I’m strangely drawn to a weird niche category of books where the author takes up a particular—and often unusual—hobby to deal with grief after the loss of a loved one: Helen Macdonald’s H is For Hawk; Katie Arnold’s book about ultrarunning, Running Home; and Litt Woon Long’s mushroom hunting memoir, The Way Through the Woods, to name just a few. Patrick Bringley’s new memoir, “All the Beauty in the World,” in which his grief at the death of his older brother compels him to quit his coveted job at The New Yorker and begin a ten-year career as a Metropolitan Museum guard, definitely fits this category, and it has the added enticement of being situated in the art world, another of my areas of interest. Unlike the hobbies in those other books, however, Bringley’s new job is inactive in nature—the long hours with nothing to do but watch and think are, in fact, what drew him to the role. His book, consequently, is a ruminative and often dreamy meditation on life, grief and art, and how being surrounded by, and really looking at, some of the world’s greatest artworks can heal the soul. Yes, there are some of the behind-the-scenes-at-the-museum insider tidbits that many people will come to the book looking for (what the museum’s cavernous basement looks like, for example, or what happens on days the museum is closed or, most interestingly for me, the varied backgrounds and lives of the men and women in the guard corps), but that’s definitely not the point of Bringley’s book—if you come to it looking merely for that, you may be disappointed. Come to it, rather, for his lovely interpretations of the art that surrounds him, or his example of how to slow down and just quietly observe the world around him, and you will enjoy it as much as I did.

Thank you to NetGalley and Simon & Schuster for providing me with an ARC of this title in return for my honest review.

Thank you to NetGalley, Simon & Schuster and Patrick Bringley for an ARC of this book. This is a memoir covering the ten years the author spent working as a guard at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City. At the age of twenty five after losing his older brother to cancer, the author was searching for a job he could escape into and found that and more at the Met. This book is filled with the history of the museum and that of many of the works of art it holds. It is also filled with the author’s reflections on art, life, loss and relationships. The cover is beautiful and invites the reader into the museum, one can very easily imagine ascending the Grand Staircase and being swept into another world. Patrick Bringley is a very descriptive and thorough writer. I really enjoyed this book and highly recommend it to all who appreciate art. Looking forward to more writing from the author!

What a wonderful book! Food for thought! How do you heal after the death of a loved one??

What a great way to heal your heart, to surround yourself with beautiful art and ancient artifacts. Instead of working in a high power job with all its pressure, spend your time working in a museum that brings you joy, while you heal emotionally and spiritually.

I really enjoyed the descriptions of the art in the book, it was almost like being there. When Patrick described rooms I had visited it brought back fond memories. The diversity of people that worked as security guards at the museum was really interesting. This diversity just made the job so much richer.

The people visiting the museum from the prospective of a security guard was entertaining and sometimes funny. Now I wonder if I went thru the exhibits in the right direction when I visited the MET.

A beautiful meditation on grief and solitude and the transformative healing power of art. This book could be a quick read but I wanted to take my time and savor every passage. As a museum guard at the Met, he left a more high pressure job at the "New Yorker" to allow space to grieve the death of his brother. Not only do we get an inside view of what a guard "sees" - from visitors to the art itself, he takes us on a descriptive journey that encompasses both his inner thoughts and feelings and the outer experience of viewing art and understanding it's context. This book is also about taking perspective. What starts out as him describing and suggesting we view art like a curious traveler in a foreign land as well as his comfort with allowing space to reflect and feel, slowly evolves into something else. He realizes that while his grief made a hole in his mind, over time it begins to be filled with trivial daily things as opposed to the deep thoughts of reflection. The other big shift is when he becomes a father and contrasting the sleep-deprived, frenetic time of caring for a newborn vs. standing still in a gallery as a guard. This is just a beautifully written book and I really appreciate too that he included an extensive index of all the art work he references in the book as well as a bibliography with books and articles that discuss the different art movements and styles. I highly recommend this book.
Thank you to Netgalley and Simon & Schuster for a free advance copy and I wrote this review voluntarily.

What a fascinating read! I felt like I was getting an insider tour of the Met. I love museums and one of my favourite things about living in NYC is having access to them all on my doorstep. This book gave me a whole new perspective to the Met though. Such a soothing journey exploring the exhibits, memories and the wonder of art.

I thought this would be an interesting book about what it is like to be a guard at the Met and everything that goes with that. I would have liked more stories of the people that visited and interacted with the author, the other guards and what that life is like, and more stories behind the scenes of the museum. There is this, but not enough. I also liked the sections about the art itself, but some were interesting and some dragged. Overall it was just a fair book. Thank you to Netgalley and the publisher for the advanced copy in exchange for an honest review.

This was a really interesting read. A fantastic addition to collections with strong art representation, not a mandatory purchase for most libraries.

Thank you NetGalley and Simon & Schuster for accepting my request to read and review All the Beauty in the World.

Published: 02/14/23

This is an interesting take on a man who is a security guard at the The Metropolitan Museum of Art. This book won't be for everyone; however it has a market. I enjoyed the tidbits behind the scenes, his observations made of people, as well as his own growth.

I laughed when he called me out -- people won't touch paintings, but will open drawers; hey, that's me. As the story went on I kept thinking about all the people who walked by him, didn't see him, and all the missed opportunities. He is a wealth of information from basic trivia to the final Jeopardy answer.

This would be a grand gift for someone retiring. This is definitely for smart people.

My first visit to the Met was during my junior year of high school. I loved every second of it and was blessed to be with a small group that also enjoyed as much of the museum as we could in the limited time we had. Other groups of fellow classmates, exhausted from the whirlwind of activities packed into the few days we had in New York City, took opportunities to sit on the floor. That always stuck with me. I couldn't imagine just sitting on the floor of the Met when there was so much to see. Years later, I'd get to visit the Met three times in the span of as many years, thanks to a friend who lived in Jersey City. Each time we'd spend hours taking in as much as we could, until we just couldn't walk any more or our brains were fogged over from too many stimuli.

Bringley's memoir captures that feeling I had the first time I went to the Met. That unbridled awe and appreciation for a collection of art that is so much more than art. I enjoyed reading about his time a security guard and envied the time he got to take in all of the art that I felt rushed to consume. His knowledge on art, displayed in this book, is formidable. I wish there had been more pictures of the art specifically referenced, instead of the illustrations provided (though I know nothing about licensing and whether that would have been an issue). I found myself constantly setting the book aside to frantically google the artwork, wanting to see the piece as Bringley described it's history or purpose.

Additionally, I appreciated the way Bringley wove in more personal elements of his own narrative throughout the memoir. His depiction of his journey with grief was very resonant and I think could be extended to those not just struggling with grief, but other big life changes or mental health obstacles.

I am a former security guard in an art museum and loved this memoir because I could relate to the author and his story. I also lost a brother and could relate to the grief he goes through after losing his brother. The descriptions of being a security guard in a famous museum are so accurate. I enjoyed the way he recounted his interactions with museum visitors, his coworkers, and the art. I was thankful he described the diversity of his coworkers and their dedication to the position. I have never been to the Met, but I felt like I visited through his insights into the galleries and the art work found in them. I would definitely recommend this to lovers of museums and art, but also just anyone interested in learning about a job that isn't typically depicted accurately in stories or movies.

I’ll preface this review by saying that I’m generally not a fan of memoirs and if you are, you might like this better than I did.

I picked this up in spite of an aversion to the genre because I’m a lover of art with a couple of degrees in Art History, and thought it might be a fun insiders tour of The Met. Unfortunately, it’s not.

What I had hoped for from this book was fun behind the scenes Met content, little known or lesser known information about the collection, or interesting museum security protocol. Instead, this is largely the personal memoir of a guard, and is more about his personal life and how that relates to his museum job than about the museum itself.

I have also (briefly) had the job of a museum guard. For me it was a part time gig during college to earn some pocket money and done with the hope of the opportunity to do a bit of networking with the museum’s more academic employees. To be blunt, the job was dead boring. It’s unchallenging intellectually and has little to do with art, and that makes a memoirist who loves the gig difficult to relate to.

Bringley came to this job by choice rather than personal limitations. He’s a smart and capable writer who clearly has an above average knowledge of art for a guard and plenty of education to take on different work. His own life made this type of job more attractive to him than one in a more ambitious sector of the field, and that’s fine for him, but it’s a bit hard to relate to if you are an ambitious person and someone who craves intellectual stimulation in your profession.

The author has found a way to make the job meaningful and scintillating for himself (he’s far more interested in people watching and informally chatting with strangers than I). Again, this is fine because, You Do You and all, but it’s not exactly worthy of a book, and of no real interest to those who might consider a book like this because they have more than a passing interest in art.

Bringley seems like a lovely person and I’m glad he’s found happiness, but his story just isn’t one that is unique or necessarily of interest to the general reading public or to lovers of art or Met enthusiasts.

Former New Yorker staffer turned museum guard Patrick Bringley reveals another side to New York's famous museum in, All the Beauty in the World: The Metropolitan Museum of Art and Me. Bringley provides a unique and intimate look at the museum's history and treasures . It is both a captivating and insightful behind-the-scenes glimpse into one of the world's most inspiring museums.

At its core, this is a fascinating look at the power of art to inspire, challenge, and transform us. Sharing amazing stories and illustrations throughout the pages, Bringley's love and reverence for the museum and its collection are evident on every page. He is a master at taking readers on a journey through the many spaces and galleries in the museum, highlighting the works that have most deeply touched and moved him.

This beautifully written memoir is a must-read for anyone interested in art, culture, and history.

All the Beauty in the World is a memoir by Patrick Bringley in which he documents the time he spent working as a museum guard at the Metropolitan Museum of Art. He discusses everything he loved about his job while providing insight into the history of art from around the world. He also shows how his life and his perception of the world changed across the years he worked at the museum.

I loved this book so much. I thought it was beautiful through and through. Patrick Bringley’s love and respect for the position he held is palpable throughout these pages. He did a wonderful job at drawing me into the world he lived in. I appreciate art just as much as anyone else does, but I haven’t been to a museum in a while. All the Beauty in the World made me want to visit one as soon as possible. There’s a sense of wonder one experiences when inside a museum and Patrick Bringley was able to give me that feeling for an entire book. This book never felt boring, and although I did expect it to be good (I wouldn’t have requested it otherwise) I didn’t expect him to be able to keep me invested in the daily life of a museum guard for hours of my life it would take to read this. There is more to this book than just the ins and outs of his job. Stories about his personal life are included in between the stories of life at the museum. He wrote about the death of his brother, his colleagues, the museum’s visitors, his wife, his children, and more. From beginning to end I enjoyed everything he had to say.

I minored in humanities in college. Reading this felt very similar to listening to my humanities professors, all of whom were so SO passionate about the topics they taught, as they excitedly tried (and almost always succeeded) to impart a sense of love and respect in their students for the art humans have created through history. Sometimes I miss those classes. I’m glad I found a feeling that was similar to them in this memoir.

I’m sure this goes without saying lol, but I highly recommend this book to all of you.

3.75 stars

A brief but lovely and odd little book, part memoir, part workplace bio, with a bit of visceral art appreciation thrown in.

The author gave up a career at the New Yorker doing promotion and events after his older brother died of cancer in his 20s. Bringley was deeply grieving and just couldn't continue life in the cubicle world. He needed to be around beauty and quiet and physical space so he became a security guard at the Metropolitan Museum of Art.

During the course of his ten year career there, he did heal and did a lot of philosophizing and interacting with the amazing art there. His writing style is interesting and descriptive and his thought processes about the masterpieces he is viewing even more so.

This was an unusual and welcome read.I received an advance review copy for free, and I am leaving this review voluntarily.

I truly enjoyed learning more about one of my favorite spots in Manhattan, but even more so enjoyed the story of the man who wrote this book!

I appreciated his vulnerability and at times his wittiness. I hope that there are more memoirs that are similar to this book, where they are “average people” and not these wild celebrities. Not to say I don’t love celebrity memoirs, but I enjoyed feeling like I could relate to the author on some level.

Thank you to NetGalley and Simon& Schuster for the ARC of All the Beauty in the World.

Reeling from the death of his older brother Tom, the author quits his corporate job that he hated anyway, and takes a position as a security job at the Met.

Part art history lesson, part therapy session, all heart. This story is slow paced, but I found I could not put it down. As an architect and as someone who lost a family member to cancer, this book hit home in so many ways for me. Like the authors mother in front of the Pieta, I found myself crying both from how beautiful it is and also from great loss.

I recommend this book to any classic art lover, to anyone who's searching for a deeper meaning to life.

After Patrick Bringley's older brother, Tom, dies of cancer at a young age he decides to quit a job he hates and become a security guard at the Met. The pace is slow as he watches people and he can appreciate the art that he loves while dealing with the loss of his brother and best friend. I am in awe of his dedication. As he rotates through a section he also studies the art and its background. There is no plot really but just following Patrick through a day observing But there is beauty in the descriptions of the art and the people. This is a quiet book, very contemplative and has me thinking that I need to find a museum.

Thank you to Netgalley and Simon and Schuster for providing me with a digital copy. This is one I will need to buy for my shelves.

The deep grief of losing a sibling is earth shattering. But the author finds peace and stability through his work at the met. I adored the connections that were presented in this book. I’m so thankful for my ARC through NetGalley.I am happy to point book-loving, art-loving friends to this title.

Patrick quits his publishing industry corporate job as he is reeling from his brothers' young death. He takes a job at the Met as a security guard, where he is mostly "alone" with his thoughts and the art all day. In this, he finds healing and connection.

This memoir is a love letter to art, museums, and the unseen employees that keep museums running. I loved the glimpse behind the walls at the relationships, motivations, and art. The intersegment of the people in Patrick's life and his adoration of art makes this book more readable and less dry and I felt like it struck the perfect balance of a book about art and a glimpse into the life of one man. (It also benefitted from its shorter length.) If you find everyday people who are anything but ordinary interesting, then this book is for you.

Thank you to Netgalley for the advance copy for review.

Any time I miss living in New York and going to the Met whenever I wanted, I will reread this book. It does such an amazing job at capturing the feeling of being there, especially for visitors like me who return again and again to revisit favorite pieces or discover new things. I'm a sucker for that digressive New Yorker style of writing, so I loved how this book touched on grief, museum history, what the working conditions are like, and time itself. It was at times touching, funny, and fascinating, just like any good trip to a museum. I actually had dreams about being back in New York while I was reading it. I did also love how the book encourages readers to both find out as much as they can about art and artists but also think brave and honest thoughts about how the art strikes you. A true gem.