Book Review Thursday

I confess, I read a lot. I can't help it. It's like an addiction. I don't buy many anymore, thanks to a great local library with an online catalog. I've learned, finally, that I can enjoy a book without having to own it. Saves a lot of space and money, let me tell you.

My latest read is a slim subtle volume by Stewart O'Nan. It's a book I spotted on the New Fiction shelves at my local bookstore-cafe, and I noted the title and later placed it on hold at the library. It came in yesterday and I finished it that day.

"Last Night at the Lobster" tells the story of Manny, the manager of a Red Lobster restaurant in Connecticut. Corporate has decided his restaurant isn't pulling its weight and will be closed. By the last day of operation, Manny is down to just a few employees, a handful of which he's being allowed to bring with him to his new job at an Olive Garden in the next town over.

Anyone who has ever worked food service will appreciate this story. We meet the chef, who cares more than anyone would expect of a chain restaurant chef. The waitresses are a mix of stereotypes; the "lifer" whose nametag is so old it's been out of production for years, the highly emotional new one, who complains if she has too many tables or too few. Manny himself is torn between a relationship with his current girlfriend, and a waitress at the Lobster, with whom he'd had a not-so-secret secret affair.

This is the first book I've read by Stewart O'Nan. I've put some of his others on hold at the library. For baseball fans, I notice that he has co-written with Stephen King a book on the Boston Red Sox.