The Silence Factory is an imaginative, immersive and spellbinding story. I was thoroughly captivated by it from start to finish! Highly recommended.
The narrative follows two time lines. First, we have a woman travelling to a remote Greek island in the early 19th century with her husband, Sir Edward Ashmore-Percy, who is seeking some remarkable find he has heard about. The scientist he hopes to meet is dead when they arrive, and they settle in as her husband continues his search. It’s a strained marriage and Sophia is unhappy as tempers fray…
Some years later, Henry Latimer is working in his father-in-law’s shop, as an audiologist, selling ear trumpets, when Sir Edward comes into the shop on behalf of his deaf daughter. He leaves Henry a small piece of cloth that Henry soon realises has remarkable properties. Shortly afterwards, Henry leaves London to stay with Sir Edward and his daughter. Sir Edward invites Henry to work for him to promote the cloth being made at his factory.
While the subject of The Silence Factory is a ‘magical’ cloth, the story is vivid and realistic and the suspension of disbelief is total. I viscerally felt the shiver of the menacing, Gothic atmosphere in the factory town, the deafening noise of the factory, the sticky cling of cobwebs, the deadly suck of rushing floodwater. And the seductive, calming quiet of the cloth.
The Silence Factory is a splendid novel and a really great read. Highly recommended. The only aspect that pulls it down from a 5* to a 4* rating is the Greek-island sections, which I felt could have been shortened. The thread of the relationship between Sophia and Hira, for example, felt a bit tangential and slow. I was impatient to return to the primary narrative.
Thank you to @NetGalley_UK, @HarperFiction and @Br1dgetCollins for the ARC. All my reviews are 100% honest and unbiased, regardless of how I acquire the book.
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