Martin’s The Last Bookshop in London, published by Hanover Square Press and Harlequin Audio in 2021, is available on Amazon in hardcover, paperback, Kindle, and audiobook formats, as well as at your local library or through the Libby App. The audiobook, read by Saskia Maarleveld, is lovely, portraying the enduring story of wartime loss and the power of literature to unite a community in the darkest of times.

Martin’s story opens in August 1939 when London prepares for war, and Hitler’s forces sweep across Europe. Grace Bennett dreamt of moving to the city with her best friend. Upon her arrival in London, she’s disappointed to find bunkers and blackout curtains. It’s definitely not the experience she’d imagine, especially not the job she lands in an old dusty bookshop called Primrose Hill. She, the girl who’s never had time to read and knows nothing about books or how to recommend them.

Martin’s choice of employment for Grace seemed off, her being a book zero, as the story progresses, and readers and listeners get to fall in love with literature for the first time, as Grace devours book after book, which is quite inspiring. Grace’s will to make the bookshop thrive during challenging times and make it a place of refuge for others in the neighborhood is heartening. Holding storytelling sessions during raids and blackouts to unite her community is commendable. The fact that Grace continues the practice in the bunkers and train platforms to keep her people unified through literature is a triumphant force, showing that even in the darkest nights of war, the people could find a sliver of peace.

The story offers an array of emotions from the bittersweet sorrow of goodbyes to joyful reunions, the terrible pain of loss and new beginnings, budding romances, the art of letter writing, and the everyday terror hanging in the air. Martin moves through it all, vividly drawing her audience into every scene. Her writing style lets her readers and listeners hear the planes in the air as they raid the sky, sending bomb after bomb down on the city, the acrid smell of the smoke in the aftermath, buildings in rubble, everything in ruins. A city torn by war, its residents clinging to life underground.

This book, inspired by true WWII history of the few bookshops that survived the raids and blackouts as the Blitz intensified, tells a story of love and the enduring power of literature, with well-rounded characters and stunning descriptions, making this a 3.5-star read or listen.