“The Imperfectionists” by Tom Rachman

This may sound like a stupid thing to say, but I love books that I enjoy reading. And I really enjoyed this one.

The Imperfectionists is marketed as a novel, but it’s really a book of short stories. (Don’t let that put you off, though! That makes it great for taking it in small bites and reading one chapter at a time.) This book did not reach critical mass (I assume because of the format, or maybe my one-chapter reading habit?) but my reading experience was better without it. 

Though there is a tenuous narrative arc (the stories are tied together by a fictional newspaper based in Rome; each chapter is about someone who works there, and people who are featured in one story often make small appearances in others) the relative lack of plot is a benefit rather than a detriment. What really shines in this book is the characters. 

The characters weren’t necessarily lovable or impressive (more often the opposite), but they felt real and true. As I read, I don’t remember thinking “Wow, these characters seem like they could be real people,” which is a good thing because that would have taken me out of the story. And that’s always annoying. (Though that would have been better than if I’d been thinking, “Wow, I totally can’t imagine any of these characters as real people.”) But looking back now, after having finished the book, I’m definitely thinking “Wow, those characters seemed like they could have been real people.”