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The Clockmaker’s Wife

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The Clockmaker’s Wife

By: Daisy Wood
Narrated by: Sophie Bentinck
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About this listen

The world is at war. And time is running out…

London, 1940. Britain is gripped by the terror of the Blitz, forcing Nell Spelman to flee the capital with her young daughter – leaving behind her husband, Arthur, the clockmaker who keeps Big Ben chiming.

When Arthur disappears, Nell is desperate to find him. But her search will lead her into far darker places than she ever imagined…

New York, Present Day. When Ellie discovers a beautiful watch that had once belonged to a grandmother she never knew, she becomes determined to find out what happened to her. But as she pieces together the fragments of her grandmother’s life, she begins to wonder if the past is better left forgotten…

A powerful and unforgettable tale of fierce love, impossible choices and a moment that changes the world forever, perfect for fans of Fiona Valpy and Suzanne Kelman.

©2021 Daisy Wood (P)2021 HarperCollins Publishers Limited 20th Century Fiction Historical Historical Fiction Romance

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Critic reviews

"A ticking time-bomb of intrigue, wrapped around stark but rich descriptions of the Blitz. An unforgettable wartime debut." (Mandy Robotham, internationally best-selling author of The Berlin Girl)
All stars
Most relevant  
Such a beautiful story , So informative about how the people of London experienced the Second World War . The heroic tail of a woman . Beautifully described . I will never listen to the Big Ben chiming the same way again .

Beautiful story

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This story gives a fascinating and convincing picture of wartime London. I particularly enjoyed the vivid descriptions of the Palace of Westminster. But I also enjoyed the modern day story of love and the quest to uncover family history and the secrets of the past. This is an enthralling story.

An enthralling read

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I quite enjoyed this book thought the story was pleasant enough I would have liked to know a little about Arthur's life after the incident and the back and forth was a bit unnecessary and tedious when the historical narrative was better Reasonably well narrated

Pleasantly entertaining

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The story was, though not compelling, gently engaging in an unchallenging way . Possibly, it missed a trick in not making more of the historical setting and clear research that underpinned it. There was unfortunately plenty of odd pronunciation of lots of pretty common words that struck awkward chords, although generally the voice was unintrusive and otherwise did not get in the way of the story. Thus, you are given ‘pre-emptory’ for peremptory; ‘Hog-nam-ee’ for Hogmanay; ‘unwieldly’ instead of unwieldy; ‘jubulant’ for jubilant; ‘shtreet’ for street and ‘shtraight’ for straight and ‘frushtration’ - surely harder to say than the correct version. Yet it wasn’t a lisping issue, as ‘cigarette’ was heard as you’d expect.
Sadly, a particular bugbear also turned up: ‘misch-eev-eeee-ous’ when there is no such word. (Mischievous is pronounced ‘mis-chif-us’).
The character Mr Talbot is given the emphasis on the last syllable, which sounds like the way a young child learning to read might pronounce it - and is plain weird on the ear. Some errors were just plain lack of preparation. It might be a common mistake, but any competent editor would erase the unnecessary ‘s’, so I can only think that ‘St John’s Ambulance’ instead of the correct St John Ambulance was performer error. It grated.
Altogether, it’s a ‘nearly but not quite’ sort of book that descends into the populist in the second half, after a promising beginning.

Promising beginning with a weak second half

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