
Hi, everyone!
Today I am sharing my Feature Post and Book Review for THE DRESSMAKER’S WAR by Michelle Vernal on this Bookouture Books-On-Tour blog tour.
Below you will find a book description, my book review, an about the author section, and the author’s social media links. Enjoy!
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Book Description
She gazes at her mother’s face in the black and white photograph, her vision blurring as tears build. Could this wartime wedding portrait be the key to finding out why her mother went missing, all those years ago?
Brides of Bold Street is filled with beautiful, brand-new ivory gowns. But dressmaker Sabrina loves it when brides-to-be wear vintage, family heirloom dresses. Seeing wedding day photographs of future mothers and grandmothers beaming – as if knowing the happiness they feel will be passed down to their daughters – is a bittersweet reminder of the mother she’s never known.
And as she and her handsome beau, Adam Taylor, start talking about marriage, not having her mother by her side weighs on Sabrina’s heart more and more each day.
But when a bride walks into the store with a family dress made of rare parachute silk from World War Two, Sabrina feels hope rise again in her chest. Because the bride also has a photograph. A photo Sabrina is sure shows her mother’s face…
With the answers to what happened all those years ago almost within reach, Sabrina decides to risk another journey through the past – and this time, with Adam by her side. He’d never let her travel alone, to a time when air raid sirens broke the silence of the night and bombs fell on Liverpool.
Together, will they finally solve the mystery of Sabrina’s real family? Or will the dangers of the darkest days of World War Two prevent Adam and Sabrina from returning to their own time?
Purchase link: https://geni.us/B0F2SVYS6Lcover
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My Book Review
RATING: 5 out of 5 Stars
THE DRESSMAKER’S WAR (Brides of Bold Street Book #3) by Michelle Vernal is another captivating dual timeline adventure featuring wedding dress maker, Sabrina in 1982 Liverpool, England who is able to time slip into the past. While each book has Sabrina helping a different couple in different years and could be read as standalone stories, I preferred reading them in order as those around Sabrina continue to evolve in their relationships to Sabrina in her present.
In 1982, Sabrina’s work at Brides of Bold Street and her relationship with Adam are going well and right now she has no plans to attempt a time slip to find the mother she was separated from. When a bride-to-be walks into the shop to have her grandmother’s dress altered for her own wedding, she shows Sabrina a wedding photo from her grandmother’s wedding. Sabrina is shocked to see not only herself and her boyfriend, Adam, in the photo, but she is sure she sees her mother’s face also.
Now in 1945, Sabrina and Max have slipped to the day before the celebrations for VE Day and to meet Lily, whom readers have been following in the other of the dual timelines in this story. Before the time slip, we follow Lilly’s young life during the war up to the time she meets Sabrina.
A night around the celebratory VE DAY bonfires changes everything for Sabrina.
Every book just gets better and better. I love this series and all the characters; both the main group that appear in every book and the new couple we are introduced to in each past story. This book once again had me completely engrossed as I turned the pages. Ms. Vernal’s descriptions of each time period pulled me right into the era’s history and clothing and it is especially fun and brings back good memories when she lists what music Sabrina and her friends are listening to in 1982. This is a beautiful story that is full of emotional ups and downs, love, family, and surprising revelations.
I highly recommend this mash-up of time travel, romance. and mystery!
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About the Author
Michelle Vernal is a New Zealand author who writes stories that will take you onto the page with her characters and make you feel part of their lives. She writes with humor and warmth, and her readers describe her books as unputdownable, feel good and funny. Her writing has been likened to Maeve Binchy but with a modern-day vernacular. In 2015 she was shortlisted for the Love Stories Award. In 2020 she won the Reader’s Favorite Gold Medal Award for Chick lit, and in 2021 was shortlisted for the Page Turner Book Awards.
Social Media Links
Website: https://www.michellevernalbooks.com/
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/michellevernalnovelist
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/michellevernalnovelist/
Newsletter sign up: https://www.bookouture.com/michelle-vernal