Cover Image: The Dollmaker

The Dollmaker

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Member Reviews

When I final;y finished this novel, I wasnt quite sure what to think. I didn't dislike it as a story but I also didn't feel any particular degree of like for the tale either. It just kind of was.

I initially requested this novel from Netgalley based upon the beautiful cover art and the blurb which drew me in. I have never read a Nina Allan novel before but due to the description and cover, I thought I would give it a go.

The Dollmaker is split into 3 portions, that of Andrew G - a lover of dolls from a young age, insitutionalised Bramber, and tales of the eccentric Eva Chaplin, a Polish Jew dollmaker of the past. In The Dollmaker Andrew and Bramber exchange penmail while he makes his way to her in order to save her from her meagre existence. Threaded throughout are the tales of Ewa, bridging the gap in correspondence.

Going in I was extremely hopeful for an enthralling experience but alas, after around 25% I really started to lose interest. I think the main point that turned me off was Ewa's obsession with dwarves which I found strange and isolating for her character.

Overall, as I said previously it was not a 'bad' novel nor was it fantastic. It simply just was.

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Andrew and Bramber start writing to each other because of their shared interest in dolls. As their friendship grows, Andrew decides to visit Bramber at the institution she calls home. Andrew and Bramber’s story is interspersed with tales written by another doll-lover, Ewa Chaplin, which Andrew reads on his journey. A beautiful, strange, multi-layered book you’ll want to keep reading long after the sun has gone down.

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Andrew Garvie, a small man, almost a midget, finds himself drawn to dolls from a very young age, lured by their beauty and their strangeness. Though concerned by his strange request, his parents indulge him, and buy him the antique doll he craves. His interest quickly becomes an irresistible obsession. He becomes an avid collector, and later a maker of dolls. A tiny man with a peculiar obsession, Andrew is only too aware that others will find his interest bizarre, and even frightening, and he hides his dolls from almost everyone.
The story really begins when Andrew is in his thirties, living a lonely, cloistered life, approaching middle-age, and ready for an adventure, even though he doesn’t know it. A message in a doll-collecting magazine catches his eye—a woman called Bramber Winters seeking information about Ewa Chaplin.
A Polish refugee who lived in London till her death, Chaplin was a writer and - more importantly to Andrew - a renowned dollmaker. Her extraordinary, unique dolls now reside in museums; on the rare occasions they come up for sale, their cost is well out of Andrew’s reach. Andrew doesn’t know much about Chaplin, but feels an instinctive affinity with Bramber. He is drawn to respond, and the two begin a correspondence that forms the core of Nina Allen’s story, as Bramber and Andrew tell their individual tales, coming together through their letters.
Bramber unfolds her story slowly. Andrew learns little about her, other than that she has lived for many years in an institution in Cornwall. Andrew’s response to this mutual outcast is visceral. Inexplicably drawn, he impulsively embarks on a road trip from London to Bodmin, not knowing why, or what he’ll do when he finds Bramber, and they finally meet. He is bewitched by the adventure, exhilarated by his own daring, and drawn to Bramber, lured by her, like an enchantment in a fairy tale. His journey seems driven by a curious kind of love, as if he hopes to find the other half of himself. And does he find it? The trip falls short of his expectations; the meeting with Bramber is merely equivocal, but not hopeless. The ending is complex, but quietly happy. The final chapters were the best for me, drawing this odd story to a beautiful and satisfying conclusion.
Bramber urges Andrew to read Ewa Chaplin’s only book, a collection of short stories, which he does, on his journey. Chaplin writes magical, quasi-folk tales that abound with curious characters that speak to Bramber. They are windows to her soul. It’s easy to see what Bramber and Andrew get out of them, they all concern magical beings and outcasts: enchanters, lost souls, dwarves—dwarves crop up a lot. Andrew is not a dwarf, but he can relate.
These tales form the second strand of The Dollmaker and I’m afraid I found them less than enthralling. Some were better than others, some had the genuinely disturbing effect of a Grimm’s tale, but for the most part, I found them an irritation. They were all far too long; the parallels could have been more tightly, brightly worked. I could have enjoyed a three or four page break here and there; a few short, sweet, magical tales to season Andrew’s knightly quest by National Express would have been refreshing. As it was, I found them an unwelcome distraction. I understand why they were there, the fiction reflects Bramber and Andrew’s sad reality, their mutual predicament as art and life become one. But for me, the mechanics were too ponderous, self-conscious and often tedious. These over-lengthy stories broke the narrative, they took me out of Andrew’s head and Bramber’s story. They were something I had to get through so I could get back to Andrew. I would far rather have had more detail about Andrew’s dollmaking, or Bramber’s elusive past. If those stories had been shorter and/or less intrusive, this would have been a five star review.
Andrew is a remarkable character, I instantly warmed to him; his story and his journey captivated me. Bramber is a more elusive personality, but I came to love her too. Their mutual story captivated me. It’s a remarkable book. Not a fast or easy read, but anyone with a taste for the peculiar and macabre and finely-worked detail will surely love it.

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I am in charge of our Senior School library and am looking for a diverse array of new books to furnish their shelves with and inspire our young people to read a wider and more diverse range of books as they move through the senior school. It is hard sometimes to find books that will grab the attention of young people as their time is short and we are competing against technology and online entertainments.
This was a thought-provoking and well-written read that will appeal to young readers across the board. It had a really strong voice and a compelling narrative that I think would capture their attention and draw them in. It kept me engrossed and I think that it's so important that the books that we purchase for both our young people and our staff are appealing to as broad a range of readers as possible - as well as providing them with something a little 'different' that they might not have come across in school libraries before.
This was a really enjoyable read and I will definitely be purchasing a copy for school so that our young people can enjoy it for themselves. A satisfying and well-crafted read that I keep thinking about long after closing its final page - and that definitely makes it a must-buy for me!

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[To be published June 2nd]

Andrew Garvie has loved collecting antique dolls since he was a child, so much so that he now makes his own. Dolls that are very much like him, miniature (Andrew has proportionate dwarfism) but graceful, with plenty of hidden depths. One day, he answers an enigmatic personal ad in his collector’s magazine: “INFORMATION (biographical/bibliographical/photographic) on the life and work of EWA CHAPLIN AND/OR friendship, correspondence… Please reply to: Bramber Winters.”

With each letter, Bramber reveals more of her strange life in an institution on Bodmin Moor and Andrew falls more and more in love, to the point where he decides to play Sir Galahad and rescue her. He takes with him on this journey a copy of Ewa Chaplin’s fairy tales: strange, potent things, like her dolls, that eerily start to mirror reality. What will happen when Andrew and Bramber finally meet? Will they remain empty vessels, like their dolls, or will they finally come to life?

Nina Allan is known primarily for her speculative fiction – her debut, The Race, won the Grand Prix de L'imaginaire and her second novel, The Rift, won the British Science Fiction Award and the Kitschies Red Tentacle, as well as short fiction that has been shortlisted for the Hugo Award, the Shirley Jackson Award. and the British Fantasy Award. However, The Dollmaker isn’t as much of a departure as it may first appear. Both previous titles are characterised by narratives that span time and space and themes that question the nature of reality. The Dollmaker is described as “a love story about becoming real” and, though it appears to be literary, the short stories apparently having little to do with the main narrative. It uses the stories, and the motif of dolls themselves, to explore the idea of how reality is created (or, as it is put in the book, the “metaphysics of physics”).

The question of parallel realities and universes is posed. Both Andrew and Bramber are familiar with the feeling of belonging to a different world – Andrew because of his stature and Bramber because of her social awkwardness and, later, because of her surroundings in the mental institution. One character – Edwin, Bramber’s first love – even mentions a link between ghosts and parallel universes – that what we see as ghosts could just be echoes of other realities. So how are they created? Through objects? There is mention of the link between dolls and the human form and the beliefs surrounding this – the uncanny influence they seem to exert, tales of possessed dolls and the idea that by harming a doll made in someone’s image, you do harm to the person, echoed when Bramber destroys her doll that looks like her friend Helen for example, or when Andrew comes across a Ewa Chaplin doll, known as “Artist”, whose spell he seems to fall under.

Are they created through storytelling? Chaplin’s fairy tales are sandwiched between Andrew’s journey and Bramber’s letters, perfect self-contained set-pieces that encompass everything from the contemporary to the fantastical. There are a number of recurring motifs: firstly, dwarfs – court dwarfs especially, who were used by the monarchs of Europe to visually enhance their powerful positions and cater to the aristocracy’s fascination for anything “grotesque” and/or extraordinary – and their allusions to mythology and magic, particularly in the form of a poem about a dwarf who fell in love with and ended up murdering his queen (possible hints/foreshadows of a possible outcome for the relationship between Andrew and Bramber) and so there is a dwarf or dwarf-like character (a soldier who has lost both his legs, for example) in every story, who always act as agents of change.

Another recurring motif is transformative acts of creation: storytelling, alchemy, make up artistry, science, philosophy, journalism, painting and, of course, doll making. As he reads, Andrew begins to notice more and more characters and details that mirror his own life, the woman he fell in love with who went on to disappear without a trace, for instance, or the daughter of his best friend who’s a musical prodigy but seems to have trouble behaving or communicating in a manner considered normal. Even a particular story itself, ‘Amber Furness’ – another story about unrequited love between a woman and a dwarf, seems to take on a life of its own, mentioned in the main narrative as well as in other stories in the form of a play.

Or do we simply make reality by existing through it? As Edwin also reminds us, “time is a human construct” – things, people, memories can become more or less real. Because Andrew is just passing through the places he stays in they have a sense of unreality about them. He has never met Bramber in person before but has already managed to construct a “real” person from her letters.

The pace is thoughtful and measured, moving much more smoothly once you become used to the different narratives, building to an ending that is atmospheric but doesn’t seem to provide definitive answers for the questions posed. But whilst some may struggle with its slow start or its ambiguity of its ending, for those who can get past this they’ll find The Dollmaker is a book that lingers on in the mind long after finishing it, much like the tales of Chaplin herself.

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A diminutive doll maker writes a letter to a woman living in a medical facility. She, also a fan of dolls, writes back. And gradually, they fall in love.....
This is the very heart of this story. As these two people learn about each other, so do we. Andrew decides that Bramber needs rescuing from her confinement and sets off to find her. Interwoven with this journey are dark folk tales that also feature stories of dwarves, dolls and desire.
The story felt a little disjointed and, ultimately, the addition of the Chaplin stories did not feel like it added much to the narrative. In fact, the colour in these only seemed to highlight the drabness of Andrew and Bramber. Not a favourite, I'm sad to say...

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What a fabulous cover, also the blurb on the back of the book made me instantly want to read more. It is a very strange and unusual novel and the structure is most peculiar. The story explores the letters between Andrew Garvie and Bramber Winters, who come to know each other through their mutual interest in dolls. As I said a strange and interesting concept. I don't want to give too much away. Recommended.

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A fascinating and very different book. Not at all what I was expecting from the cover, but I really enjoyed it.

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I had no idea what to expect from this book. I loved the descriptions and the characters, both were so quirky and so misunderstood. I really enjoyed it but I did keep having a moment where I flashed back to a scene in Brooklyn 99 where Jake and his girlfriend go away from a romantic weekend and the B&B is filled with dolls - everywhere! However, very enjoyable book. Thanks.

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The Dollmaker by Nina Allan is an original novel that I enjoyed from start to finish. i had never read a book by this author before but I was pleasantly surprised. Allan has a lovely way with words and has created strong and memorable characters. The plot line moves at a good pace and maintains the readers attention. I look forward to reading more from the author in the future.

Thanks to NetGalley and the publishers for this ARC.

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The Dollmaker is an unusual book and for quite a while, I was sure whether I liked it or not. The main narrative is between Andrew, a man who has had a fascination with antique dolls since childhood, and Bramber, a woman living in an institution. Interwoven between their letters are dark, fairy tales written by Ewa Chaplin who is a dollmaker that Bramber wants to learn more of. I actually found these fairy tales more interesting than the story of Andrew and Bramber which seemed a bit dull in comparison. Overall, I did enjoy the book and I look forward to reading other works by Nina Allan.

Thank you to NetGalley and the publisher for providing me with a free e-copy of this book in exchange for my honest review.

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Andrew Garvie lives a quiet life making delicate and intricate dolls, Bramber Winters lives in isolation in an institution. Their paths connect after Andrew answers Bramber’s personal ad in a Collector’s magazine. They grow in closeness with every passing letter and Andrew hatches a plan to journey through England to rescue her.

As Andrew travels he reads Ewa Chaplins’ fairy tales, thus introducing stories within the story.

As this novel contains mini tales throughout, the overarching structure was difficult to follow. I’m sad to say it fell short. I found myself disappointed when the fairy tales ended and ‘real life’ resumed. I was absolutely in love with the story of Nelly Toye and would have loved a fully fleshed novel of that tale.

Nothing about this book is bad but I just found myself wishing for more.

3/5 Stars

Thank you to Quercus Books for providing an e-ARC copy via NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.

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Fascinating characters, and stories which kept you reading to find out more. Lovely lyrical descriptions and wonderful use of language to set the scene.

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I have to confess that china dolls, like clowns give me the creeps so I don't know why this book called out to me to be read! I'm glad it did because it has joined the list of 'most memorable reads' this year.

Andrew has always liked dolls. Maybe his small stature drew him to the miniature people. Whatever it was, his interest in them eventually led to him making exquisite handmade creations. In an attempt to reach out to a fellow enthusiast he answered a pen-pal ad in a specialist doll magazine and so grew the snail mail relationship between Andrew & Bramber, a woman living in a large house in Bodmin-an institution she has been in since girlhood. As their relationship develops Andrew decides to travel to Bodmin to meet her.

This book is written in a fairly unusual way following Andrew's life, the letters between him & Bramber & the stories written by Polish dollmaker Ewa Chaplin. It takes a while to get used to this but the whole book is beautifully written & kept me totally enthralled Thanks to Netgalley & the publisher for letting me read & review this book- I loved it!

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Andrew, an avid lover of dolls, takes a trip across SW England in order to rescue Bramber, his pen pal. He’s convinced he loves her and is need of his help. Interspersed with the letters and Andrew’s experiences are fairy tales featuring dwarfs. I thought I’d really enjoy this book after reading its description but I didn’t and instead found myself skimming more and more (the fairy tales and most of Bramber’s letters). The cover was intriguing and the book was well written, but just not to my taste.

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Such a beautifully written book with wonderful turns of phrase throughout. The Dollmaker is filled with stories within stories as well as having tangents thrown in for good measure. The characters are also memorable as well as compelling which is a requirement for a novel with this kind of ambition.

While I'm not sure I can recommend the book for an impatient reader, I suspect The Dollmaker will get nominated for numerous book awards upon its publication.

With thanks to Netgalley and the publisher for the ARC.

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This is a beautifully written, sinister gothic tale, reminiscent of fairytales. The story format is almost like a collection of short stories and can take some getting used to, but all in a good read.

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A swiss-roll of odd elements; gathering up a snarl of peculiar ingredients in its entrails, Nina Allen's, The Dollmaker was not for me. The first person narrative; the letters; the mystery and secrets; the short stories; the disabilities...too much.

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Andrew a doll maker is off on a journey to find a young woman he has been writing to for some time. Along the way he learns about himself and her. Will he find her and will she want to know him?

I had high hopes for this but it didn't quite live up to it. It was an interesting story but just didn't draw me in that much. I enjoyed the letters Bramber sent him. It helped develop her character and I really enjoyed the translated fairy tales. The ending was good and finished the story nicely. An interesting read but not enough for me. I'm sure others will love it though.

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I was sent a copy of The Dollmaker by Nina Allan to read and review by NetGalley.
I have very mixed feelings about this book. I enjoyed the main story of the relationship between the dollmaker of the title, Andrew, and his correspondent Bramber and the way their relationship unfolded. I was not so taken however, with the chapters of the character Ewa Chaplin’s modern day fairytales. I found these to be overly long and, for me personally, rather irrelevant and quite possibly unnecessary! I found the novel to be quite unsure of its era , though this may well have been a foil by the author by making the setting seem old fashioned even though it is set in the present day. Living as I do in Cornwall I must say I was absolutely appalled by some of the blatant inaccuracies regarding the county; even if a place is used within the context of a novel surely it must actually be founded on the reality?! I was really looking forward to reading The Dollmaker and I think it had real potential but I’m afraid it fell far short of my expectations, hence the three stars.

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