WOW!
Pip has done it again. A lot of people enjoyed her first book The Dictionary of Lost Words. For me, I found it a little hard to get into. However, with this new book, I was hooked from the first word. Pip has written about the women who bound the books at Oxford University Press. They weren't supposed to read or edit the books, just bind them. Just like women of this time who weren't allowed to vote and to graduate from university was for most a dream. Set during World War 1, this is a time of enormous change for women - the suffragettes, fighting to move away from their daily lives and work in areas where they had never been given a chance.
I took this book with me while I was away and just couldn't wait until I had a chance to open the pages again and delve into the world of Peggy and Maude. Both Peggy and Maude, work at the bindery like their mother, undertaking women's work of the time. However, when their mother passes, Peggy becomes Maude's carer. Unlike her co-workers, Peggy would rather read the books than bind them and builds a collection of books allowing her to delve into her own passion of learning.
This is a book that is full of emotion and history, lives lost and love found as well as new opportunities discovered. It definitely is an eye-opener into a period where opportunities we take for granted today were not always that way.
Happy Reading
Chris 😊
