The Clockmaker's Daughter
€20.50
About this Book
In the picturesque town of Kazimierz Dolny in 1920s Poland, Zofia Nowak grows up surrounded by the delicate mechanisms of her father's clock shop. Born exactly at midnight on the winter solstice, she discovers as a young girl that she possesses a strange ability: she can subtly manipulate the flow of time, slowing or quickening moments at will. Her gift remains a secret until she falls in love with Jakub, an aspiring photographer who captures her in a portrait that reveals her temporal aura.
As Poland navigates the tumultuous interwar period, Zofia's power becomes both a blessing and a burden. When a mysterious clockmaker arrives from Prague with knowledge of others like Zofia, she must decide whether to embrace her unusual abilities or live an ordinary life with Jakub. But as political tensions rise across Europe, Zofia discovers that her gift may be the key to saving those she loves from the gathering storm of history.
Blending magical realism with meticulously researched historical fiction, Majewska creates an enchanting tale that explores the nature of time, memory, and the choices that define us. "The Clockmaker's Daughter" weaves Polish folklore and actual historical events into a spellbinding narrative that has captivated readers around the world.
Praise & Recognition
- "A dazzling blend of history and magic" — The New York Times
- Winner, Janusz A. Zajdel Award for Best Polish Speculative Fiction
- Selected for World Book Night 2023 recommended reading list
Majewska's prose is like poetry—every sentence feels carefully crafted and luminous. The magical elements are woven so seamlessly into the historical setting that they feel completely natural. Zofia's ability to manipulate time serves as both a compelling plot device and a beautiful metaphor for how we all wish we could slow down precious moments or speed through difficult ones. The love story between Zofia and Jakub is tender and believable, and the descriptions of 1920s Poland are so vivid you can almost smell the markets and hear the town clocks chiming.
As a fan of both historical fiction and magical realism, I found this novel delightfully fresh. Majewska doesn't just insert magic into history; she explores how such gifts might actually function in a society teetering between tradition and modernity. The research into clockmaking and photography adds fascinating technical details that ground the story. I deducted one star only because I felt the middle section moved a bit too slowly, but the final chapters more than made up for it with their emotional impact.
Beyond the beautiful story, what I most appreciated about this novel was its immersion in Polish culture and folklore. From the detailed descriptions of seasonal traditions to the subtle incorporation of Polish legends about time and fate, Majewska creates a cultural tapestry that feels authentic and engaging. The translator deserves special praise for preserving what must be equally beautiful prose in the original Polish. This is the kind of book that makes you want to research the setting and learn more about the history—I've already booked a trip to Kazimierz Dolny for next summer!
From Chapter Two
The first time it happened, Zofia was seven years old. She was sitting on the wooden floor of her father's workshop, surrounded by the comforting tick-tock of dozens of clocks, each marking time at its own precise rhythm. Her father was working on the inner mechanism of a particularly stubborn pocket watch, his fingers nimble despite their size, his breath creating small clouds in the cold winter air.
"Pass me the small screwdriver, the one with the blue handle," he said without looking up.
Zofia spotted it on a high shelf, far beyond her reach. She stood on tiptoe, stretching her arm as far as it would go, but the tool remained tantalizingly out of reach. She focused on it intently, wishing she were taller, and then something strange happened. The workshop seemed to slow around her—the pendulum of the grandfather clock in the corner swinging through molasses, her father's blinking taking an eternity, the dust motes suspended almost motionless in the beam of sunlight from the window.
In this strange, stretched moment, Zofia found she could move normally. She dragged a footstool beneath the shelf, climbed up, retrieved the screwdriver, and returned to her father's side. Only then did the world resume its normal pace.
"That was quick," her father remarked, taking the tool from her small hand.
Zofia said nothing. She wasn't sure what had happened, but she knew instinctively that it was something to keep to herself, at least for now.
Over the following weeks, she discovered she could replicate the effect if she concentrated hard enough. She practiced in secret, learning to control the duration and intensity of the time-slowing. It was exhausting, leaving her with headaches and a strange hunger afterward, but the ability fascinated her. On her eighth birthday, she discovered she could do the opposite as well—accelerate time in a small area around her, making the tedious arithmetic lesson pass in what seemed like minutes instead of an hour.
She kept her gift hidden until the spring she turned sixteen, when Jakub Stein moved to Kazimierz Dolny with his family and set up a photography studio next to her father's clock shop. The first time he aimed his camera at her, capturing her image on a glass plate, something unexpected happened. When he developed the photograph, there was a strange aura around her figure, a blurring that he couldn't explain.
"I've never seen anything like this," he told her, showing her the image. "It's as if you exist in two moments simultaneously."
The way he looked at her then—curious rather than frightened—made Zofia wonder if perhaps her secret didn't need to remain a secret forever.
