KS3 Book Recommendation - The Bookmaker of Krakow by R.M. Romero

The Dollmaker of Krakow by R. M. Romero

PROLOGUE 

The Seamstress and the Land of the Dolls 

There once was a little doll named Karolina, who lived in a country far from the human world. The Land of the Dolls was a large kingdom that stretched countless miles in any direction. To the east, lay the sea and to the west, a glass mountain sprouted from the earth and climbed towards the sun. In the days when the wise king and queen ruled, the sky had always been a perfect shade of midsummer blue, the moonlight shone as pure as silver and no one had ever grown old or shabby. Across the sea, however, was a dark country. 

Its residents, huge rats whose appetites seemed as great as the ocean itself, had been crafted by a wicked witch from shadows and tears and ash. The doll king and queen lived in fear that, one day, the rats would grow hungry enough to come to their home and would bring with them only cruelty and greed. But Karolina knew nothing of these rumours. Her home was a tiny cottage nestled beside a brook that flowed between two green hills. The curtains were spun from wildflowers, and the walls had been built from slabs of gingerbread, though Karolina was never tempted to nibble at them. The little candy house was all she had wanted, for Karolina was not a king or a queen or even a princess; she was a seamstress. She made satin ballgowns and velvet waistcoats, skirts that fanned out like butterfly wings and handsome jackets with gold buttons. And, best of all, Karolina sewed wishes into each piece of clothing. Each wish was an incomplete hope, a half-spun tale that still needed an ending. 

But Karolina could not grant the wishes she sewed; she had little magic to call her own.