Some memories hold you captive, some set you free. They can be stolen, and sometimes returned.

BINDING

Noun: A strong covering holding the pages of a book together; the action of fastening or holding together, or of being linked by chemical bonds. 

Adjective: (of an agreement or promise) involving an obligation that cannot be broken.

I fell in love with Erin Morgenstern's The Night Circus many years ago, and after a very long eight years was delighted by The Starless Sea. Bereft of further Morgenstern novels, and being unprepared to wait another eight years for her next feat of magic, I went hunting for something in a similar vein. So it was I stumbled across The Binding by Bridget Collins. 

The description was intriguing. What could be so terrible about bookbinding?:

Emmett...is to begin an apprenticeship as a Bookbinder—a vocation that arouses fear, superstition, and prejudice among their small community but one neither he nor his parents can afford to refuse. 

What really got me, though, was the claim by Erin Kelly on the back cover:

Pure magic. The kind of immersive storytelling that makes you forget your own name.

That was a gauntlet thrown down if every there was one. 

Collins' central character is Emmett, a young lad with no greater ambition than to live at home on the family farm, working the fields and tending to the animals. Then something happens to him. He can't remember what, but it must be bad indeed because his loving family now wants him to leave and become apprenticed to a woman everyone regards as no better than a witch - the fabled Bookbinder.

What can I tell you about Bookbinding without giving too much away? Probably nothing. But it is an interesting premise - at once tempting and abhorrent. We follow Emmett's story as he learns his new craft and realises what it will cost him and those who seek the services of the Bookbinder. 

You may never look at a book the same way again.

The book looks at 'binding' in different senses: the literal sense of a book being bound... although not quite how you'd expect; and how people are bound to each other in good and terrible ways. The characters are for the most part beautifully-drawn and fleshed out, but I did find it odd that one central character was simply dispensed with part-way through the book, with no more than a cursory explanation. I would have enjoyed witnessing his demise, rather than merely being told about it! That, though, was the only flaw I found. The Binding is well-written, efficiently-edited, and a great yarn.

I did not forget my name. But I did forget where I was, lost touch with the here and now, and became bound to this story, as we readers are wont to do. This book binds in many ways. Read it. You're bound to like it.

Available in standard print book, large print, and e-book formats