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SALLYO'S BOOK REVIEWS.

 

 

The Merlin Conspiracy,

Diana Wynne Jones.

H/C, 2003.   reviewed 17/4/2003.  

 

The Merlin Conspiracy is a follow up to DWJ's earlier book "Deep Secret". It must be close to the same length, but was written for children rather than adults. Very little mention is made of the events in Deep Secret, and only two characters from that book reappear in the flesh. Indeed, (I think) only two or three others (Nick Mallory's deceased birth parents and his half brother) are even mentioned, which disappointed me a little. I'd like to know what had happened to Maree and Rupert.

 

Nick is still fourteen, I think, so the events in "MC" must take place less than a year after those in "DS". He is still determined to become a Magid, and his Earth dad, Ted Mallory, is still attending conventions. And this is about all we learn that pertains to the previous book.

 

Like "DS", the story is told in dual first person, with Nick being one narrator and Arianrhod Hyde, (known as "Roddy") the other. Roddy lives in Blest, which is another version of the British Isles. London, Salisbury and Stonehenge and Wales all exist under those names, but the King of Blest travels constantly about the land. With him travels the court, made up mostly of wizards and their relatives, some of whom have magic. Roddy is the daughter of a weather wizard and a witch, both of whom seem pleasant and ordinary people (so far as a magic-user can be ordinary!). It therefore comes as a slight shock, later in the book, to meet Roddy's two grandfathers who are very far from ordinary.

 

Roddy is a little tired of travelling with the court, and spends much of her time protecting her slightly younger friend Grundo, who is dyslexic in magic as well as reading and writing. As the King's Progress nears Wales, Roddy's mother gets a message that Roddy is to go and visit her maternal grandfather at his manse. (Shades of DWJ's own grandfather?) Mam seems very shaken by this, and Roddy agrees to go if Grundo can accompany her.

 

Meanwhile, Nick Mallory is reluctantly attending a detective writers' convention with his dad. Tom Mallory wants to meet his favourite author, Maxwell Hyde, but just as he's on the point of achieving this ambition, someone murmurs "Off you go!" to Nick, who promptly finds himself in another world. Without giving away too much, I can say that Nick is soon caught up with a quasi-security force which contains a very large man named Arnold. And yes, I do think DWJ did it on purpose. On the run, Nick encounters big cats, a drunk, a beautiful girl and a most charming elephant, all three of whom need his help. He meets an assassin, and changes the destiny of a city. He encounters some truly horrible food and a clever world-skipping goat, as well as an extraordinarily powerful man named Romanov.

 

Meanwhile, Roddy has been given a huge source of power and she and Grundo have made some terrifying discoveries of treason and wickedness to do with the new Merlin (the King's official wizard) and Grundo's mother and her lover. Roddy desperately needs help, which comes in the form of a world-travelling teenage wizard, the very amateur Nick.

 

The story, though long, never lags, and some of DWJ's most felicitous characters flock its pages. Mini the elephant is wonderful, Sybil is a thoroughly wicked villain. There is a pair of brilliantly conceived twins, and a wonderful old witch in the mode of Howl's old tutor Mrs Pendragon from "Howl's Moving Castle". There are echoes of many other books here too - Roddy's grandmother could be a sister to the elderly witch in "A Sudden Wild Magic", while the wicked, the weak and the untrustworthy seem to have their roots in "The Lives of Christopher Chant". Human relationships get a serve too, in typical DWJ fashion, with parent/child, sibling/sibling, husband/wife relationships all under the eyeglass.

There's even another (and mostly benign) version of the thoroughly unbenign thornlady in "DS", plus some hints of "Archer's Goon" in characters who are really personifications. And of course there are plenty of twists in the tale that I defy anyone to sniff out ahead of time. I was taken totally by surprise on at least three occasions by events and explanations that seemed perfectly obvious in hindsight.

 

A few points - I'd love to have learned more about the panther, Gwyn and Maxwell Hyde, Mini and Helga and even Romanov. There were hints about all these characters' backstories and origins that I wish I could have followed up. The ending is marvellously controlled; a typical tightly woven DWJ ending, but easier to understand than that of "Fire and Hemlock" or even "Howl's Moving Castle". The last note is in a minor key, hinting at something more to come, although, knowing DWJ, this mightn't mean a promise. Then there are the salamanders, the dragon, the beings, the little folk... all the wonderful ingredients used with such precision that there's never the slightest hint that anything has been put there for effect. This is *easily the best longer book I've read this year and probably last year too. It would be most unfair to compare it with shorter (say 30K) books, so I won't.

 

* Having considered that, I must say Good Omens by Terry Pratchett and Neil Gaiman and Alchemy by Margaret Mahy were also excellent books.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

SPOOK'S SHACK - Wendy Orr (illus. by Kerry Millard.) (reviewed 4/3/2003.)

Allen & Unwin 2003.

 

Finn is between worlds. His old house has been sold, and his parents have flown to 'the biggest city in the world' to choose a flat. Finn is left to spend the hiatus with his mother's aunt, Agatha Greene. Agatha lives on a bush block between a farm belt and Boris Banks' mansion. She tells Finn to watch out for snakes, explains the procedures for surviving a bush fire and basically leaves him to himself.

 

Down in the bush, Finn discovers a fire-singed shack. When he enters, he wakes the inhabitants; an old swagman, Jack Henry, and his collie, Nipper. Jack and Nipper are surprised to find themselves waking as ghosts, but they discover that swallowing green fungus from the inside of the shack renders them easily visible.

 

Finn makes friends with the odd pair, and together they rescue a joey wallaby, foil the land-grabbing Boris Banks' plans to foreclose on Aunt Agatha, and preserve her house from a fire.

 

The plot may sound like a standard bush/fantasy adventure, but the style, the themes and the deft interweaving of worlds and times sets this novel apart as something rather special. The narrative is both elusive and allusive, as Finn moves through Jack Henry's world experiencing the old ghost's kinship with the local wildlife and introducing him to the modern joys of radio, computer games and mobile phones. Their shared fascination with one another's knowledge and skills is touching and very believable. Jack's life story is one of wandering and betrayal, of a friendship turned to enmity with Boris Banks' ancestor. The past impinges on the present, and the various elements of the plot move forward in a dream-like way. At times, the reader is enmeshed in Jack Henry's perception, either directly or while he is recounting an incident to Finn. This led to me needing to reread a few brief passages, just to make sure I really understood what was going on.

 

There is humour in the story, but Wendy Orr has not taken the easy route of making Jack Henry into a comic figure. As Finn discovers, Jack is not dangerous, but allowing himself to become immersed in Jack's world is. The thrilling defence of a goat and kid from a pack of dogs is a triumph - but the appearance of the farmer with a gun brings real danger to Finn.

 

In the end, Jack redeems his long-ago betrayal with a favour for an undeserving enemy, but it is not the redemption that could send Jack into limbo…

 

Symbolically, Jack casts off his modern delights, but Nipper is able to join him - somewhere.  Aunt Agatha has her happy ending, and Finn is able to move on to the next thing; his life in 'the biggest city in the world'.

 

 

 

THE MOULDERING OF MISS HAVISHAM, (reviewed 18/6/2002.)

By Patricia Kennedy.

(Greater Glider Publications, 2000)

Y.A. paperback, R. R. P.  $14 .30.

Genre -- ghost story: mystery: Gothic: romance.

 

A broken love affair has sent Stella and her mum to the refuge of a café in Newtown. Here Stella mixes work with school, and dreams of freedom. Life should be opening out for the sixteen-year-old but instead it is closing in.  Her mother has become overprotective and slowly seems to be losing interest in everything else -- including the welfare of the cafe. Bad choices and bad luck seem to dog them, and after a brief but shattering brush with death, Stella begins to suspect that something, or someone, is behind their problems.

 

Stella dubs this Someone "The toxic ghost", but why is this being bent on destroying their lives? Could it be something to do with a kindly old woman who lived in the 19th century?  If so, does Stella's history teacher hold the clues? Or what about Cara Chandler of Time Trek Antiques? 

 

As Stella begins to unravel the mystery, the sense of unease grows deeper and more pervasive. Relationships with friends and enemies are overshadowed by a state of being that Stella terms "The Necropolis". Step-by-step, the impossible becomes real as Stella penetrates a labyrinth of lost and mistaken love, misunderstanding, misery, and lies.

 

In The Mouldering of Miss Havisham, Patricia Kennedy has produced a powerfully atmospheric novel, steeped in foreboding and in the sense of place. Chains of coincidence (that are really no coincidence) are deftly handled, and Stella is kept firmly at the centre of the story.  Relationships, social standing, standards, and appearance are all important to the denouement, and are all kept beautifully in balance.

 

Intriguingly, parts of the novel are based on fact. Eliza Emily Donnithorne (whose life story Stella must piece together) was a real person whose story is said to have inspired Charles Dickens to create Miss Havisham.

 

 

The Chimaera Conspiracy, by Beverley Paine. Reviewed June 22nd. 2002.

Y.A. paperback, R. R. P.  $14 .30.

Genre – science fiction thriller.

Published by Greater Glider, 2002.

 

The Chimaera Conspiracy is a fast-moving thriller set in Queensland in the year 2024. Katya, the reluctant heroine, is the middle child of two scientists and is not at all happy to be relocated from a farm to an underwater colony.

 

The thriller begins with Katya's shuttle journey to Aquadome. During the journey, she meets a man named Jerome to whom she takes an instant dislike.  Next, she encounters a teenaged boy named Coen -- who seems to be hiding from Jerome. An explosion follows, and Katya is on the run.

 

The action that follows is swift, tautly written, and pulls no punches. Katya discovers unbelievable facts about herself and her family, but is never given the time she needs to assimilate these. Whom can she trust? The revelations follow mercilessly, as Katya and her new friends run for their lives.

 

Despite the breakneck pace of this novel, there is plenty to think about.  Genetic engineering, cloning, cross-species communication, ethics, nature versus nurture, and the true meaning of family all form part of the story; death, redemption and identity are also part of the blend. The background information is blended seamlessly into the narrative; there are no awkward chunks of exposition, nor is the reader kept unnecessarily in the dark.

 

This adventurous thriller is Beverley Paine's first published book, and a very accomplished debut it is!

 

Reviewed by Sally Odgers.

 

 

 

More reviews to come…

 

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Background – "Gems Under Water" from Sallyo's Backgrounds.