The Folded Clock Book Summary

In 'The Folded Clock', Heidi Julavits explores the intricacies of time and self through a series of diary entries that blur the line between past and present. With wit and candor, she reflects on life's moments—from mundane to profound—inviting readers into her introspective journey. Each entry serves as a contemplative vignette, revealing how memory shapes our identity and experiences. As she unfolds her thoughts, Julavits grapples with themes of aging, love, and the passage of time, ultimately leading to a deeper understanding of what it means to be human. This compelling narrative will leave readers pondering their own relationship with time long after the last page is turned.

By Heidi Julavits

Published: 2016

""Time is a strange companion, always shifting and folding, reminding us that our memories are not just linear but layered, echoing the complexities of our lives.""

Book Review of The Folded Clock

A New York Times Notable Book Rereading her childhood diaries, Heidi Julavits hoped to find incontrovertible proof that she was always destined to be a writer. Instead, they “revealed me to possess the mind of a phobic tax auditor.” Thus was born a desire to try again, to chronicle her daily life—now as a forty-something woman, wife, mother, and writer. A meditation on time and self, youth and aging, friendship and romance, faith and fate, and art and ambition, in The Folded Clock one of the most gifted prose stylists in American letters explodes the typically confessional diary form with her trademark humor, honesty, and searing intelligence.

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"Time is a strange companion, always shifting and folding, reminding us that our memories are not just linear but layered, echoing the complexities of our lives."

The Folded Clock

By Heidi Julavits