84, Charing Cross Road

Well, this was lovely. Do yourself a favor and sit down for 2 hours to read it. Useful things I did not realize until I had the book:
1.) It's incredibly short
2.) It's not fiction. These are real letters Hanff collected and published.
3.) 95% of the books discussed hold no interest for me, and that didn't detract in the slightest.

Sometimes Hanff would annoy me with her sass, but then I'd remember that she was a lady living on her own in NYC in 1949&c, and making a living as a writer. Sass. Earned. And her actions make abundantly, touchingly clear that she was kind and giving, so mock-irate messages about the quality of a Latin Vulgate are completely excusable.

This also gives an eye-opening window into post-war conditions in England. That people would be so grateful for even powdered eggs speaks more poignantly than any history book ever could.

This book is wholesome. This book is the definition of wholesome. I'd recommend this to just about anyone, but especially those who has a passion for books and English literature. I'd even say, keep this book for a bit of a rainy day, when you're feeling like you're sliding into or already in a book slump, this book will lift you right out of it. It's so short but so impactful at the same time.

The premise of this book is exceedingly simple. Helene Hanff, an American writer, writes to a bookseller in London specialising in second-hand antique books, and so strikes up a correspondence with Frank Doel, the staff at the bookseller's in charge of responding to her, which lasts for 20 years. You could easily spoil yourself if you tried to Google anything about this book or about the author because this is a story about a part of her real life, so I'd suggest going in completely blind if you can.

Helene's casual witticisms and affectionate jibes at Frank were just such a delight to read, especially when contrasted with Frank's classic British reserve, which took a much longer time to thaw out. By her warm generosity with him and the rest of the staff at the bookshop, Helene also begins correspondences with other staff there and even with Frank's wife, though her primary correspondent is still Frank. Their relationship is all the more wholesome because there's nothing illicit or romantic about their genuine affection for one another, they both clearly held each other in very warm and platonic regard.

I suppose it's also because we're reading about real people writing real letters to each other, but Helene and Frank's personalities just really jumped out of the page for me. This book is so short and we see comparatively so little of them compared to regular fiction books, but they have so much more life and vividness to them than most other books I've read. It didn't take me many pages to get very much attached to both Helene and Frank, as well as their friends and family.

Ultimately, this book really highlighted how beautiful it is to find people who share the same interests as you do, even if your only contact with them was sending each other letters and parcels across thousands of miles, and maybe seeing the occasional photograph. This justified Internet friends before the Internet existed. I feel like this book also showed how important it is to be kind to customer service staff because even though your relationship with them may start off as being transactional, they are ultimately human beings with their own thoughts, interests, friends, and family and I think even nowadays so many people forget that when they're the customers. Helene's beautiful friendship with Frank, his family, and the rest of the staff at the bookstore only really started because she saw Frank as a human being first, sending him and all the staff generous food parcels that she could barely afford, even when Frank was trying to maintain that polite distance between staff and customer.

The ending: I had a great feeling through most of the book that it would end with one or the other dying. I didn't know which because I went into this book completely blind as I usually like to do. Frank's death certainly came out of nowhere and it was all the more tragic because it was so sudden and unexpected. He had been meaning to send Helene the Austens at Christmas, but he died before then. I had to really stop myself from crying because once I start, I know I won't be able to stop. I felt so so so sad for Helene that she didn't even manage to meet Frank in person before he died, and according to one of the epilogues, when she did eventually manage to make a trip to England, even the bookstore was gone. At the very least, I'm glad that she probably managed to meet Nora and the kids. Ugh, so sad. To me, that really highlighted the importance of not putting things off because you just never know whether they'll still be there by the time you get round to doing it.

In summary - just read this book, especially if you love reading in general. Read it when you're feeling down, or just read it whenever. You won't regret it.

20 years of snail mail between Helene, a writer in New York and Frank, a bookshop dealer in London. I read this book in a day and I was happy to finish it. There was some charm in their correspondence, but I found it very repetitive at times, especially after the 15th thank you letter sent to Helene in response to her gift of a parcel of food.

I also found that she was quite bossy and rude at times, and that Frank always kept good manner despite all of it.

I was choked to hear Helene's reaction to Megan's decision to move to South Africa: “WILL YOU TELL MEGAN WELLS SHE IS OUT OF HER COTTONPICKING MIND? If she's that bored with civilization why doesn't she just move to a siberian salt mine?”

In the end, I think it will be a book quickly forgotten.

It feels a bit intrusive to read the letters people wrote each other but this collection of them were quite enjoyable, although it gets a bit boring after a while. It's not very engaging as you're just a spectator reading other people's letters to each other and they did not talk about books as much as I expected them to. These were more letters that came with the books and packages they sent each other. I liked that they genuinely care about each other and sending each other letters and other stuff, but as it didn't really involve me, I didn't really enjoy it as much as I'd hope to.

Helene Hanff is a writer in New York, and it is she who first writes to the bookshop at 84, Charing Cross Road about books she is seeking, and, slowly, oh so slowly, Hanff and the bookseller, Frank Doel, become friends. It's a twenty-year correspondence, a twenty-year friendship, all centering around the love of books. Delightfully funny. Exquisite.

4.5 - What a charming and emotional epistolary memoir. It captures perfectly how books can provide opportunities for reflection, information, and deep meaningful connections. These letters also give us a glimpse of life in the US and England post WW2, which I found fascinating. The generosity and kindness these people showed through their letters and parcels made me feel so proud to be human. Give this short book a read. It's delightful.

This is such a touching story of the correspondence between a writer and the bookstore across the pond that keeps her in books. The story starts just at the end of WWII while England is still under rationing and continues for several decades.

Its a great little book for anyone who loves letter-writing or who is a bibliophile – both could fully relate.

This is a beautiful account of a NYC writer and her correspondences with some staff from an antique bookshop based in London. The letter writing begins on October 5, 1949 and continues for over 20 years. The relationship that develops between the letter writers blossoms. As they begin to feel more comfortable with one another, the dialogue becomes quite witty and amusing. What I loved most was getting a glimpse into how the times gradually change through the eyes of the writers (from QE II's coronation to Beatle-mania, etc.).  

The story is quite moving without meaning to be – a true testament to the fact that you do not have to live near someone or even know them to show him/her decency and kindness. It also made me feel a little guilty of how out of touch I am with people that I care for deeply, despite the luxury of such technological advancements such as email and video-conferencing! The work has everything I love in a story – the only thing I would have liked is maybe a couple of snapshots of some of the friends Hanff made along the way.

This was just so DELIGHTFUL. Had I been alive in the 1950s/1960s, perhaps Miss Helene Hanff and I would have been friends - I saw pieces of myself in her letters. Surprisingly touching too. I had to take a photo of the last page before the epilogue, because it was just perfect, and mine was a library copy (which seems wrong since the whole book is correspondence regarding purchasing books). Very good.