You need to sign in or sign up before continuing.
Take a photo of a barcode or cover
3.7 AVERAGE
3.7 AVERAGE
Kate Morton's The Clockmakers daughter is a beautiful story. The mystery surrounding the house and the different families who lived within its walls is a good one.
My disappointment comes in at the execution of the plot for this story. As many others have said, there are far too many characters. it is difficult to differentiate between the primary and secondary characters. There also is a lot of jumping around. Within 1 chapter, it could be the ghost observing something happening in present day in one paragraph and then the immediate next it was back into the late 1800s when the ghost was a young woman... Then within that 1800s memory... is a story of the ghosts' younger childhood life.
The other part that is very difficult to swallow is after a lengthy plot and mystery, there is no resolution. The reader is robbed of the conclusion for every single character, including the ghost. everything that the writer had been building up to, just ended anticlimactically.. with a mere hint of what possibly happened. There is no relief for the reader, even if it was a tragic end.. there wasn't even that.
My disappointment comes in at the execution of the plot for this story. As many others have said, there are far too many characters. it is difficult to differentiate between the primary and secondary characters. There also is a lot of jumping around. Within 1 chapter, it could be the ghost observing something happening in present day in one paragraph and then the immediate next it was back into the late 1800s when the ghost was a young woman... Then within that 1800s memory... is a story of the ghosts' younger childhood life.
The other part that is very difficult to swallow is after a lengthy plot and mystery, there is no resolution. The reader is robbed of the conclusion for every single character, including the ghost. everything that the writer had been building up to, just ended anticlimactically.. with a mere hint of what possibly happened. There is no relief for the reader, even if it was a tragic end.. there wasn't even that.
Just....lush. The story, like all of Morton's works, pulls you in deeply and then reveals itself in poignant, beautiful layers. So rich and intricately written.
Challenging task to link storylines and characters from 1862 to 2017. Ambitious effort but not totally successful. Perhaps the book should have gone through one more editing run or the author got too carried away and strayed too much.
Time and light are so important in the novel but the slow pace of the novel at times was frustrating. I was confused as to why the author included Elodie Winslow and her family members as characters but then shunted them aside as she saw fit. It felt like they were put into a hiding nook in the floor like poor Birdie and just let out to get some air from time to time. Will there be a sequel to this book perhaps to tie up loose ends?
Time and light are so important in the novel but the slow pace of the novel at times was frustrating. I was confused as to why the author included Elodie Winslow and her family members as characters but then shunted them aside as she saw fit. It felt like they were put into a hiding nook in the floor like poor Birdie and just let out to get some air from time to time. Will there be a sequel to this book perhaps to tie up loose ends?
Kate Morton weaves together an intriguing house and several interesting, well-written, tragic female characters. I say "several" because I lost count--it was too many plot lines, too many characters, too many romantic deaths, and I was not willing to work that hard for such a slow boiling semi-mystery.
DNF 50%. I'll try again with one of her more focused books.
DNF 50%. I'll try again with one of her more focused books.
I really enjoyed the characters and the way the book flowed. The ending was a surpriseand left some questions in my mind but overall a good book
This is one of those books that you get completely wrapped up in and you aren’t released until you know the answers. I was shocked by one of the answers that I didn’t see coming, but disappointed by the lacklustre, almost side-note revelation of another answer. The real beauty of this book was the cast of characters and how the house at the centre of the story brought them all together and how those relationships were revealed through clever clues. This book was a good combination of mystery, romance, history, and magic.
Beautifully written but it’s too long, has far too many characters and too many separate stories that (sort of) come together far too late. And the ending? What an anticlimax.
I was totally drawn into this book and the storyline or should I say storylines but my one criticism is that it jumped around a lot in terms of time period and perspective making it difficult at times to follow or understand the relationship of the characters. The ending when it came did answer many questions that arose while reading, but I feel that one explanation did not quite make sense to me. Hence 3 stars.
slow-paced
So many different character stories it felt frustrating and hard to see the connections.
I tried to read this book but it was almost impossible to continue. I decided when I was over 100 pages in to get my life back and move on to another book that was more enjoyable. The switching between stories was disjointed and confusing. I have no idea how anyone could rate this book higher than 2 stars. The characters were not engaging and I had little interest in finding out more about them. Please don’t waste your tIme. There are hundreds of books out there better than this one.,