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Showing posts with label England. Show all posts
Showing posts with label England. Show all posts

Wednesday, August 21, 2019

Foxlowe by Eleanor Wasserberg

This atmospheric, creepy novel uses a superb narrative technique. The story is told through the eyes of Green, a young girl who has grown up in an artists commune at Foxlowe.

S
he has no parents and all is shared equally in the family in a pile called the Jumble.  Green thinks, however,  she belongs to Freya Marsh. Freya, the de facto leader, is an affectionate tormentor who loves and tortures Green.

The family's actions are compared to a shoal of fish; none of them wants to be "edged" or ostracized. Green feels being "Edged" is worst than taking the Spike Walk--a horrid punishment that Freya invented.

Though the family think they have retreated into safety, real danger lurks through the halls of the ancestral home. Freya takes a baby away from her mother. The family seems unable to sense the growing moral uncertainty. 

Instead of checking her authority, the family goes along with whatever Freya decides. Thus, when Freya arrives with an infant, the family never questions her origins. They simply welcomes the infant as a new family member. Curiously, Green names the infant Blue.

In order to feel safe from the outside world, the family performs numerous rituals. During the Winter Solstice  they perform the Scattering--a line of salt is poured around the house to protect the house from outsiders. Green, in a fit of jealous, puts the infant outside the salt line, an action that will have serious repercussions . 

Green, Blue, and Toby grow close in the years that follow. The grown believe that they have provided the children with the most magical childhood. They don't go to school and are not subjected to society's rules.

The ungrown are not given access to the most basic things e.g. mirrors and cannot leave the grounds or talk to strangers. Green in never given a chance to leave Foxlowe until a tragedy occurs.

Psychologically damaged, Green may never be able to integrate into society.  One of the growns who became a Leaver is determined to give her a chance. Can he help her or will he only make things worst? 

Green is a fascinating yet unreliable narrator in this novel that is both complex and frightening.

Wednesday, December 27, 2017

The Dark Dividing by Sarah Rayne

This hypnotic novel tells the story of a house, Mortmain House, located in the Welsh Marches, and the people whose lives intersect with its sad history.

Mortmain, means "dead hand," because the house was protected from taxation for its so-called charitable purposes. The house served as a workhouse and orphanage before it fell into disrepair.

When Melissa Anderson gives birth to conjoined twins in the 1980's, the prognosis for their separation is good. Since they are only joined at the shoulder and side, doctors expect they will be able to separate them. 

Their story is intertwined with another set of conjoined twins who lived at the turn-of-the-century, Viola and Sorrel, who faced vastly different prospects. 

Hopelessly entwined, Viola and Sorrel, are sent to Mortmain, the house for unwanted children. From there they are sold to Tom Dancy's freak show. 

The novel moves back and forth from the present to the past. Readers are given glimpses of  the the twins from the eighties, Simone and Sonia, and contrasted with their turn-of-the-century counterparts.

In one fateful moment, Simone meets her twin at Mortmain, whom she has never met before. After the eighties twins are separated, one of the twins, Sonia, is kidnapped by a woman who feels she is "owed a child."

She has an odd reason for believing that Melissa owes her a child--and its all goes back to Mortmain House.

A thriller, a mystery, and a gothic horror story, this is an intriguing novel about the power of secrets, telepathy and ghostly occurrences.


Saturday, February 11, 2017

The Girl With All The Gifts

If you liked the television series Stranger Things, you might like, The Girl With All The Gifts

Melanie lives in a military facility with other children where she is given minimum care. Each day she is taken at gunpoint to a schoolroom and tied to a chair. Unbeknownst to her, Melanie is infected with a zombie-producing virus. She is infected, yet remains half-immune.

She and a few other "hungries" as they are known maintain their ability to think and reason. Consequently, scientists like Dr. Caldwell. want to study and even dissect them. Melanie and the other children are treated as animals, as lab experiments. 

The only kindness Melanie receives is from her teacher, Miss Justineau.

Even if you've read a hundred other zombie books, this one is different. All of the characters, Sargeant Parks, Private Gallagher, Dr. Caldwell, Miss Justineau, want to survive. Melanie wants more than that; she wants a chance to be treated like a human being.  


Other books with similar themes:
Heller, Peter. The Dog Stars.
Gregory, Daryl. Raising Stony Mayhall. 

Sunday, May 29, 2016

I Let You Go by Clare Mackintosh

People in crisis mode are interesting. Jenna, the protagonist of this debut novel, is definitely in trouble. She has just lost her five-year-old son in a hit-in-run accident. In response, Jenna attempts to restart her life by moving to a remote village in Wales.


Two detectives, Ray and Kate, are slipping in a maelstrom of their own making. Both want to find the hit-and-run-driver who killed Jenna's child, even if they solve the crime off the books. Though each are seeing other people, they are increasingly drawn to each other.

Kate remind Ray of his old self, the kind that cared more about getting the bad guy than getting promoted. Meanwhile, in remote Penfach, Wales, Jenna and Patrick, a local veterinarian, fall in love. 

Jenna's life seems to be improving until she finds a strange message in the sandy beach near her cottage.

Not to give anything away, but Part 2 of the novel is completely startling. In a rush, readers are given a new point-of-view and a new version of events. 

Jenna's sad history unfolds revealing a different picture of the accident. Ian's cruel manipulation of Jenna and her quiet aquiescence is painful to watch.  

A thriller of first rate quality ensues as Jenna struggles to free herself from Ian's cruelty.

Random House has sent me an advance reader's copy in exchange for an honest review.




Wednesday, July 30, 2014

Among Others by Jo Walton

Hugo-award winning, Among Others, will have you believing in magic and in the power of books, libraries, and friendship.

Mor, who loves science fiction, is sent to England where she will meet the father that abandoned her years before. He and his sisters have decided to send her to a posh boarding school, a situation Mor dreads. Morwenna is used to living in Wales with her Grampar, her twin sister, and the beings she calls fairies that inhabit desolate spaces like empty mines and  abandoned factories. 

While at school she is lonely she creates a karass, a term Walton borrows from Kurt Vonnegut. According to Mor, magic is a bit different from how its represented in stories but the karass seems to work. Using two apples she works a magic spell that helps her find a like-minded group to which she can belong.

At a library, Mor joins a science fiction club and meets Wim who changes her life. Meeting Wim makes her stronger. Though her leg is not healed, she is able to confront her mother and deal with the loss of her twin sister.

Tuesday, April 15, 2014

The Small Hand by Susan Hill




On his way back from a client on the coast, Andrew Snow, a rare book dealer, cuts through the Downs and has an odd experience. After leaving the main road, he gets lost and finds himself inexplicably stopping at a dilapidated mansion. On The White House grounds, he feels the presence of a small hand gripping his own but yet there's no visible child. Is this a ghost or is he going mad like his brother, Hugo? Why do the gardens and pool fascinate him? Why does it all seem so achingly familiar?

Susan Hill (The Woman in Black) does a masterful job of creating tension and suspense in the marvelous ghost story. Hill is particularly good and creating psychological portraits that ring true. Infused with the supernatural, this novelette also revels how skillfully we deceive ourselves as adults. Grown-ups falsely believe their past is past--that their childhood fears and offenses are long buried. 

Thursday, March 27, 2014

Some Kind of Fairy tale by Graham Joyce

Two versions of the cover art from Some Kind of Fairy Tale by Graham Joyce

Joyce returns with another captivating fantasy. In Some Kind of Fairy Tale, a sixteen-year-old girl, Tara, creates havoc when she goes missing. Many suspect the teen-anger's boyfriend, Ritchie, including Tara's brother, Peter. 

She and her boyfriend, Ritchie, have just fought after taking a walk in the Outwoods near Leicestershire. She runs off and he leave her there which is why many suspect him.

Tara returns twenty years later at Christmas time. She is ostensibly unharmed but relates a wild tale about being kidnapped by fairies.

 Tara knows however that the beings are must more dangerous than storybook fairies. She believes one of them, Hiero, has even followed her from that other world.

Though no one believes her story about the bluebells, the crossing, and the other realm, she clings to this belief. Her psychiatrist and family members believe Tara has suffered trauma or else is an imposter. The only one who does believe her is the "mad" old lady whom everyone believe is a witch.

Joyce wonderfully mixes the plausible and the implausible in this fantasy. The theories presented by Vivian (Tara's psychiatrist) seem completely reasonable. One problem. Though Tara has been missing for twenty years, she has not aged a day. 

Some of the scenes are empowering. In a wonderful scene, Tara gets the upper hand over her psychiatrist who has been patronizing her. 

Though some threads of the plot are resolved nicely, the ending is problematic. As a reader, I was hoping Tara would become a true heroine instead of self-sacrificing one.  




Wednesday, October 9, 2013

The Ocean at the End of the Lane by Neil Gaiman

The Ocean at the End of the Lane by Neil Gaiman.

Gaiman is a master at creating magical stories and this novel is no exception. In this sad, but enchanting story there are "fleas," "varmints," and a diabolical babysitter.

 A "flea" is a monster who embeds a path into its victims that allows it to escape from its own world. Though the boy does not realize it, imprinted on his heart is a portal. The "flea" uses him to gain access to him and his family, nearly destroying them in the process. A "varmint" is a large bird-like creature that is essentially a scavenger. 

George puts his trust in Lettie and her pond, which she calls an ocean. Together they battle the "flea" and the "varmints" that hunt them. Will Lettie's magic and the healing powers of the ocean be enough to save them?


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