“This enchanting river was—like the apple in the Bible—forbidden.”

Although structured as the novel’s first chapter, this section functions more like a prologue. This line early in the story immediately incorporates several of the novel’s key elements, including the recurring motif of the enchanted river, the practice of viewing the world through the lens of myth and story, and hints of the theme of The Personal Interpretation of Religion and Spirituality. It foreshadows not only the driving conflict of the novel, but the aesthetics and thematic ideas that will follow this conflict throughout the plot.

“Edwin gave her a new life. He taught her what he’d taught all of them: Cultivate a love of fine and rare books in a customer and you didn’t just have a sale that day but also a devoted customer for decades.”

This moment gives nuance to Hazel’s workplace as well as communicating The Restorative Power of Storytelling and the power stories have to bring communities together. Although the books Hazel works with are intrinsically valuable, this attitude puts the emotional and sentimental value of books at the forefront—which, not coincidentally, ultimately pays off for the business more than any single collectors’ piece.

“They’d been fitted at school—Hazel’s dark black and Flora with the pre-school version, which was a red-and-blue Mickey Mouse mask designed to keep young children from being frightened of them, but it didn’t work.”

In the deeply saturated genre of WWII fiction, the novel needs to rely on precise, human details to create a connection with the reader. This simple and innocent moment of being fitted for gas masks alludes to the true horrors of war experienced by very young people living through this tempestuous time.