The Emporium opens with the first frost of winter. It is the same every year. Across the city, when children wake to see ferns of white stretched across their windows, or walk to school to hear ice crackling underfoot, the whispers begin: The Emporium is open! Christmas is coming, and the goose is getting fat... It is 1917, and London has spent years in the shadow of the First World War. In the heart of Mayfair, though, there is a place of hope. A place where children's dreams can come true, where the impossible becomes possible - that place is Papa Jack's Toy Emporium.
For years Papa Jack has created and sold his famous magical toys: hobby horses, patchwork dogs and bears that seem alive, toy boxes bigger on the inside than out, 'instant trees' that sprout from boxes, tin soldiers that can fight battles on their own. Now his sons, Kaspar and Emil, are just old enough to join the family trade. Into this family comes a young Cathy Wray - homeless and vulnerable. The Emporium takes her in, makes her one of its own. But Cathy is about to discover that while all toy shops are places of wonder, only one is truly magical...
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[The Emporium opens with the first frost of winter] ***(Del Rey, 8 February 2018, ebook, 480 pages, ARC from publisher via NetGalley and voluntarily reviewed)
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I thought The Toymakers was amazing.
I feel completely in love with this book, the characters, the sadness, the joy, the magic and the wonder. I was totally absorbed in this book.
The Toymakers is heart-breaking at times, especially when the First World Wat happens. The book is filled with magic and wonder at first as Cathy's finds a place in the Emporium for herself and her baby.
Things start to get pretty dark when Kasper goes off to war. Emil, the younger brother, the brother who isn't quite as good, finds himself having to run the Emporium and find a way to keep the magic and wonder alive and keep customers happy. He makes some bad choices and there are terrible prices to pay.
I cried a lot reading The Toymakers. I thought things were going to stay dark but the book ends on a note of hope.
