The New Town Librarian grew on me as I kept reading. Nan moves to a small town to become the librarian, and the story follows her as she learns how to run the library, befriends people in town, and handles issues in her professional and romantic life.

The story was mostly light and chapters were pretty short. The book is written in Nan’s voice, with a lot of her self-talk included. I went from not liking Nan at all to kind of liking Nan at the end of the story. Her character went through a lot of growth and I appreciated how she became less judgy by the end.

The other characters were what made this story more enjoyable for me. I loved Nan’s neighbors, Immaculata and Joe. They were by far my favorite characters, but all the other local business owners Nan interacted with were really interesting too.

The writing felt a little repetitive and this was definitely a quick and easy read. I would’ve liked more conflict with slightly higher stakes, and the ending kind of came out of nowhere and felt too easy.

This novel was so fun ! As a former librarian, I could totally relate to the heroine’s experiences with the patrons. Grumpy Nan Nethercott is an adorable character : queer middle-aged woman, she still has no idea what to do with her life. So her new job in a small town in southern New Jersey sounds like a new start. She is finally head librarian, yeah ! But her dream coming true isn’t exactly what she imagined.

I love the secondary characters and how they really help in the development of the story and the heroine’s growth. Nan’s landlady, Immaculata and her husband are the best ! It is a story about a Found family, but it is also above all about the love of books, about the joy of coming together to talk about books and how books can change lives. It is definitely an adorable cozy romcom, and I really enjoyed it.

2.5 rounded to 3 stars

The New Town Librarian is a low steam queer contemporary by Kathy Anderson. About a public librarian getting a new job in a small town. Where she finds she wasn't quite prepared to be fully in charge of her own library and the person growth she experiences among the unique residents of this small town.

This one just really didn't work for me, and that is primarily because I couldn't stand the main character, Nan. I found her to be judgmental and thought way too highly of herself. From her dislike of bookstores , and judgment of others life choices, to her looking down on different forms of reading that weren't her own beloved classics. I'm not going to go on because I don't want this to be a ranty review.

There were some highlights to be found within it's pages that are all thanks to the secondary characters in the small town. Her landlords were fantastic, especially Joe, with his quiet words and huge heart. The member that made up Nan's "secretive " book club ( which she rudely nitpicked members of) they each were kind souls. Last but not least, there was the foster boy , Jeremy, who found solace at the library and found encouragement and friendship in Nan and her landlords.

Overall, while The New Town Librarian by Kathy Anderson didn't work for me but it might work for you.

I really liked where the story progressed for Nan. I found it surprising but also realistic that Nan, at 50, is really just figuring out what she wants to be when she grows up. Up until the day she decides to relocate to New Jersey to become the lead librarian, she's really only been coasting through life. No big love, no nest egg, no real family connection, no true ambition. She's rather underdeveloped and rough around the edges, but I liked the way Nan's age comes through in her confidence and steadfast resolve to avoid being pushed around. That to me is one of the most obvious advantages of life experience. The townspeople really steal the show though. There are some quirky and interesting people in that little town, and I just loved watching them smooth out Nan's rough edges to get her to fit into their world. The writing style reminded me of vignettes, snippets of Nan's life, that together illustrate the extent of growth that Nan experiences and fosters as the librarian. It starts a bit slow and is a little clunky in the transitions, but I got really invested in the stories as I fell in love with the characters. 3.5 stars

Thank you NetGalley for the opportunity to read this book in exchange for an honest review.

Thank you once again to Pride Book Tours for hooking me up with another fun read! When I saw that the main character in this book was a 50-year-old queer librarian looking to start a new life in a new place, I was all in! Seriously, the world needs more 50-something ladies in books (says the 50-something lady).

Full of the ultimate cast of quirky characters, The New Town Librarian by Kathy Anderson will have you chuckling at all of the antics that Nan faces in her new life. By looking at the cover you may think that this is a romance, but it's really not. The brief interludes that Nan has with women in town are merely referenced, and completely closed door. This is more women's fiction, with Nan learning to have faith in herself and to finally strive for more in her life.

Definitely recommended for those looking for a charming tale full of heart!

Thank you to Pride Book Tours and NetGalley for providing a copy of this book in exchange for an honest review.

As an avid reader, some of my best childhood memories involve trips to the library and long summer days spent reading in my backyard. So it's no surprise that I am drawn to books featuring libraries and librarians. I saw this book on Net Galley and couldn't click the request button fast enough. This isn't my usual genre, and our MC isn't a typical heroine. Nan is a 50-year-old who has been stuck in her life for at least two decades, she is a low-level library at a Philadelphia library branch and has had a string of short-term girlfriends. Nan likes to spend some of her spare time drinking wine and applying for amazing librarian jobs she knows she will never get, until one day when she applies to work in a small rural New Jersey library and gets the job!

Finally, Nan's life is getting unstuck! Will she make a difference in this small town? Will she build friendships and will she make better life choices? You will have to read to find out. I found this book to be delightful and so interesting to read about the interworking of a public library. This book is truly cozy--but without any murder mystery.

5 stars!

well, this was awful.
you know when someone is just a little TOO invested in a topic or argument to the point that everything they say becomes repetitive and annoying? that was this book and everything “radical” it had to say about libraries.
and believe me, i get it. every library in my city has been shut since covid due to the vandalism the buildings endured during lockdown and the government’s unwillingness and financial inability to pay for repairs. before that, i only remember old, falling apart books lining the shelves and out of date scientific material sitting in piles on a wooden table.
but you can’t base an entire book on that, not if you’re also trying to tell the story of a found family, past family, and new romance. nothing about this flowed or felt connected. the main character was trying too hard to be likeable, even in her own head, and every side character’s story was abruptly cut short.
nothing about this book worked and i wouldn’t recommend it.

I loved the premise of the book. Having an older queer mc was so refreshing! However the pacing didn't really work for me. I feel like I wanted more from this book. It was the a bad read but it could have done more.

A lifelong junior librarian applies for a job at a small New Jersey library on a whim, and suddenly her life is filled with all the strange characters of the town.
A really fun, easy read. So many great characters, especially Nan. I loved the found family of the small town, and the chance it gives Nan to reinvent herself and her life. At heart are the small interactions that make up our days that hold as much meaning as we give them.
Recommended for anyone who likes small town gossip, libraries, and queer librarians!

We meet Nan as a snarky 50-year-old reluctant librarian with crazy hair, oddball behavior and with an ever-running chaotic commentary inside her head. Along with her two sisters she is a grade A hypochondriac. She has worked as a librarian in Philadelphia for years, never climbing up the ladder to a more prominent role. She is bored, lonely and seeking a dramatic change in her life. And that one special woman who actually sticks around. Her idea of fun is to peruse the want ads and apply for dozens of jobs she is mostly unqualified for. While doing so she comes across an ad for a head librarian job in a small town in new jersey that seems too good to be true. She gets the job and that sets off an assembly line of mishaps with the quirky town folks she never would’ve dreamed of finding in small town America. With a new lease on life and finally in a position of leadership and some unusual and fun ideas she transforms the small-town library into hotspot with, among other things, her book displays (Books the Library Shouldn’t Have Bought) and a hotline for hypochondriacs.


I liked that there is a decent amount of time telling the stories of many of the characters through their interactions with Nan. I thought this was a fun read. In the beginning I wouldn’t say Nan is likeable character, she seemed quite negative and bitter and some of the commentary that played out in her head was not so nice. I guess it could have been written as a byproduct of her unhappiness at that time but I can see where readers would be put off by this. She does go through major changes by the end of the book. Although a few of the scenarios that played out seemed over the top and some I don’t think would happen in a real library this is a book of fiction so personally I’m not terribly inclined to hold that as a negative. I found most of the scenarios and humor enjoyable. I think they captured the mayhem Nan encountered in her early days as a head librarian, a new person in town, in a role she had little practice for and a cast of characters who threw her for a loop almost daily. I would recommend this book.

As a library science master's student, I absolutely devoured this book. A thoughtful look at humanity. Some characters are less likely than others, but this story was so well written. It was simple and takes place in small town NJ and seemingly mundane, but so much beauty happen in this story. Can't wait to recommend this to customers.

This was such a heartwarming and charming story about a middle-aged lesbian librarian wanting to change her life. I loved the library setting, the witty humor, the queer representation and all wonderful side characters!

Nan Nethercott is a queer middle-aged librarian, who finds herself stuck at entry level in the Philadelphia public library system and as well as in tiresome affairs with women who are not looking for that forever after that Nan is. Realizing she might not have that many chances left to make a drastic change, she accepts a pay cut for the job as a head librarian at a small-town library in southern New Jersey. Soon she finds herself way over her head dealing with staff problems, marauding middle-schoolers, a bossy town council principal, and a hot deli owner who is, of course, not looking for the kind of relationship that Nan is.

I loved the library setting and to read about all literary tasks, book club discussions and programs that Nan organized and to get new insights of the life of a librarian (the task of weeding books was definitely a novelty to me)! I also absolutely adored Nan’s wit and sarcasm, and the fact that she was a bit older and very relatable in the way she felt that life hasn’t turned out the way she dreamed of. And the side characters were such charming, kind and fun originals! I loved the way Nan opened up to people in a way she hadn’t before and made some wonderfully sweet new friends that way.

The story was perhaps a bit uneventful at times and it wouldn’t have hurt with a little more romance and passion. Even though Nan is having affairs and dating, I wouldn’t call this a sapphic romance. It’s more a story about changing your life than finding love.

But all in all, The New Town Librarian is a truly sweet, fun and enjoyable feel-good read that doesn’t shy away from the sadder parts of life, with an adorable small-town bookish setting. A perfect book for my fellow bookworms!

Thank you to Pride Book Tours, NetGalley and Ninestar Press for the eARC in exchange for my honest review.

This book was quirky and fun! I enjoyed the LGBTQ+ themes, the love for independent libraries, the topic of foster care, and the general strife of customer service work.
There were quite a bit of tenses that need work. But, other than that, this is a great read! 4 stars.

Thank you for the read!

I was SO excited to read this book, finding a story with a 50 something queer woman as the center was so exciting and I happily dug in. Unfortunately, I found this book challenging to read and Nan unlikeable (but not in a love to hate way). Often times the timeline of this tale felt unclear and shifting, and I struggled to place how much time had passed, or if in fact none had at all, multiple times. Nan felt unrelatable, somewhat pretentious, and annoying throughout the majority of the book. I was hoping at the mid-point, when she has her near death experience, that things would pick up, and well they did, and they didn't. This whole book just left me kind of waiting for it to be over.

2.5 stars rounded up. Even though I should be the target demographic for this book, I just didn't get into the characters or even the plot (honestly, what was the plot, exactly)? Some good lines but the book as a whole didn't hold up for me.

As someone who has worked in a library for nine years, I really enjoyed this book. In the beginning when Nan first starts working at the library and all the things that are happening are so relatable. I loved all the characters in the story, Nan is super cool and all the side characters are pretty fleshed out so it's easy to feel like you know them and their personalities. Great read!

I am 33, married and very happy with my job that has nothing to do with libraries and yet this story made me yearn to be 20 years older and embarking on a new adventure as a librarian in a quirky new town.
Although this was a super hilarious, silly and light hearted read, I found myself having trouble relating to Nan. Her taste in books, which is pretty limited to the classics, differs from mine a lot. However, I was rooting for her to find happiness and success in a new town.

I liked the idea around what this book is about! I would love to be a librarian and Nan is living the dream… sort of.

This is a book where stuff is always happening, yet NOTHING happens at all. It was like there was no real destination this book was supposed to reach. It’s a lot of mish-mash information all piled together with nothing eventful or noteworthy happening.

I waffled back and forth about whether to give this a three star or a two star rating. It wasn’t really “bad” or problematic but I went with my guy here and this one is a two star for me because I just did not enjoy myself.

This was not a romance. Yes, it was sapphic, but this shouldn’t be classified as a romance in my opinion.

I loved Immaculata! She was a bright spot in the din.

DNFed at 25%

The part of this book that I made it through was not good. I don’t know if the MC gets better as the book progresses, but she was absolutely awful in this first quarter. She thinks she’s better than everyone else, is disparaging towards mental health, cancer, children, deli workers, etc. Like, it makes a point of saying what she talked to her sisters about, both of whom are apparently hypochondriacs, and it was basically that she got them all riled up and freaking out and then she hung up. But she’s also a hypochondriac, because she always thinks about death. Sorry, what???

She is just a very unlikeable character, despite folks in her new small town being nice and friendly, she was constantly thinking mean things about them. I tried really hard to keep going, as I thought maybe she would have a redemption arc, but it was just too much, I couldn’t go on.

Also, the author uses the word thug a lot, which isn’t okay. Overall, the book had a very un-self aware sort of vibe. I don’t even quite know how to describe it? It was all rather cringey…

I was not sure what to expect from this story but I ended up really liking it. It was refreshing reading about a women in her 50s who still has goals and dreams for her life. It was also great to see all the goals being very grounded and realistic for her knowledge and skills and seeing her grow to appreciate the life a small town can give her.