Time's Door

'A book you can recommend unreservedly' - Kirkus Review

When Luigi Cavatini takes his wife, Gerda, and their young son, Giovanni, to see the master violinist Nicolo Paganini play, he sets in motion a chain of events that will change their lives forever.

Luigi is possessed of a melancholic disposition heightened by his passionate Italian nature, and his mind breaks when he realises that no matter his accomplishments, he will never be the violinist that Paganini is.

Upon hearing of Luigi’s condition, Paganini arrives and takes Giovanni under his wing, promising to educate the boy and shape him into the finest musician possible.

With Luigi’s death, Giovanni inherits a packet of letters written by his ancestor, Paolo Cavatini, while living and working with Johann Sebastian Bach in Leipzig.

Despite his Italian upbringing, Giovanni is half-German, on his mother’s side, and has long felt a connection to the famous composer — a connection that seems particularly apt given the intertwining of his ancestors’ lives with that of Bach.

When he and Gerda return to Leipzig, Giovanni meets his mother’s family and discovers his German musical heritage.

Bach becomes an obsession for Giovanni, who often speaks of the man as though he has not been dead for nearly a century.

Giovanni is determined to walk where Bach walked, work where Bach worked, and touch what Bach touched, connecting with his idol in any and every way he can.

He envisions Bach’s life and career as Paolo expansively describes in the Letters, coming to know not only Bach but his extensive family, including his daughter Catharina — until one day reality seems to shift around him and he sees Bach clearly before him, as though he has travelled back in time.

At first Giovanni thinks he is imagining things, but when it happens again, he realises the mists of time have somehow parted, allowing him a privileged glimpse into the past.

He does not dare share his visions with anyone for fear they will think he has become as mad as his father, instead holding his secret close to his chest.

But as he learns more about Bach, Paolo, and others long dead, Giovanni realises that his link to the past may devastate him. He can never become part of the scenes he witnesses — or be with the woman he loves.

Time’s Door is a touching historical novel about an Italian man coming of age. It is a suspenseful novel about time travel and the love of music.

Praise for Time’s Door:

‘This story has singular fascination in its musical background, with Bach as the unifying motif. Minor characters include other famous musicians, Paganini, Mendelssohn, Schumann…A book you can recommend unreservedly to those among your clientale who are interested in music, although the market is not limited thereby, as there is no surfeit of technicalities, but merely a contagious enthusiasm for music and what it can mean.’ — Kirkus Review

Esther Meynell, Marchioness of Salisbury, was born in 1878 in Leeds. Best known for The Little Chronicle of Magdalena Bach, she also wrote a number of books about Sussex, where she spent most of her life.

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