What is nature and what is nurture.  Rare book forging seems to run through a few generations of the family, but not for want of trying to stop it at each generation.  An allegory of Edgar Allan Poe’s works, this centers on the need to create a copy of Tamerlane.  Our hero (Antihero?) has to bring his daughter into the mix to get it done, which he only does because he’s being blackmailed about an old death.  Great insights into the rare book business, and the dangers of forgeries there. Wonderful settings in upstate NY and the East Village.  Less mystery than psychological drama, it’s still a compelling read.

This book had all the elements of a book that I should love - a psychological thriller, a story about books, a typical family,.. but I was disapointed with the execution of said elements.  
The main character, Will,  is blackmailed into creating an exact replica of a rare first book by Edgar Allen Poe as well as creating a letter of provenance to back it up.  However, in order to do this, he must call upon the talents of his oldest daughter who is studying art in college.
From the getgo - I never really understood the relationship between the forger and his former accomplice.  I think there were too many points of view and too much detail about forgery that lent little to the process of the story.  I thought the first half provided TMI and not enough background without ever really identifying the real crime that Will committed and why the blackmailer was so intent on ruining his life.  
Although the plot twists were pretty obvious, I feel that there wer many unanswered questions, including Will's past crime, but what was Megan's brother such a factor in this crime?  I think that the book would have been a little more engaging had it just been about the turmoin that the blackmailer brought upon the family, and cut out several characters who didn't really add anything to the story.  
The first half of the book was extremely slow and filled with the internal thoughts of Megan and Will, without much happening.  The middle went by with a little more going on, an a little tension, however, the ending was so abrupt that I felt there wer still some unresolved issues.  I wasn't sure if it was the end of the book or a lead into book 3 of the series.

The story is told in tandem by Will and his wife Meghan, characters who are living quiet lives, but possess a great deal of baggage. It is a sequel to The Forgers, but takes off in a different direction. Their peaceful life together is suddenly interrupted by the past, and a rare Edgar Allen Poe work is at the center of everything. Poe fans will enjoy this story, with all of it's twists and turns. The Forger's Daughter is a well-written thriller that will keep you guessing.

"The Forger's Daughter" follows retired literary forger Will, his bookstore owning wife Meghan, and their two daughters as someone from Will's sordid past tries to pull them back into the world of creating high risk literary forgeries. Will and Meghan each struggle with their own parts to play in orchestrating the forgery and sale of one of the rarest works in American literature while trying desperately to keep from entrenching themselves in a criminal past that they would rather forget.

While this book is advertised as a thriller, I found it anything but. Any danger or risk inherent in the plot is immediately overwhelmed by extensive and tedious descriptions of outdoor surroundings or antique literary works. Both Will and Meghan narrate the novel, but their points of view are written so similarly that the reader often only knows who is speaking once they mention someone else's name in dialogue. These characters feel static and undeveloped. Will spends a lot of time congratulating himself on his skills in both creating and detecting literary forgeries while Meghan spends a lot of time dropping not-so-subtle hints as to just how cultured and impressive she is in everything from what she buys for her store to what kind of music she listens to. Even Will and Meghan's teenage daughter Nicole has somehow become a wine connoisseur while attending college as well as possessing incredible calligraphic and printing talents. Overall, I didn't find the family interesting to read about, the action compelling, or the constant asides to literary culture amusing.

This is a sequel to the author’s first book, The Forger, which I did not read.  Therefore, it took me a little while to get caught up with the characters and where the story had picked up.  The protagonist, Will, is a reformed forger of rare books and documents.  He is married to Meghan, an owner of a rare bookshop and they have two daughters.  The story is told in two voices, going between Will and Meg, a technique which the author employs very well.  We learn that Will’s past has made him vulnerable to blackmail and that is exactly what happens as an accomplice from his past surfaces, threatens to make public his deepest secrets which  forces him into a grand scheme to  forge a book by Edgar Allen Poe.  As the story unfolds, Will’s wife and two daughters are pulled into the plot.

Well written, with beautiful descriptive passages detailing the Hudson River valley, and relationships between characters that are believable, this book will keep you waiting for the other shoe to drop—because it always seems to—until the surprising end.  My thanks to NetGalley for the advanced reader’s copy.

Is a thief always a thief? How about someone who scams people for a living? Can they turn the corner and change their lives? That’s the gist of what this book is about. I had a hard time believing this plot. The idea of an old pal blackmailing a former forger into recreating a Poe poem is not difficult to comprehend. Somehow though the involvement of a past forger participating due to extreme concern about his family and then involving his own daughter to help just didn’t fit with me. I kept thinking “go to the police”. There would then have been no story, huh? 

Truth is, I just had a difficult time with the beginning of this book. I felt it moved very slowly. I didn’t read the previous book. Maybe that would have given me a better understanding of the explanation I felt I was being given. I was very confused at first, but I think that had to do with the pace of the book. 
All told if you enjoy hearing about the rare materials and books and a little bit of flowery language, this may be your book. I wasn’t disappointed I read the book, but I would not go back and read Book 1.

Thanks to NetGalley for the opportunity to read this book.

The Forger's Daughter is about forging the "rarest book in American Literature, Edgar Allen Poe's first book, Tamerlane." The idea  sounded so-so - but I thought I'd give it a whirl. Unfortunately, I didn't enjoy the read at all. The sentences are ridiculously long and the descriptions felt stilted. Where was the book editor? It is too long and feels like it was written by a narrator from 200 years ago.

I thought this was a decent book with the characters set not too complexly. I would be interested to see what the author will come up next.

Somehow, I missed that this book was a sequel when I requested it. But, this volume was readable without the first book as a precursor. An entertaining book with book forging, blackmail, marriage and mystery.

The Forger's Daughter by Bradford Morrow was an insider account of the forgery of a first edition book by Edgar Allan Poe, with no author's name, only 12 being in existence. This was done on a letterpress. Also, an accompanying letter in the author's handwriting. It was done under threat of blackmail by an experienced forger and his adult daughter. It was an interesting story, which even at its conclusion left many unanswered questions. Another important fact: no one told the truth.

This was an interesting novel, which was mostly a first person narrative, but the speaker varied. It was in turns the story of a marriage, the story of a murder, the story of a past life, and the story of blackmail. The entire thing was the story of stress, for many people. It was interesting and well done. It held my rapt attention, at first because I couldn't understand then because I needed to know why, which I figured out, in part, before the author revealed all. It was at times frightening, at other times, loving. Murder. Blackmail. Corruption. I recommend it. 

I was invited to read a free ARC of The Forger's Daughter by Netgalley. All opinions and interpretations contained herein are solely my own. #netgalley #theforgersdaughter

I normally don't attempt a sequel without reading the precursor (The Forgers), but was intrigued by a number of things on first glance.  Books, of course, are always a favorite and the forging of literary works grabbed my attention especially as it concerned Edgar Allen Poe.  A remote country home near a forest and a mysterious encounter got me off to a great start.  I became bogged down during the increasingly detailed discussions of forging, calligraphy and printing and confess I began to skim.  I found the circumstances surrounding Will's motivation to participate in the forgery even with the suggestion of the threat to disclose his involvement in an old death of a family member rather vague; it was never explained to my satisfaction.  I was entertained but not wowed and occasionally annoyed by the alternating narratives which led to my being confused as to who was speaking and having to reread when I realized the perspective had changed.  Perhaps reading the first book might have changed my opinion.

This book, like the first one, is full of information as well as suspense.  I only wish I could read faster--not because I want the book to end, but because I want to know the ending.  And there is a twist at the end.  I did not even imagine the surprise revelation of the first book, this one I figured out ahead of the great reveal, but I still liked that it was Meg that knew the secret instead of Will.  I hope that the author continues to write books about this family, but I think Nicole should be the new heroine!!

This books was a disappointing follow up to "The Forger". The hook at the beginning was great, but the slow build and unbelievable involvement of the main characters daughter caused me to put the book down half way through. Maybe it improved in the 2nd half, but I didn't have the patience or interest to keep reading.

The sequel to The Forger, this book full of secrets didn’t fail to keep me in suspense.  A reformed forger and his wife, now with two daughters, are pulled back into his old life by an old enemy and an old friend. The story alternates between Will and his wife’s telling of it, with their different perspectives, and affected by  their own secrets they are keeping from one another,  I loved the descriptions of their lives, from little details of the clouds, the lushness of the Hudson Valley, contrasting with their return to their New York City home. Will’s guilty thrill he feels from the forgery he’s creating, to his guilt over involving his daughter and family, to his fear of his adversary unmasking his secret all keep create tension that underlies the bucolic summer in the country setting.
This was a wonderful sequel to the first book, and I’ll be hoping for more from the author.
Thanks to NetGalley and the publisher Grove/Atlantic for an advance copy in exchange for my candid opinion.

What a ride!  If you enjoy Sherlock Holmes and intricate, convoluted puzzles, this is a novel for you.  
Will is a much-consulted bibliophile with extensive knowledge of the history of published 19th century American literature, a printer of classic letterpress work,  and personal history as a long reformed forger of the same.  His wife Meg is the owner of a renowned NYC book store specializing in rare books of that period and the impetus that keeps Will on the straight and narrow path, along with their two daughters, Nicole and Maisie.  Nicole is 20-something, just about finished with college, and a talented artist and calligrapher taught at her Daddy's knee.  Maisie, Will and Meg's adopted daughter and the child of Meg's deceased partner in the book shop, Mary Chandler, is just 11.  

Eleven months out of the year were spent in Manhatten.  The family traditionally spend August at an old farmhouse they own in the Hudson Valley, and it is there that Will is approached by his old nemesis, Henry Stader, also a forger of manuscripts from back in their younger days, and blackmailed into duplicating a copy of Edgar Allen Poe's first self-published work, a 40-page tale titled Tamerlane, and a cover letter.  Will is over twenty years out of practice as a forger of 19th-century works, though over those years he has taught and encouraged Nicole in the art of classic lettering, and due to an extensive hand injury twenty-something years ago - his right hand hatcheted, leaving only the thumb and part of the little finger by nemesis Slader - not as good as he was as a young man with calligraphic work, but his daughter Nicole is excellent - better even than he in his heyday - and she worms her way into helping with the forgery very much against her mother's wishes and at the heartfelt protest of her dad. 

Henry Slader holds an intense grudge against Will, as he did many years in jail for the attack on Will in Scotland.  And he intimates knowledge and photos from back in his forging days that would have Will doing hard-time in New York and completely destroy Meg's business reputation.

Then the bumps in the night begin, the little tells that someone has been in the house when they are gone, the missing photo from the family display, and Slader with inside-knowledge that he could only have obtained by spying on the family from the surrounding wooded acreage as they went about their lives. And then Meghan is a witness when a familiar-looking dead man is dumped on a dead-end road. Does she recognize him as the ginger-haired driver who brought Harry Slader to the farmhouse the first time? 

Who can you turn to when your life is as at stake, as is your freedom and reputation?  How do you keep your children safe in their beds at night?  At what point do you have to trust the boys n blue?

I received a free electronic copy of the ARC of this novel from Netgalley, Bradford Morrow, and Grove Atlantic- Mysterious Press.  Thank you all for sharing your hard work with me. I have read this novel of my own volition, and this review reflects my honest opinion of this work.

He’s a forger. No, he used to be a forger and now he must protect his family and be a forger again. 

I wasn’t sure I was going to like this or even finish it, but I’m glad I did. The narration jumps from husband to wife which sometimes takes a few sentences to understand, but it’s worth it.

This is obviously very well researched, which I always appreciate. If you’re the least bit curious about Edgar A. Poe, this is definitely one to add to your TBR list. 
Who knows — you might even get some tips on forgery!

I’ve never heard of Bradford Morrow but would like to go back and read the first book in this series. I feel as though it can fill in a few gaps. However, the beginning of the book does go into quite detail about the past. I definitely will read the next book. There is going to be one right ? I mean there has to be !!!  

I enjoyed both the drama and the thriller of this read.  The first half is a little slow but once the craziness begins, you won’t put the book down. 

Thank you Netgalley for letting me read this in exchange for my honest review.

3.5 / 5.0 stars

This sequel to Bradford Morrow's, "The Forgers" is a thought-provoking tale of antiquarian book forging, a failed attempt of breaking free from one's criminal past, and of a tortured soul conflicted between a desire to to stay clean yet also desiring to protect his family from great harm. It's a story of many secrets where every character has them or may even be one. The writing is superlative. It displays the author's love for the written word as well as his ability to paint well the landscape of place as well as that of the mind. The book is part mystery, part psychological thriller and has a fair amount of historical and technical detail related to the fine art of forging historic documents. It also speaks well to the involved process of assessing provenance of historical masterworks from which the forgeries are made. The vast amount of research gathered for this story is most evident and handily shared throughout the book.

A bit about the story - 
After twenty years of living a crime-free life, our protagonist and former forger, Will, is coerced, if not blackmailed into creating an exact replica of Edgar Allen Poe's rare imprint of his first book, "Tamerlane". The person seemingly behind this distasteful plan is an old "colleague" of Will's from his former life, with a bit of an axe to grind, who claims to hold damning evidence of a horrific crime perpetrated by Will. What choice does Will have but to do as told and hopefully place this scoundrel in his rear-view mirror for good. To complete the forgery, Will must draw upon the burgeoning artistic talents of his twenty-something-year-old daughter, Nicole. She is as gifted as her father if not even more so. 

In alternating chapters, we hear the voices of Will and his beloved wife, Meghan as they provide a delicate counterpoint - he, trying to protect his family from his disgraceful past and she, fretting about the "masterwork" created by father and daughter, toiling over an old letterpress behind closed doors - their world; not hers. All this to appease a criminal?!!

To this reader, the technical detail and painterly descriptions of scene and senses were captivating. Yet there was also a touch of the macabre which was found to be a bit repulsive. Regardless, the narratives are beautifully rendered, the plot was twisted and went in unimaginable directions. The ending felt disappointingly abrupt, leaving this reader with a myriad of unanswered questions. Perhaps this is just an indication that there will be a third installment in this forger's tale. Only time will tell.

I am grateful to publisher Grove Atlantic for having provided a complimentary electronic uncorrected proof of this work through NetGalley. Their generosity, however, has not influenced this review - the words of which are mine alone.

I have read many books but this one I just couldn't get even half way through.  Forgers of any kind usually peak my interest.  I will try again to later to get into it.

It can be a problem, knowing too much about something… particularly if you find that thing absolutely fascinating, and feel compelled to share said knowledge with others (who may find it similarly interesting, but in all likelihood, won’t).

There’s also something of an issue with being too fond of your own voice, whether aural or written, so I—fully acknowledging my own tendency to ramble—hesitate to call anyone out on it, but there you have it.

It’s when you combine both of those propensities, though, that things start to get really… tiresome, shall we say. And with that, I give you The Forger’s Daughter, Bradford Morrow’s sequel to his earlier The Forger.
_______________

On the surface, this sounded like a can’t-miss-winner: a mid-life couple and their younger daughter leave Manhattan to spend the summer at their country home in the Hudson Valley… where secrets from the past rear up their ugly heads(!). And oh, such secrets they are… for it turns out that husband Will is an ex-forger of super-rare books (after nearly getting busted some two decades prior, and vowing to wife Meghan to NeverEverDoTHAT,EverAgain!!1!)—something which neither of the couple’s children, collegian Nicole or junior-high-schooler Maisie, know anything about. 

(OF COURSE we know that’s all about to change, but it’s cool; we wouldn’t be very good readers if we couldn’t figure that much out, right?)

Anyway, Maisie returns home from visiting friends one day, scraped up and scared to death… because someone wearing a mask (that looked just like her dead uncle!) jumped out in front of her bicycle, giving her a package and instructions to hand it over to Will, then disappeared. 

In the package? One of the rarest literary finds of them all (apparently): a copy of a small, obscure, early work by Edgar Allen Poe, entitled Tamerlane… so rare, in fact, that only a dozen are known to exist. And Will’s task? To create a completely-believable facsimile of same… or else. 

The “or else” involves what must have been the plot of the author’s previous book; it seems Will and an old “frenemy”—one Henry Slader—had their final falling out over… something, twenty years ago, during which Slader hacked off a couple of Will’s fingers (effectively making the whole forgery thing something of a moot issue, you’d think). But now, Slader wants Will to come out of retirement… or else he’ll tell Will’s family (and possibly the authorities) about what Will did back then. And that is something Will absolutely refuses to let happen.
_____________

So, here’s the thing: if Morrow had been content letting The Forger’s Daughter be just about that scenario, and how Will (and family) dealt with the very determined (and utterly-bonkers) Shader’s demands, it could’ve been a fast-paced, cracking-good story.

Instead, we’re forced to “listen” to more internal monologues, in all their monotonous glory—from both Will and Meghan, since the narration switches back and forth from one chapter to the next—than we really need, or certainly want, to “hear”. (There’s only so much navel-gazing anyone can/should do… and a considerably-smaller amount that a reader wants to endure, on the characters’ behalves.)

Not only that, but remember how I started off… by talking about the inherent problem with being too excited about a topic? Yeah, that. Will is extremely into arcane facts about the history of rare books, famous authors, forgeries (successful and otherwise), printing, and so on… and the author lets him ramble on and on, like, forever. My eyes glazed over through more seemingly-endless passages that went absolutely nowhere than I ever thought possible. (And this, from someone who truly enjoys reading, and really likes Poe!)

Maybe you’ll enjoy The Forger’s Daughter more than I did. The author writes well, in a technical sense, so that’s something. And, while I didn’t really care about either Will or Meghan, the two daughters—Maisie and Nicole—were easy to get behind. Honestly, though, I couldn’t wait to finish this one… just to be done with it, and to never have to return.
~GlamKitty