The boy actually just wants to return two books and browse a little. But instead of leading him to the reading room, the strangely choleric old librarian takes him into a labyrinth beneath the library, where he imprisons him. Instead of water and bread, there is tea and delicious donuts in this dungeon, served by a mysterious sheep man and a silent girl who can speak and is beautiful. However, this does not change the fact that the boy must fear for his life as a prisoner of the library, while the boundaries between things, people, and places continue to blur. The eerie library is a Kafkaesque nightmare and at the same time a poignant story of loss and loneliness. Murakami intertwines the layers of this artful narrative like the worlds that seem to touch in the library, and Kat Menschik's breathtakingly beautiful illustrations add further depths. A gem.