The Helsingør Sewing Club

by Ella Gyland

[pamela]

I suspect my rating would have been higher if I'd read The Helsingør Sewing Club rather than listened to it through Audiobook, so please keep that caveat in mind with this review.

The Helsingør Sewing Club was an interesting story about an historical event that I knew very little about. The subject matter was therefore very interesting, and I did find Gyland's writing style to be expressive and beautiful.

The audiobook narrator did an absolutely wonderful job. I especially appreciated the correct pronunciation of Danish words. The problem for me was that the book started slowly, with a lot of meandering scene-setting that simply didn't keep my attention in audio form. And when the narrative got going there were a lot of PoV and jumps in narrative from first person to third that lost me a few times if I wasn't paying attention to every moment. Consequently, the characters ended up feeling a little underdeveloped.

I might want to give this a go in non-audio form in the future, as I think there's probably a lot I didn't get out of it due to the format. From a story point of view, I think it's definitely worth picking up - but if you're going with audio format make sure that you're a listener who is willing to fully commit and doesn't mind a slow start.