** 3.5 stars **
What a sweet story about all kinds of things. Small things, big things, things that aren’t actually things at all.
After Nora finds out she’s been cheated on by her boyfriend the trip back to her home country, after her grandmother died, seems to come at the right time. Though heartbroken and with no clue as to what she should be doing with the many things left in her grandparents house she knows that she doesn’t want to just sell them heartlessly through an auction.
There’s a story behind every scarf and every tea set in the house so what better way to remember those stories while selling the trinkets and things which tell them. Even secrets are hidden and waiting to be discovered.
Though the memory shop with all its little reminiscing pieces is at the center of this story there are lots of other lives and stories that connect with it. A 60 something year old woman whose just decided to divorce her husband. A man griefing his late wife while dealing with his teenage daughter who thinks she can never live up to his fathers memory of her mother. A young woman who wants to feel loved and seems to have the perfect live and partner while also not sharing a dark fact about both, etc.
I loved that the memory shop somehow intertwines all of those stories and that we learn through them that it’s the small, sometimes seemingly insignificant things, gestures, words, etc. in life that make all the difference.
While it was a cute book, it was a tad too predictable and at one point there were almost too many characters on the page for me to follow along. Still, it’s a good book for a rainy afternoon or a cosy christmas holiday ☺️
