Chapter Two Hundred Thirty-Eight: The Library Book

I was so excited when it was finally my turn to borrow the e-audiobook of Susan Orlean's new non-fiction book about the Los Angeles Public Library, The Library Book.  It switches back and forth between a more general history (to the present day) of the LAPL and an account of the fire that mostly destroyed the Central Branch of the LAPL in 1986 and its aftermath.  While sometimes it was a little unclear about why the writing was switching from one of these threads to the other, all of the content was so fascinating that I was happy to just follow along.  As one might imagine with LA (and with a public library), there are plenty of interesting characters in the pages of this book!  I also appreciated that Orlean leaves her conclusions about the actual cause of the fire pretty open-ended.  She lays out her research, which goes beyond just what the investigation at the time concluded, but the only concrete conclusion she comes to is that we'll probably never be able to truly know the cause of the fire.  If you like libraries, or history, or you just want a great true story, try out The Library Book.