It’s a bit like the film Back to the Future ... But it’s unusual in a book, and Chamberlain gets full marks for the smooth movements from 1970 to 2001 to 2013 and finally back to 1970. The Dream Daughter is a page-turner that has the power to simultaneously warm your heart and break it. Readers will be drawn to the narrative of a mother’s love and sacrifice for her baby, along with the intriguing details of time travel and flashes of history.
Chamberlain...steps up her game with her latest, a departure from her usual plot and structure that still maintains the southern style that makes her so well loved among readers ... With a little tension and a lot of heart, The Dream Daughter will delight Chamberlain’s fans and hook new readers.
...exciting and heartfelt ... Chamberlain expertly blends the time-travel elements with the wonderful story of a mother’s love and the depths of sacrifice she makes for her child. This is a page-turning crowd-pleaser.
Traveling through time is fraught with danger for not only the traveler, but also the reader, who's asked to suspend a lot of disbelief, accept arbitrary and at times inconsistent rules of time travel, and try not to guess several obvious plot twists. Still, Carly is a likable heroine, and if many of her difficulties are easily overcome, she's nonetheless caught in a heart-wrenching dilemma ... The story is well-paced and the ending satisfyingly sweet despite its predictability.
