Shortlisted for the Costa First Novel Award
An Indie Next and LibraryReads Selection
“The charmer of the summer…A touching, hopeful story about figuring out what matters and mustering the courage to make necessary changes.”
—NPR
“How subtle. How perceptive…Meet Me at the Museum is gently provoking, delving into how we interact with our children, our spouses, our communities, but mostly with ourselves.”
—Minneapolis Star Tribune
“A farmer’s wife and a museum curator begin a life-changing correspondence in this lovely book by Anne Youngson, a first-time novelist at age 70.”
—Woman’s Day (Editor’s Choice)
"A beautiful, moving, and utterly mesmerizing tale about life, love, and starting over, Meet Me at the Museum will make even the most cynical listeners believe in second chances."
—Bustle
“Beautifully written and deeply moving, Meet Me at the Museum is a superb—and tenderhearted—debut that will interest anyone who's ever questioned how they became the person they are today.”
—Shelf Awareness
“This sweet novel, which unfolds through a series of letters, is a short but spellbinding story of life and friendship.”
—Hello Giggles
“A thoughtful meditation on buried passions, regrets, love, grief, and loneliness. But Youngson’s debut offers hope for change in its tender exploration of what it means to have experienced a life well-lived.”
—The Guardian
“Already being hailed as a classic…Absolutely beautiful, about loss and the life choices we make.”
—Daily Mail
“Warm-hearted, clear-minded, and unexpectedly spellbinding, Meet Me at the Museum is a novel to savor.”
—Annie Barrows, #1 New York Times bestselling co-author of The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society
"Precise, clear, funny, poignant, and truthful. This is a work of art, dear readers. Revel in its beauty.”
—Adriana Trigiani, New York Times bestselling author of The Shoemaker's Wife and Lucia, Lucia
“A moving tribute to friendship and love, to the courage of the ordinary, and to starting again.”
—Rachel Joyce, New York Times bestselling author of The Unlikely Pilgrimage of Harold Fry
“Exquisite. Its characters somehow resist following their story and reverse themselves into a new one. A beautiful, lasting read.”
—James Hannah, author of The A to Z of You and Me
“Tender, wise, and moving, Meet Me at the Museum is a novel to cherish.”
—John Boyne, New York Times bestselling author of The Boy in the Striped Pajamas
“A wise and tender novel. Proof that the richest fruits come on the edge of autumn.”
—Sarah Dunant, New York Times bestselling author of The Birth of Venus
“Intriguing and compelling, Meet Me at the Museum invites you into the meeting place between two people, imparting wisdom, thought, and endless charm.”
—Jennifer Ryan, bestselling author of The Chilbury Ladies’ Choir
“A beautiful, affecting novel of late love.”
—Nina Stibbe, author of Love, Nina
“Readers are sure to love this wise and witty debut that celebrates the art of letter writing and the kindness of strangers.”
—Phaedra Patrick, author of The Curious Charms of Arthur Pepper
“Full of grace and humanity.”
—Sunday Times
“If you only read one book this year, read this. Highly recommended.”
—Mature Times
“Insightful, emotionally acute, and absorbing.”
—The Daily Express
In this lovely audiobook an English farm wife, fascinated by the Tollund Man, an iron age Dane found uncannily preserved in a peat bog, begins a correspondence with a curator at the museum in Jutland that houses the remains. Helen Lloyd’s Tina is warm, thoughtful, and seeking. The curator, Anders, who has been fairly recently widowed, is writing to her in his second language, so Lars Knudsen’s Danish accent conveys the differences and distance between them, even as they come to trust and rely on each other through shared language as they acknowledge joys and face hard truths about their own lives. Meanwhile, they speculate about death, mourning, ritual, sacrifice, and how life happens to people, from Tollund Man to themselves, to deeply satisfying effect. B.G. © AudioFile 2018, Portland, Maine
2018-05-15
A debut novel that tells the unlikely story of an English farm wife and a Danish museum curator through their spirited correspondence.Loneliness draws them together—that and their keen interest in the prehistoric Tollund Man, whose perfectly preserved head is on display in Denmark's Silkeborg museum. Tina Hapgood has always wanted to visit there from her home in East Anglia; but having passed her 60th birthday, she doubts she ever will. Anders Larsen—intercepting a note she's written to the (now deceased) archaeologist who discovered the Tollund Man in 1950—encourages her to make the trip. And so it begins. Tina, we learn from her letters, married at 20 and had the first of her three children shortly thereafter. Her marriage is loveless, and she has many regrets about roads not taken. Anders, a widower with two grown children, loved his wife deeply; but the marriage was fraught owing to her emotional fragility. Tina and Anders exchange confidences, and their connection—though limited to written exchanges—becomes more intimate. (In a nod to modern technology, the pair eventually shifts from letters to emails.) The book proceeds at a leisurely pace until close to the end, when a major plot turn seems to change everything. Or does it? The writing is, for the most part, poised and literate; and Tina's descriptions of the natural world she knows so well can be quite lovely. Unfortunately, she sounds way too sophisticated given the cloistered life she is supposed to have led. There is also an overly earnest quality to some of what Tina and Anders write to one another: "We have been talking to each other about where life went, and if the way we spent it was the way we meant to have spent it…." (Tina) "Our letters have meant so much to us because we have…arrived at the same point in our lives. More behind us than ahead of us. Paths chosen that define us." (Anders)Though well-crafted, this genteel novel never quite achieves liftoff.
