The Sewing Machine

Having recently visited the Singer exhibits in Paisley, it was very easy to imagine the setting for the early parts of the story. Historically, Scotland's sewing machine exports were unmatched and influenced the lives of many families across the world. Until recently, most homes would have had access to a machine and the skills to use it were taught in primary and secondary schools. This is no longer the case as Scotland now struggles to find teachers who have the knowledge and experience of threading a sewing machine. Those who can are highly employable.This concept of making things you will use drives the story really well, showing how the desire to repair and improve was a necessity of the times for past generations. I have sewn all my life and am fortunate enough to make my living teaching fashion and textiles so had a keen interest in the topic, but the family elements of this book were equally interesting. The characters respond well to the challenges presented by strike, war, love, life and death. The insights in to hospital life were really well described as was Edinburgh in general. Family secrets link the characters together in an interesting and plausible way that kept me turning the pages. We now live in a digital world of fast fashion, poor quality and can't expect household items to last beyond 7 years. My hope for this book is that it may inspire some readers to repair, sew and upcycle more and appreciate the quality it brings to many aspects of modern living. The novel is reflective but not sentimental and raises many questions about the differences of surviving in the 21st century compared to the 20th. So more power to the needle and thread and God bless the NHS.I would recommend this book to anyone who enjoys items that are functional, built to last, likes family and social history and making things.

I’ll admit I bought my copy of this book in part because of its delightful cover which caught my eye and then on reading some wonderful reviews of this book which easily convinced me that I needed to find out the tale of the Singer factory strike which was held in Clydebank, Glasgow in 1911.I love historical fiction especially that which vividly shows the changes in our lives, particularly women’s lives, over the last century or so and The Sewing Machine squarely hits this brief. In 1911 Ten thousand workers went on strike, eighteen year old Jean being one of them. Jean’s story is one of split loyalties, between her family and her sweetheart and the consequences of the decisions made at this time in her narrative which spans decades.In 1954 Connie has a Singer Sewing machine, bought in the early days of her marriage and unpredictability of life are beautifully captured in her own narrative and the details of those items she makes on her Singer, each item having a scrap of fabric and a few details entered into a notebook, these excerpts really hitting the mantra that less is sometimes so much more!The most recent narrative is written by Fred In 2016 who is tasked with clearing his Grandfather’s flat which includes not one but two sewing machines. Fred is a man of this age, he blogs about his life, the big decisions he is forced to make and his memories of his grandparents. I’m not going to lie, I was surprised that we had a male perspective a book which shrieks ‘women’s interest’, one of the many successful and enjoyable departures from the formula often employed by writers in this genre.In any historical novel the characters are key and each of those who feature are distinct and realistic. Some of the stories told are those that we may well be familiar but given life through the eyes of Natalie Fergie’s creations. The passing down of needlework skills from generation to generation is one which was an automatic rite of passage and this feeling of links in a changing world was one of the many delightful aspects of The Sewing Machine with even some of the technicalities of the machine itself being so wonderfully woven through the story one that proved to both entertaining and informative at the same time.As with any story in this genre there are coincidences but the wealth of historical detail that spans the years this book is brilliant, especially as the choices clearly made to relate in one way or another back to the good old sewing machine, that these are soon accepted as an absolutely possible truth. The Sewing Machine is cleverly constructed with many different threads which are entwined to produce an outstanding read which took this reader through the full range of emotions with each of the perfectly drawn key narrators.This is one of those books that even though I turned the last page a while back, is still resonating now and I expect it will for some time to come yet. A stunning debut novel that vividly captures both time and place wherever and whenever that happens to be.

Natalie Fergie's writing flowed perfectly and her words took you back to the lives of working class families from Scotland. The lives of Jean, Connie, Fred and Ruth are reminiscent to coloured threads on a knitting machine that once woven together make the perfect cosy wrap. This novel was so well researched you could feel the love and time that Natalie Fergie undertook seeping out from the words on the pages. The Sewing Machine is one of the best debuts I've read and the author should be so proud of her book baby.This book ticked lots of boxes for me, it captivated me into the lives of workers at The Singer Sewing Machine factory in Clydebank. It takes you back to industrialism in 1911 and we experience a monumental event in history when thousands of workers went on strike. This strike was to change the course of Jean's journey but she didn't want to leave her first place of employment without leaving a little something behind.A singer sewing machine was a tool of employment, it was a tool for women at home to help clothe the household and also bring in extra money, it was also a tool for creativity and a tool of love.One machine was to bring joy during sadness and hardship and it was also the catalyst of a romancing of the soul and heart. This machine would watch families grow, it would see them face their first job interviews, see them wed and rejoice in the birth of little ones. The symbolism of the sewing machine was like a beacon of hope to all.Natalie Fergie has written a story of life, of love, of hardships and of hope. I feel almost honoured to have had the opportunity to read this novel as it was just brilliant!

This is an amazing book. The story makes you want to know more. You do not need to like sewing to enjoy this book.

"The sewing machine has provided work in manufacture, eased work in the home and facilitated work when there was none to be had."A well researched historical novel that alternates between several timelines.1911 Clydebank, Scotland where we meet an eighteen year old Jean who works as a sewing machine tester at the Singer Factory. At that time, the Singer Factory was all powerful and employed thousands of workers. It even had its own railway station and its own trains. Jean lives with her domineering father who also works for Singer. There follows a brief and accurate portrayal of the strike that took place that year. A strike which Jean's father disapproves and which Jean's beau, Donald Cameron, helps organize. The betrothed Jean and Donald eventually are forced to leave Clydebank and they move to Edinburgh."A time to rend, and a time to sew; a time to keep silence, and a time to speak."1954 Edinburgh, Scotland where we meet 33 year-old Connie Baxter. She lives with her mother Kathleen, a tailor. The two women get along very well. Kathleen works on an old Singer machine. For every sewing task she completes, she writes the details in a notebook. After a family tragedy, Connie, a typist, finds a new job as a seamstress for a hospital. This position will be instrumental in her meeting a young woman named Ruth Watkins, and her future husband, Alf Morrison.1980 Edinburgh, Scotland where we meet Ruth Watkins. Single and pregnant, she is trying to finish her nursing practicum before the Old Royal Infirmary realizes her condition. She approaches a woman named Connie who works at the hospital to see if see can let out her uniforms so that they will not be so tight and camouflage her pregnancy.2016 Edinburgh, Scotland where we meet 35 year-old Fred. Newly single and unemployed, Fred inherits a flat (and a cat named Crabbie) from his grandfather Alfred. A flat that has been in the family since 1890. Fred writes a private blog which he uses as a sort of diary/confidante. Fred is a very private man. He begins the herculean task of clearing out the flat, only to find himself keeping most of what he discovers. There are Marmite jars everywhere - used for keeping pens, plant cuttings, and various other things. The most important find though, is an ancient Singer sewing machine. Within the machine he finds numerous old notebooks that tell the tale of his family history, one stitch at a time...Surprising himself, Fred begins to use the old machine. He finds that sewing helps him to decompress, freeing his mind of his stresses and his loneliness. When the machine needs servicing, he meets an artistic young woman whose life is intrinsically tied to his.MY THOUGHTSNatalie Fergie brings the past eloquently to life. All of her characters are well fleshed out so that the reader is invested in their plight. The narrative reminds us of a time when frugality was the norm - quite the opposite of our current disposable society. She skillfully stitches all of her characters and timelines into one cohesive whole - while at the same time describing how both tangible and intangible things are passed down through generations.A novel of what family means, of love, loss, of hardship, and of letters lost and received. A great read that I highly recommend to lovers of literary, historical fiction, and of course.... family secrets. An emotional and evocative debut.4.5 stars rounded up for Amazon

All the stories and their characters in their own different time periods are captivating. Then bringing them all together through such an unlikely piece of equipment as a sewing machine, is genius, and totally fascinating. Loved it.

Today’s world is disposable, with cheap consumer goods imported from distant third world countries, items that are used or worn a few times and discarded when they break or tear or we lose interest. We have little connection to the making of these things or the lives of the factory workers who toil over them for little pay and often in rough conditions. This is an enormous shift from the lives of our grandparents and great-grandparents, when clothing was made at home and when an appliance such as a sewing machine was hugely important to a family. People made their own clothes and repaired them when torn or worn out, turned collars and cuffs, remade adult clothing for children, made their own household linens and cleverly reused every leftover scrap for pretty but utilitarian quilts.In this wonderful novel, we encounter the full spectrum of this generational shift, starting with Jean and Donald, a young couple caught up in the drama of the Singer Factory Strike of 1911 at Singer’s huge factory compound in Kilbowie, Clydebank in Scotland. Nearly 11,000 workers left their posts in protest of the unfair treatment of 12 women workers and the factory was closed for 2 weeks. At the other end of the story is Fred, a thirty-something unemployed tech worker in the present day, returning to his family home in Edinburgh after his grandfather’s death. He has a self-absorbed girlfriend who embodies the superficial, throwaway society that Fred lives in and he struggles to come to terms with his own identity and his place in the world. Tying everything together is an old Singer 99K hand crank sewing machine that had belonged to Fred’s grandmother and the revelations of some unexpected family secrets. Other key characters are Kathleen and Connie, the mother and daughter who make their livings with sewing, Connie’s tender-hearted and gardening-mad husband Alf, and Fred’s mother Ruth, whose encounter with an elderly patient as a young student nurse will have a poignant impact on the story.The story shifts back and forth in time, from 1911 through the First World War to the 1950s, 60s, 80s and present day. You might have some suspicions from the beginning about how everything is connected, but the mystery is less important than the moments and relationships it serves to frame. Some of the plot points and coincidences might beg our disbelief, and some of the characters could be more fully fleshed out (Ellen, especially, in my opinion), but overall I found I was willing to overlook these things as I got caught up in the story.As the great-granddaughter of a widow who supported her family as a seamstress on her Singer treadle in the far-away Pacific Northwest, the novel was especially moving to me. Not only did it bring to life the living conditions of the working class in the 20th century, but also it reminded me of how little we can know of our own family histories, even only two or three generations removed. Secrets are never shared and get lost entirely, stories are forgotten or misremembered, values and interests change with the times. I never met my great-grandmother, who I was named after, and I can only imagine the changes she lived through in her lifetime and the challenges she faced. I don’t have her sewing machine, but when I see an old machine like the one in the story (usually still functional, as those machines were made to go forever) I think of all the hands that worked on it and all the projects that were made with it. Sentimental, yes, but if you think the same way as me, if you sew, or if you like a cozy story that you can get lost in on a rainy afternoon, you’ll enjoy this thoughtful, well-researched and heartfelt novel.

I thoroughly enjoyed this book. It was a lovely read. I recommend it.