First sentence: Syd opened her eyes and glanced out the window.
Premise/plot: Syd Stowe moves with her family from New York City to a small town in Minnesota. Her great-grandfather, Jake Stowe, moved from that same town to New York when he was just eighteen. That would have been circa 1900. At first she's so upset that she doesn't want to leave the house and make friends. But after discovering a toy shop with homemade wooden dolls, she becomes fascinated with the history of the town. In particular how the dolls connect to the history of the town. The shop owner says that the dolls' appearance is based on real life people.
Soon after Syd meets a girl around her own age that looks just like one of the dolls. Both of them carry a bag of marbles. Weird. The two start hanging out together. Can Laura help her figure out who the dolls are supposed to be? Can Laura help her discover the identity of their maker?
My thoughts: A Question of Time is a weird mystery. Syd, our heroine, is drawn into a mystery in the past. It's a mystery that leads her straight back to her own family. It's a book that in some ways leaves more questions for readers than it answers. I haven't decided if that's a good thing or a bad thing.
Would I have enjoyed reading A Question of Time as a kid? Probably not. I would describe this one as bittersweet at best. I did not do bittersweet as a kid. If it didn't end happy, I was MAD.
© 2018 Becky Laney of Young Readers
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