The Sisterhood of the Traveling Books

Somewhere on Facebook a couple of months ago, I came across an interesting offer in one of my book groups. Fill out the Google form and you would be assigned to a group of four strangers. Each person in the group chooses a book to read and marks it up as he or she reads. Underline, annotate, draw little pictures, whatever you want. Finish it within a month and then mail it off to the person under you. In the end, you make notes in four books and read what the person or people who had it before you wrote, and finally you get your own book back so you can read what everyone else was thinking. It's like a real-world version of S by JJ Abrams and Doug Dorst.

I looked on my TBR shelf for something I'd been meaning to read and texted three titles out to the other members. Since everyone in the group had already read a book by Kate Morton, I settled on The Clockmaker's Daughter as my selection. I am ashamed that I finished it really late and set the group back a bit... We had a vacation in the way. I tried to finish it before we left but there was just no way.

Anyway, my marked-up copy of this book is wrapped in brown paper and will head to the post office tomorrow morning!

It was really fun to write in the book, if I'm being honest. I never do that, nor do I fold pages, nor do I set them down open in case I wreck the spines... so it felt like an act of rebellion. ;) The next book that I need to read for this project is The Bookshop on the Corner by Jenny Colgan, and I need to get started on that one ASAP!

The Clockmaker's Daughter is the story of Birdie, a young girl whose father leaves her behind in 1860s London to seek his fortune in America. He promises to send for her, but in the meantime, she ends up in the hands of some unscrupulous people. The book jumps around in time, including timelines in the 1940s and 2017. I will say that I would have liked to see more of the 2017 characters. The 1860s chapters were just a little repetitive for me. However, I would say that the tone of this book and the atmosphere that Kate Morton creates are just perfect. This book is exactly the right companion for curling up on a rainy day. It's partially a ghost story, it has elements of Oliver Twist, A Little Princess, and even Titanic. You'll see what I mean!

Pick this book up if you're in the mood for historical fiction, Victorian England, and a ghost story that isn't scary.

4/5 stars