Book Review
Sun 2004-11-14 20:27:07 (in context)
- 18,131 words (if poetry, lines) long
- 0.00 hrs. revised
This just in: The second book in Clive Barker's Abarat series is out. I hadn't expected to see it until 2005, and here it is, out in hardback on the endcap shelves in the Boulder Bookstore's young readers section when I went to go exchange Mr. Socks Fox for a copy with correctly cut pages. Whoot!
(By coincidence, when I went to go return my library books and pay my fine, I picked up a copy of Barker's The Thief Of Always from the paperback sale rack there. Who knew it was an omen?)
Abarat is the first book that, once I finished reading it, I flipped right back to page one and started over. It was sort of an "Ohhhh... I get it now," moment. The writing isn't by itself the best in the world, but the world that is this fantasy's setting is compelling, and the illustrations painted by the author are gorgeous and vivid. It's a story that really sticks with me and follows me into my dreams.
Right. So... I need to reread the first book again, but If I Recall Correctly, the hero is one Candy Quackenbush (ha! love it) from Chickentown, Missouri. Or another state that starts with an M. Her life ranges from utterly boring to sinisterly abused. One day, she's out wandering in a cornfield... and discovers a lighthouse. She becomes involved in the struggle between two very strange characters over the lighthouse's key, which when used correctly causes the sea to roll in. So off she sails, floats, swims to the archipelago known as The Abarat, where each island perpetuates a single hour of the day (making Time in actuality a Place), and the evil and creepy Prince of the Midnight Island is particularly interested in her for reasons that begin to come clear towards the end of the first book.
(I'm eager to see how many of my guesses about that are proven right in the second book.)
As I understand it, Clive Barker has been painting oil portraits of these characters for years. One day, IIRC, he realized that all these pictures he was painting were coming from a single story, and he sat down and wrote that story out. It'll span four books, each of them illustrated with prints of those paintings, and Disney's already bought the rights for the animated film, due out in 2005ish.
I'm hoping it'll turn out to be the first decent adaptation of a Clive Barker novel yet. (Don't even get me started on Lord of Illusions. Choke me with a nine of swords, why don't you.)
So go go go go read these books, 'cause they're that darn good, and 'cause it's neat to see Mr. Barker, known for his work in horror, doing astoundingly inventive young adult fantasy.