THIS is a book that should be on everyone's 2006 must-read list.

It is a really thought-provoking book about loss and recovery.

It starts off with a man called Leo Gursky who leads a lonely life in present-day New York.

He falls in love at the age of 10 to a young girl called Alma and writes a book about his love.

The book and his love are both now lost to him after his escape from the Nazis in Poland.

Years later, a copy of the book has turned up in the hands of the Singer family. In fact, their 14 year old daughter Alma was named after the girl in the story. Her mother has been asked to translate a copy of the book from Spanish into English and in order to help her mother Charlotte with her loneliness after her father's death, Alma decides to track down the author of the book that meant so much to her mother and father.

This is a remarkably poised book full of wonderful characters such as Alma's brother Bird.

It is haunting and quietly funny and at times brilliant and is a beautiful read and comes highly recommended.

The History of Love is available for loan from Redditch Library.