The Bookbinder

March 1, 2023

Peggy and sister Maude live on a narrowboat in Oxford and drudge through work at Oxford University Press's book bindery, but Peggy wants more from life: to study books, not just bind them. Then World War I brings an influx of Belgian refugees into town, upending the world. Following the Reese's Book Club pick The Dictionary of Lost Words. Prepub Alert.

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Copyright 2023 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

June 26, 2023
Williams returns (after The Dictionary of Lost Words) with a moving coming-of-age historical set in England during WWI. Peggy Jones, 21, works in the bindery at Oxford University Press, where she reads tantalizing snatches of Shakespeare and Homer while folding, gathering, and sewing together the pages. When war refugees arrive in Oxford from Belgium, Peggy befriends Lotte, a former librarian from Louvain, who joins her at the bindery. While reading and writing letters for wounded soldiers being cared for on the campus, Peggy gets to know a handsome Belgian named Bastiaan, and they fall in love. Meanwhile, an entitled student and a sympathetic college librarian encourage Peggy to prepare for and take the rigorous Somerville College admission exam, and her supervisor helps her see that her twin sister, Maude, who has a developmental disability, will thrive if afforded more independence, which in turn frees Peggy to pursue a more fulfilling life for herself. Authentic period details and intriguing glimpses into the bookbinding process add to Williams’s portrayal of resilient women. This would make a riveting costume drama for the large or small screen. Agent: Linda Kaplan, DeFiore & Co.

Starred review from July 1, 2023

Williams (The Dictionary of Lost Words) brilliantly weaves a new thread into her world of words at Oxford University. Peggy Jones has been told her whole life to bind the books, not read them, but as a child her love of words grew despite her limited access. Now, as the Great War looms and steals Britain's men and boys, the women of the Oxford University bindery must step into new roles to keep their small town running. Between volunteering to read to wounded soldiers, welcoming Belgian refugees, and taking on the tasks of the men who have left for battle, Peggy loses hope that her own desire for a higher education will ever come to be. Relentless in her pursuit of knowledge, she pushes past her own fears into a new, unknown world. With heartfelt characters, a bit of romance, and a bleak and deeply sad place in time, Williams's novel is a deft story about the meaning of words, who is allowed access, and how they're inevitably interpreted. VERDICT Highly recommended for readers who enjoy historical fiction about strong women, like the works of Kate Quinn, Beatriz Williams, and Laura Willig.--Carmen Clark

Copyright 2023 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

September 8, 2023
Peggy Jones is a bindery girl in Oxford during WWI, one of the unsung literary heroines who folds, gathers, and sews books. Although she never tires of the "clean leather and the fading scent of ink and glue," she must always remind herself as she sneaks glimpses at the manuscripts that her job is to bind books, not read them. One day, when looking at The Oxford Book of English Verse, Peggy notices that all the names are men's, which leads her to wonder about the world's most famous author: Anonymous. "If they had names," she considers, "might they be Anna or Mary or Peg?" When Peggy volunteers to help the soldiers who have returned from the war by talking and reading to them, she is finally able to indulge her love of stories, and soon, when she falls in love with a Belgian soldier, she finds herself in a story of her own. Set far from the front, The Bookbinder tells of the wars, including those of class and women's rights, that go on at home. Williams' lovely novel was inspired by the Oxford University Press archives, where she came across the names of the actual bindery girls who worked on its in-house publication, The Clarendonian. She reproduces their signatures at the end of the book, reminding readers that stories like Peggy's belonged to real people.

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