The Secret of Lost Things
About this audiobook
Eighteen years old and completely alone, Rosemary arrives in New York from Tasmania with little more than a love of books and eagerness to explore the city she’s read so much about. She begins her search for independence with appealing enthusiasm, and the moment she steps into the Arcade bookstore, she knows she has found a home. The gruff owner, Mr. Pike, gives her a job sorting through piles of books and helping the rest of the staff, a group as odd as the characters in a Dickens novel. But when a letter arrives from someone seeking to “place” a lost manuscript by Herman Melville, the simmering ambitions and rivalries of the Arcade staff rise to a boiling point.
The Secret of Lost Things is at once a literary adventure and an evocative portrait of life in a bookstore very reminiscent of the world-famous Strand.
About the author
Sheridan Hay earned an MFA in writing and literature from Bennington. She worked in bookstores and in trade publishing in both her native Australia and in New York, where she has lived for the past twenty years
Vanessa Benjamin (a.k.a. Roe Kendall) is a native of the British Isles. Some twenty-five years ago she moved to the United States with her family and set down roots in Maryland. She graduated from the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art, London, receiving their silver medal as well as the Sir Emile Littler and Caryl Brahms awards. Benjamin has performed on stage in the Washington, DC, area for several years and at many venues and has performed at the Kennedy Center as Mrs. Schubert in the long-running show Shear Madness. An accomplished actress and narrator, she has recorded over two hundred books. Her work as a freelance voice-over artist and narrator has led her in many interesting directions, from technical government materials to eighteenth-century romance novels to hotel advertising, but narrating books is what she really enjoys. “I really love playing all the parts when I narrate a book. It’s an adventure, a challenge, and above all I feel that I learn something new with each book I read. I do a lot of reading for the Library of Congress’ Blind and Physically Handicapped program, and it is so rewarding for me especially when I get a letter from a patron; it’s a great service for the listener.”
