Take a photo of a barcode or cover
A review by zsuzsanna22
The Clockmaker's Daughter by Kate Morton
3.0
I agree with most everything in the previous 2 and 3 star reviews of this book. I am also a big Kate Morton fan, eagerly awaited the release of this one, started it as soon as it was available, then settled in for what I hoped would be a good, long, engrossing read. But came away very disappointed for many of the same reasons that were so well said by others.
But I will add am additional view on what was wrong with this book. It felt more like a collection of short stories than a cohesive thread where the different time lines and characters are eventually sewn together. The device Morton uses, of the house as the common factor, is just too weak and tenuous. By the end, the characters are shown to have some sort of connection but this too is very weak and minor and it's hard to remember how they were connected. Morton could have done a much better job of showing the connections between characters from different eras, as she did in previous books, particularly the Secret Keeper and the Forgotten Garden.
Too many characters, too little tension, slow moving, not that interesting and I really didn't like the ghost element at all. Finally, the change from first person narration to third person just didn't work. I don't normally mind this, it can be done quite skilfully and to good effect but it didn't work for me here.
But I will add am additional view on what was wrong with this book. It felt more like a collection of short stories than a cohesive thread where the different time lines and characters are eventually sewn together. The device Morton uses, of the house as the common factor, is just too weak and tenuous. By the end, the characters are shown to have some sort of connection but this too is very weak and minor and it's hard to remember how they were connected. Morton could have done a much better job of showing the connections between characters from different eras, as she did in previous books, particularly the Secret Keeper and the Forgotten Garden.
Too many characters, too little tension, slow moving, not that interesting and I really didn't like the ghost element at all. Finally, the change from first person narration to third person just didn't work. I don't normally mind this, it can be done quite skilfully and to good effect but it didn't work for me here.