirlwind romance and interweaves it with the story of Elsie’s healing and her friendship with Ben’s mom, who met her for the first time at Ben’s hospital bed. It’s a warm and compassionate book, and I loved that Elsie is a librarian, and that this isn’t just a passing reference, but an integral part of the book and of what makes her such a compelling character. “I loved holding books in my hands,” she says. “I loved smelling their pages.” What I love about this book — apart from the warm, witty voice that drew me in instantly — is that it’s not about sugarcoating reality. Instead, it faces the fact that in life, hard things happen, but that there is always joy, and that we can make the conscious choice to embrace it.
