Latest Reads: The Binding Bridget Collins

Imagine you could erase grief.
Imagine you could remove pain.
Imagine you could hide the darkest, most horrifying secret.
Forever.
Young Emmett Farmer is working in the fields when a strange letter arrives summoning him away from his family. He is to begin an apprenticeship as a Bookbinder—a vocation that arouses fear, superstition, and prejudice among their small community but one neither he nor his parents can afford to refuse.

Very difficult book to review this, without giving away the secrets that make it pure magic on the page, but let’s see how we go.

Imagine if you could bind away your memories in a book – once written and bound you forget. You can leave the bad behind. Is that good? Or would it empty you of that which makes you who you are..

Emmett has been unwell, a fever of the mind, when he is called to learn the trade of the bookbinder. So begins an unusual love story, a speculative fantasy tale, a beautifully complex social commentary in  a world that lives and breathes.

The Binding is a slow burner of a literary delight, gorgeous immersive prose and an utterly compelling story. A novel of many layers, with a huge heart and a melancholy emotional core, it was utterly riveting from the very first page. 

Gently impacting on you as you read in a way you won’t realise until you are done, The Binding is an intelligent and well woven story that speaks to who we are at a very human level. 

Recommended. 

You can purchase The Binding (Borough Press) Here.

Happy Reading! 

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