Exclusive: Author Madeline Martin on heartwarming WWII tale The Booklover's Library
New York, New York - Historical fiction fans are in for a treat this month thanks to the latest release from Madeline Martin, and the author sat down with TAG24 NEWS to share the secrets of The Booklover's Library.
In The Booklover's Library, readers are transported to wartime England, where a widow named Emma lives with her daughter, Olivia.
Struggling to make ends meet, Emma unexpectedly finds employment in the dreamy Booklover's Library – a lending library located in the back of an apothecary that offers a book subscription service for the local residents.
Though the library may seem like something of a bookworm's fantasy, it was indeed a real establishment from the late 1800s through the 1960s!
"While I was doing my research for where I wanted to set this book, I found the Boots' Booklover's Library, which was a real lending library that actually existed," Martin told TAG24.
"This was during the time when they had the marriage bar, which meant that when women got married, they had to give up their jobs."
As a widow with a young daughter, the marriage bar still applies to Emma, but the crew at the Booklover's Library is willing to give her a chance.
But as the threat of another world war escalates, she is forced to send Olivia away to a safer location, and as she struggles to cope with the separation from her daughter, Emma soon finds strength in the community at Boots.
The Booklover's Library is Madeline Martin's "most personal" yet
The Booklover's Library is Martin's most personal novel to date, drawing heavily on her own experience as a single mom of two daughters to craft the relationship between Emma and Olivia.
"I was a single mother for several years, and so writing Emma's character was really near and dear to my heart," she explained.
"Don't get me wrong – being a single mom is very hard. Being the sole person that's really responsible for the children, taking care of everything that's needed, especially these days when the kids are in every single activity known to man!"
"But it's also wonderful, and that's the other side of being a single mom that I really wanted to showcase, too," she continued.
"Those beautiful moments where it's just you two against the world, or in my case, it was the three of us... You get to be the sole source of solving all of the problems, but you also get to be the sole person they love, and it really just creates such a wonderful bond."
Though much of the struggles Emma faces as a single mom resonate with today's readers, the novel's wartime setting adds an incredibly complex and heartwrenching context to the tale.
Madeline Martin explores the power of hope in wartime England
Martin has written quite a few historical fiction reads set in the shadows of World War II, a time period she finds to be particularly poignant.
"This is a time period where I feel like bravery is such a huge source of inspiration for writing books [set in this era]," Martin said.
"There are so many stories that haven't been told, not just the people who are actually out there on the frontline, but also just on the homefront trying to keep things together."
The Booklover's Library also explores the importance of literature at the time. While Emma has always been an avid reader, the books around her provide a key source of comfort for her – and the other bookworms of the era – amid the horrors of the war.
"With it being such a dark time, hope feels even more brilliant, especially when writing about stories that incorporate books because books offer such a comfort and so much light as well," Martin said.
The Booklover's Library will be released on September 10. For more on this season's hottest reads, be sure to check out TAG24's September Book Release Radar.
Cover photo: Collage: Courtesy of Kathleen Carter