Publisher: Doubleday
Pages: 380
Format: DRC
ISBN-10: 0857525654
ISBN-13: 9780857525659
Publisher: eBook | Hardcover | Paperback | Audio
A dark midwinter’s night in an ancient inn on the Thames. The regulars are entertaining themselves by telling stories when the door bursts open on an injured stranger. In his arms is the drowned corpse of a little child.
Hours later the dead girl stirs, takes a breath and returns to life.
Is it a miracle?
Is it magic?
Or can it be explained by science?
I had hoped to love this book more than I did. I failed to connect to the story which I think is sad when the book is about stories. How stories can help people coop with things they can't or don't want to face. How stories can help to explain things that cannot be explained. But I got lost in this story.
I got lost in the amount of characters. I was unable to put them in the right spot, with the right people. Did that one character just appeared in that other characters story or.. and are we before or after the happening. Things I was asking myself for about 65% of the book. Only after that things started to make sense a bit as all characters are moving towards the same point in time.
What I did enjoy was the place of the river in all the stories. It shows how important the river was in that time still to get all the news. The story play in 1887 but sometimes it felt older. I remember I got a bit confused when someone took a train at some point wondering if they did exist around that time.
I did however finish this book. Diane Setterfield has a beautiful way of writing things. Creating an atmosphere. Using beautiful words to make beautiful sentences. I am notoriously horrible when there is a big character pool with a changing point of view and I am sure this book can be a pure joy to read if you do not have that problem.
ConversionConversion EmoticonEmoticon