| Title | : | The Moon of Gomrath (Tales of Alderley, #2) |
| Author | : | |
| Rating | : | |
| ISBN | : | 0152017968 |
| ISBN-10 | : | 9780152017965 |
| Language | : | English |
| Format Type | : | Paperback |
| Number of Pages | : | 208 |
| Publication | : | First published January 1, 1963 |
The Moon of Gomrath (Tales of Alderley, #2) Reviews
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Susan and Colin live on the borders of magic after receiving a bracelet from Angharad Goldenhand, the Lady of the Lake. Working through the children the Old Magic is returning to the world.
Entering Fundindelve
“Will you open the gates?” said Albanac.
Susan stretched out her hand, and touched the iron gates. They swung open.
“Quickly now,” said Uthecar. “It is a healthier night within than without.”
He hurried the children through the gates, and the rock closed after them the moment they were all inside.
“Why did they open? They wouldn’t before.” said Susan.
“Because you spoke the word, and for another reason that we shall talk about,” said Albanac.
They went with Albanac down the paths of Fundindelve. Tunnel entered cave, and cave gave way to tunnel caves, and tunnels, each different and the same: there seemed to be no end.
As they went deeper the blue light grew pale and strong, and by this the children knew that they were nearing the Cave of the Sleepers, for whose sake the old dwarf-mine of Fundindelve had been charged with the greatest magic of an age, and its guardian was Cadellin Silverbrow. Here in this cave, waiting through the centuries for the day when Cadellin should rouse him from his enchanted sleep to fight the last battle of the world, lay a king, surrounded by his knights, each with his milk-white mare.
Susan's journey through Old Magic
Susan told her story. She spoke hesitantly, as though trying to describe something to herself as much as to anyone else.
“I remember falling into water,” she said, “and everything went black: I held my breath until the pain made me let go, but just then the water rushed away from me in the dark, and – well – although the darkness was the same, I was somewhere else, floating – nowhere in particular, just backwards and forwards, and round in nothing, You know how when you’re in bed at night you can imagine the bed’s tilted sideways, or the room’s sliding about? It was like that.
That wasn’t too bad, but I didn’t like the noises. There were squeakings and gratings going on all round me – voices – no, not quite voices; they were just confused sounds; but they came from throats. Some were near and others far away. This went on for a long time, and I didn’t like it. But I wasn’t frightened or worried about what was going to happen to me – though I’m frightened now when I think of it! I didn’t like being where I was, but at the same time I couldn’t think of anywhere else that I wanted to be. And then all at once I felt a hand catch hold of my wrist and pull me upwards. There was a light, and I heard someone shouting – I think now it was Albanac – and I started to move faster than ever; so fast that I was dizzy, and the light got brighter and brighter, and it made no difference when I shut my eyes. Then I began to slow down, and the glare didn’t hurt so much, and I could see the outline of the hand that was holding me. And then I seemed to break through a skin of light, and I was lying in shallow water at the edge of a sea, and standing over me was a woman, dressed in red and white, and we were holding each other’s wrist and our bracelets were linked together – and Cadellin! I’ve just realised! Hers was the same as mine – the one Angharad gave me!”
“Ay, it would be,” said the wizard quietly. “No matter: go on.”
“Well, she undid her bracelet and slipped it out of mine, and we walked along the beach, and she said her name was Celemon and we were going to Caer Rigor. I didn’t feel there was any need to ask questions: I accepted everything as it came, like you do in a dream.
“We joined the others who were waiting for us on a rocky headland, and we rode out above the sea towards Caer Rigor, and everyone was excited and talked of home. Then suddenly there was this bitter taste in my mouth and all the others had it, too, and no matter how hard we rode, we couldn’t move forward. Celemon said we must turn back, so we did, and then I felt dizzy again, and the taste in my mouth got worse until I thought I was going to be sick, and I couldn’t keep my balance, and I fell from the horse, over and over into the sea, or fog, or whatever it was. I was falling for hours, and then I hit something hard. I’d closed my eyes to stop myself from being sick, and when I opened them I was here.“But where is Celemon ? Shan’t I see her again?”
“I do not doubt it,” said the wizard. “Some day you will meet, and ride over the sea to Caer Rigor, and there will be no bitterness to draw you back. But everything in its time. And now you must rest.”
A dream or Magic?
“She said it was like a dream,” said Cadellin. “I wish I could dismiss it so but it is truth, and I suspect there is even more than she remembers.
“The Brollachan thrust her from the one level of the world that men are born to, down into the darkness and unformed life that is called Abred by wizards. From there she was lifted to the Threshold of the Summer Stars, as far beyond this world of yours as Abred is below and few have ever gone so far, fewer still returned, and none at all unchanged.
“She has ridden with the Shining Ones, the Daughters of the Moon, and they came with her from behind the north wind. Now she is here. But the Shining Ones did not leave Susan of choice, for through her they may wake their power in the world – the Old Magic, which has long been gone from here. It is a magic beyond our guidance: it is magic of the heart, not of the head: it can be felt, but not known: and in that I see no good.
“And Susan was not prey of the Brollachan by chance. Vengeance was there, too.
“She was saved, and is protected, only by the Mark of Fohla – her blessing and her curse. For it guards her against the evil that would crush her, and it leads her ever further from the ways of human life. The more she wears it, the more need there is to do so. And it is too late now to take it off.
“Is that not enough, without calling the Old Magic from its sleep? I should be lighter in my heart if I knew that what you have quickened this night could as easily be laid to rest.
The Old Magic yearns to be free, the High Magic tries to control it. The shapeshifting Morrigan thinks only of taking bloody revenge on the children.
Enjoy! -
What a weird and impressive little book.
This one was leaps and bounds better than
The Weirdstone of Brisingamen (my review
here), which was not by any means devoid of skill or interest, but compares relatively poorly to its sequel. While the same oddments still stand - where are these people, where do the dwarfs come from, how come no one else notices this stuff happening? - the truly impressive thing in this story is Garner's absolute mastery of the action scenes. Page after page is filled with his inventive capers, all tightly controlled and fingernail-bitingly gripping. I am really, really enamoured of this kind of fast, breathless storytelling. Pages flew before I realised I was hooked, and then once I did, I thoroughly enjoyed the ride.
It manages to be both weirdly magical and fantastically exciting at once, without the one ever seeming detached from the other. I think if I'd read this as a child, I may have grown up stranger than I did reading the
Redwall series. I'm sad I didn't, though, as I imagine reading this as a young'un would be pretty bloody amazing.
As an adult it was only mildly less so, but I lack the ability, now, to retreat to my bedroom and devour a book whole until Mum calls that dinner is ready. Which is what this book truly needs. -
This is a book to read only if you thought it was a favourite as a child. The vivid images it conjures from landscapes and celtic references is excellent, a real fire for the mind if you are young. The downside: old and jaded maturity will grumble about the writing, how rushed it is to the end and it's for kids.
Well a pox on us all for these thoughts. Grow down, not up dammit and enjoy. -
‘The Weirdstone of Brisingamen’ is very much a foundation stone for the rich and beautiful wealth of legends underpinning its sequel. High fantasy melds with Celtic myth and folklore drawn from across the British Isles resulting in pure magic that delights on every page.
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I'm sure this book has been reviewed within an inch of its life, so I'll make mine very brief (by my standards): had more teeth than the first in the series (The Weirdstone of Brisingamen), and I enjoyed it more. I'm no scholar - my comprehension of Anglo-Saxon mythology is based almost entirely on my Tolkien Society Membership mailings and those times I read Beowulf on my phone while waiting for the bus - but the various names in this book jarred me. It seemed some were Norse, and some Irish, or Scottish, or Welsh, or Breton or something. It really felt jumbled and a bit confusing. I likened the first in this series to "Tolkien-lite" (intentional awful spelling of light), and I felt much the same about this version. The "lite" side of things were the character building (Colin and Susan are stil pretty flat), and of course there's not much on the background and origins of the species or groups, etc. As was my complaint before, these books are too short - I want more content!
Two things I really liked were the idea that Susan has some sort of astral bond with Celemon, a woman, and by the end I was wondering if she was her counterpart/consort/mate (this would make Susan a much more interesting and complex character! I would like to hear more! It doesn't even have to be romantic and mushy - I just want more depth!). The other was the appendix of sorts, where the author explains where he got all the names. This shocked me, and also endeared me to him. I was able to forgive a lot of the randomness in the languages used. I also really, really, really need to know more about these straight paths (!!!) and their associated archaeology. And the magical manuscript mention at the British Museum and Bodleian reminds me that the latest
Ben Aaronovitch novel,
Amongst Our Weapons has just been released, and suddenly I want to believe in the existence of The Folly in real life. :)
Oh, there was a third thing I have always liked - Gowther Mossack, who, in my opinion, is the most well-developed and realistic character of the lot. And the appendix only added credence to my views on him. How sweet. :)
Boneland is the third book in the Tales of Alderley series, released in 2012, some 49 YEARS after this book (dear
Alan Garner is currently 87 years of age! Impressive!). I will certainly be reading it. I am so keen to read what Alan Garner has added to this, after nearly half a century to think it over! -
When I was a young boy, I knew of a book called
The Weirdstone of Brisingamen and I coveted it but never read it.
Years and years and a little while later, the sun fell from the sky and I was to resort to listening to audio books whilst walking to and from work - it avoided the unpleasantness of walking into lampposts in the dark whilst trying to read paper books.
One of the items on offer was the aforementioned tome and I on listening, I was mightily smitten.. apart from the parts where they were running about underground lost, which seemed mightily boring.
Anyhow, being as the second and third books in the series were on offer at the local library, and the sun had bounced back into the sky, I put in my requests for the books and waited..
..and waited..
..and waited..
..and then asked the nice lady at the library what the hold up was.
"Oh, I know who's got this one" she says "it's one of the other librarians; but she's in Wales at the moment!"
So I waited..
..and do you know: Librarians don't pay fines on overdue books! Can you imagine! Even if someone is waiting patiently for it!
This book is a children's book. It's better written than the first in the series. The action is intense and sustained. There is something different happening on every page and so by the end of the book, you're thinking 'Wow!'
In fact, two pages from the end, you're still in the thick of the action and you're thinking 'By golly, how is this going to come to an end in such a very short space of lines?'
But it does, and it's a good ending and all the twists and turns are nicely resolved and the threads tied into a pretty bow. Nice.
So, yeah; definitely the best of the trilogy.. so far?
But, as of 2012, more than half a century later, there's more! -
I loved
The Weirdstone of Brisingamen with a passion (pay no attention to the appallingly bad cover on the linked edition; it's a shameless knockoff of Star Wars, I know, and it embarrasses me to look at it) so I was really excited to find out there was a sequel.
Can I just say "Er, huh?"
So much is crammed into this book that it's very nearly incoherent -- as if Garner had a million ideas and was afraid he'd never have another chance to use them. The Wild Hunt, the Morrigan, a mysterious ruined house that's real only in the moonlight, elves dying off due to industrialization (the "smoke sickness"), the Lady of the Lake, some sort of Celtic version of the Valkyries, bracelets and runes and a demon water horse and some sort of black smoke beast and mines and female moon-power and tunnels and mysterious horsemen and the Eternal Warrior and and and and and...
Whew. I'm out of breath just writing it all down. The book would have to have been twice as long to have any hope of pulling all of this together in a coherent form, and even then I'm not sure it would have been possible. It's not a bad book, just not nearly the book it could have been with a little discipline applied to it.
There's a third one out,
Boneland. I hear it's much more for adults and very different than the first two, but I plan to give it a try. I'm not sure where he can take it from here but I'm very curious! -
This tale picks up soon after the events in The Weirdstone of Brisingamen when 12-year-old twins Colin and Susan are still staying in Cheshire whilst their parents are abroad. Evil witch the Morrigan has, along with her allies, finally been defeated, but Susan no longer has the teardrop heirloom, the weirdstone of the title. In its place is a curious silver bracelet, its shape echoing the young moon, and it is the moon -- from the title of this sequel to Susan's crucial role -- which runs as one of the leitmotivs throughout this dark tale.
It's hard to tell, but I'm guessing that these events take place sometime in the late 1950s; the date is immaterial but helps to get a handle on the narrative. Air pollution has driven a group of travellers from North Wales to Alderley Edge in Cheshire. No ordinary travellers these: they are lios-alfar, what we humans would call elves, and they are resting in the caves underneath the Edge before going on to the Northlands, where they hope to defeat whatever is destroying their kin there. They are let into the heart of the Edge by Cadellin, the wizard who befriended Colin and Susan in The Weirdstone and who still guards the sleeping knights under the hill.
Meanwhile a pit has been accidentally opened by workmen outside the Trafford Arms Hotel in the village, in which apparently in the 17th century a 'devil' had been bound by local clergymen. This we later find is a brollachan, a Gaelic name for a shapeless thing; this being is able to transform itself into an each uisge, a water-horse which bears any unsuspecting rider into a lake where the human is eaten. Colin and Susan are to come across this dangerous creature, but first they are to encounter -- in very close succession -- Atlendor the elf-lord, Uthecar a one-eyed dwarf and Albanac, who first appears to be merely a tall horseman cloaked in black but who is more than that. Along with Cadellin they are all concerned about the evil gathering in the area; taken in conjunction with the news that the Morrigan is still alive and heading down from the Northlands it's clear that the twins' lives are again at risk.
I found this a terribly confusing book when I first read it in the 70s, much less attractive than The Weirdstone and with an even less conclusive ending. First the action switches, seemingly at random, back and forth from the Edge to the Peak District a few miles to the east. The maps by Charles Green are beautifully drawn but more allusive than cartographically helpful -- perhaps in keeping with the fantastical happenings of the story. We meet a bewildering and formidable array of adversaries: not just the brollachan and the Morrigan but also the chillingly creepy bodachs (Katharine Briggs describes the bodach as a 'Celtic bugbear' whose appearance betokened death) and palug cats (the Welsh cath palug or 'clawing cat' was a large wildcat, maybe even a lynx; one also featured in Diana Wynne Jones' The Islands of Chaldea).
More ambiguous in nature are members of the Wild Hunt. Garner draws in names and traditions from Scandinavia, England, France and Wales to create his huntsmen: the Einheriar, Scandinavian bodyguards to the gods who are also the horsemen of the Welsh deity Donn; the English Herlathing (similar to the French Harlequin) who accompany the ancient British king Herla across the land and through the centuries; and their leader the Hunter, a horned deity who goes by the name Garanhir, in Welsh 'tall crane' or perhaps 'longshanks' from his sheer height and stride. Why such a complicated cast list with borrowed names from every which where? In a note Garner tell us that he re-used existing ones simply because to him 'a made-up name feels wrong'.
It's impossible to detail all the plot, the hows and whys of Susan's coma and Colin's later abduction, the nature of the Morrigan's enmity, the differences between the Old Magic, High Magic and Old Evil, what exactly comes about in the final page after the final confrontation. I can only make some sense by referencing two contentious books that I remember reading in the 60s and early 70s and which profoundly influence the action and themes: Alfred Watkins' The Old Straight Track and Robert Graves' The White Goddess. I still have these on my shelves, the first in the third edition of 1945, the second in a paperback edition from 1961. The Watkins book I remember being all about a sense of place and local traditions, and this is certainly characteristic of The Moon of Gomrath -- especially when Colin has to use the old straight track to retrieve the antidote to Susan's worrying absence from her body. What I draw most from The White Goddess is Graves' hypothesis of the universal belief a Triple Moon Goddess. It turns out that Susan has a part to play as the representative of the young moon, just as the lady of the lake Angharad Goldenhand stands for the full moon and the Morrigan symbolises the old moon.
It is of no small importance that Angharad gave Susan an ancient silver bracelet, emblematic of the moon, at the end of The Weirdstone to replace the teardrop stone that had been destroyed. In some ways both books are the opposite of the masculine stories of the quest for the grail: in Garner's novels the object is presented to Susan at or near the start of each tale, and the quest is to find its particular virtues. The three phases of the moon seem also to be related to Susan's existence in three worlds: her own flesh-and-blood world, then a state of unformed life called Abred when she is in a coma, and finally Angharad's world of the Shining Ones called the Threshold of the Summer Stars.
And it's also no coincidence that a turning point in this novel happens on the Eve of Gomrath, a time when beacon fires are lit to mark either the quarter-days (the beginning of February, May, August or November) or the equinoxes and solstices. It's difficult to tell when the action happens -- probably not the dead of winter or the height of summer -- but one of the ancient Celtic quarter-days seems likeliest to me: in any case all are dangerous times of year, moments of transition from one period to another when anything can happen.
I've talked at length about the ideas in this book, which is largely all one can do. Colin and Susan are more differentiated in this second book, but Susan turns out to have a role in which character has little part. The human adult figures, Gowther and Bess Mossack, fret and worry in the background but are largely irrelevant; all the other individuals are non-human, even if some of them are in human form. The test comes when the reader identifies with either Colin or Susan, and it's clear that many readers did so; I however never did, and The Moon of Gomrath was always an enigma to me.
What is more interesting to me is whether Garner invested more of himself in either one or other sibling. That he has had deep emotional attachments to protagonists as well as place is clear from his breakdown following The Owl Service, a breakdown which was detailed in a talk he gave to a science fiction convention and which was later republished in The Voice that Thunders. It is the nature of that investment that is key to understanding the Weirdstone trilogy, and that key is I suspect only to be revealed in Boneland, the final part of the trilogy, which was published nearly half a century after The Moon of Gomrath.
http://wp.me/s2oNj1-gomrath -
I re-read this in preparation for Boneland! It was a wonderful re-visiting of a past pleasure. This second book is perhaps the more writerly, edgy (no pun intended) and sophisticated book, but I have to say the first book still stands out for its unbelievably gripping underground scenes and great storytelling. As for Boneland.... have read it now :-) It goes further again from traditional storytelling and more towards edgy and sophisticated... but it's not a kids' book, so must be looked at differently. I'm inspired to read more Garner fiction for adults now.
By the way, this 1981 paperback has yet another awful cover! But it does strangely awaken my sympathies for poor Colin (who looks nondescript and put-upon here) and it depicts an intriguingly different kind of Susan - a scruffy little gamine. This is rather appropriate, given her character development towards independence and wilful defiance in this second novel.The idiotic character in fancy dress in the foreground is probably supposed to depict one of the Einheriar, unless it is an even worse interpretation of a dwarf. This could be a case for illicit re-covering :-)
http://alexisdeacon.blogspot.com.au/2... -
Another reread. I remember the first time I read this that I was so terrified by the first appearance of the Brollachan that I hurriedly closed the book and made my dad sleep with it under his pillow so that the thing couldn't get out. I finished it very quickly on the next sunny morning. It's one of the books I have an incredibly strong memory of.
Coming back to it now, it's so pacey and single-minded, it's a wonderful contrast to virtually everything around 'these days'. The web of myth and past involved is a joy, and the phrasing is as entrancing as ever. I'm slightly surprised by how quickly I read it, though. - it didn't...how to say...have much to it. Not that that degrades it in any way, as I say, it's simply that my enjoyment was brief but significant. And certainly this book, and the prequel, should always be a staple of British bookshelves, because there's no more pleasant way to be introduced to such a swathe of legend than this. -
I remember I adored this as a kid.... it really got under my skin. I must have been about nine years old and after reading this I convinced myself the wild hunt was coming for me on the first of May.... and I nailed an iron horseshoe over my bed so they wouldn't get me. A good book that seriously spooked the daylights out of me... and made me get into old English myths and legends.
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A million years ago!
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I liked this book better than the first book, The Weirdstone of Brisingamen. Maybe that's because I've already had some of the world building from the first book and I know kind of what to expect, though. It was weird to me that it was a sequel, but it completely ignored the ending of the last book. There was virtually no reference to it at all, which is amazing considering the total lack of resolution I felt at the end. The only references are in a recurring enemy -- the Morrigan -- wanting revenge, and the fact that the characters are the same, plus the backstory about the sleepers in the cave.
The mythology in this one was interesting, anyway. I'm amused at how often the concept of the Wild Magic and the Wild Hunt comes up in fantasy books -- here, in The Fionavar Tapestry, in The Dark Is Rising... I like it. The descriptions of Susan riding with them, and the way she gets left behind and feels both joy and anguish, are lovely.
Again, I felt a lack of resolution at the end of this book. Both books just end, with no reactions from the characters, nothing. Just. An end. It's weird, I like things to be rounded off a little better. It's not that they stop with big plot things left to happen, but they stop without making it feel satisfying.
It also feels like there should be more books in the series -- you have all these comparatively little events, dealing with Grimnir and the Brollachan and the Morrigan, but throughout there's the threat of Nastrond hovering over it, and the idea of the waking of the sleepers, but nothing happens with them. It feels like the focus is on the wrong thing. In one way it's nice to have a big story hovering in the background, but when you know you're never going to find out how that story resolves, it's not so nice. There's plenty of room for sequels, but I read that Alan Garner never intended for there to be another book. There's so much that feels unfinished, though...
At least he didn't write a shoddy page long epilogue in which we find out exactly what happened to everyone in as few words as possible.
This book is fun enough to just read, but I didn't really get emotionally invested in it. Characters can die and I don't really care. Not good! -
Good read. The author, once again, shows a vivid picture of the town and surrounds with his wonderfully descriptive passages. I enjoyed this book for the most part because of this and also the story line. However, the character Susan got on my nerves this time around. She would go off and do stuff even when those older and wiser than her said not to (this is a pet peeve of mine so not exclusive to this book) and cause utter chaos as a result. Time and again.
Still, it was mostly an enjoyable read and I look forward to the final book in this series. -
The Moon of Gomrath by Alan Garner is the second of "The Alderley Tales". The first of which I have also reviewed.
"Moon" was first published in 1963 and is still in print today. That alone would be testament to its strength - before print on demand came along books generally went out of print pretty quickly due to the cost of print runs.
However "Moon" is not quite as strong a book as it's predecessor - but given the strength of "Weirdstone" that would be a struggle. Taken on it's own merits, however, it is a very strong book.
Colin and Susan - the protagonists from "Weirdstone" - are drawn back into the otherworld and the ancient struggle between good and evil when they accidentally rouse the Old Magic, and thus the Wild Hunt, from its slumber. As enemies and allies from the previous book return and new ones appear only the children's courage will enable them to survive the ordeal - and if they don't it's likely the world won't either.
There is a depth to Garner's characters that is breathtaking. While the Wizard Cadellin is undeniably good and the Morrigan evil every other character exists somewhere inbetween. Some of the 'good' characters really get my back up - and this is quite intentional.
For example his his elves are prats. They aren't evil, they're creatures of light who fight on the side of good. But they are also arrogant, uncaring and lack empthy for humans. When you learn that they have been forced to flee to the edges of Britain because smoke pollution makes them ill you get the point but you can't help feeling it's not that much loss.
I'm conscious in this review that I don't want to give too much of the plot away, but the ending is a bittersweet thing like the best dark chocolate. There is death and life, sorrow and joy all wrapped up in one package and it works. It works very well.
Where it's weaker than "Weirdstone" is that it all feels more contrived. Some of the dangers and solutions that face Colin and Susan - especially early on - are the result of unfortunately combining events. For example the Elves ask for something Susan has at the same time as something else happens, and Susan ends up in danger from event two only because she's given the thing in question to the Elves. In "Weirdstone" the coincidences felt like the hand of fate guiding things - in "Moon" it's less so - though by the end you wonder, because it does all wrap up well. It's cetainly not a deal breaker.
I gave "Weirdstone" Five Stars. I give "Moon" Four and a Half - listed as four even though I don't usually round down, because I want to make sure it's clear I feel it's slightly weaker. -
This is an altoghether different proposition from The Weirdstone of Brisingamen. The prose is still bleakly beautiful, but the characters are better developed, more assertive and more independent after their experiences of the last novel, and the story is far more creative. The imagination which created elements like the mara and the lyblacs for the last book is given full rein here. The bodachs, the palugs, above all the Brollachan, are all weird and disturbing creations not found elsewhere in fantasy.
That's not to say there are no influences. There are a few Lord of the Rings echoes still -- the magical McGuffin is now a series of ancient bracelets of lunar power, one of which is revealed to be wielded by the last book's Galadriel substitute -- and the focus on the Morrigan as primary villain recalls CS Lewis' White and Green Witches in the Narnia books. (Rather shockingly for a trilogy whose third volume has just been published, it was less than half a decade between the publication of The Last Battle and that of The Weirdstone of Brisingamen.)
That said, The Moon of Gomrath's evocation of a matriarchal Wild Magic pre-dating the masculine wizardly magic of Cadellin and co prefigures multiple examples of children's fiction, from the weird hierarchy of High, Dark, Light and Wild Magics in Susan Cooper's The Dark Is Rising sequence to Terry Pratchett's treatment of witchcraft in the Tiffany Aching books.
For me there's nothing quite so memorably upsetting as the underground sequences in Weirdstone, but the developing both of Garner's cosmology and of the individual characters of the children (especially Susan, emerging triumphantly from her brother's shadow here) make this the better, more sophisticated book. The hints of Susan's and Colin's futures (we're told casually on the penultimate page that the latter "never found rest again") make the eventual publication of Boneland, if not inevitable, then something many of this book's readers have probably been waiting fifty years for. -
I always preferred this ever so slightly to Weirdstone, and one of the reasons may be that Colin and Susan have a little more agency in this book, while at the same time having less. More stuff happens to them directly and they do things and even have opinions, but they remain, sadly, ciphers, albeit ciphers on the cusp of change. More than that, though, it was the idea of wild magic, magic that exists purely for its own sake, savage and emotional and dangerous, set against the more ordered, courtly magic of Cadellin, which anticipates a lot of modern fantasy magic with rules and systems, but of course, it is the wild magic that breaks Susan's heart at the end, and leaves the reader haunted too.
Gomrath is a wilder, more formless book as opposed to the rather tidy chase narrative of Weirdstone. The magic comes out of the very landscape, and the danger from the shadowy Brollachain and the shape-changing Morrigan while Colin and Susan's relationship with their allies is more uneasy, and strained to the point of bitterness with the lios-alfar. Futhermore, much is left unsettled at the end, unless I missed some details, with the Morrigan still on the loose and whatever was bothering the lios-alfar unresolved. In retrospect, the set-up for a third volume was always there, but Garner resisted or refused, and many years later we got Boneland, something of an entirely different order. -
If The Weirdstone (Garner's first novel) leans a little 3-, this leans 3.5 or maybe a little more. Weirdstone has a lot of unfortunate-nesses like a goblin named Slinkveal, the general batch of bad guys called the morthbrood, and of course the main villain, Grimnir. The best decision in Weirdstone is to make the tunnel scary because spelunking is terrifying, not because of lurking fell beasts. Gomrath gets more complicated, the kids, especially Susan, develop as characters, and so does the mythology. I was interested to learn, upon Googling, that the wizard story is real. That is, Alderley is an actual place, it has an ancient legend of a wizard stopping a farmer from Mobberley (seriously, where do the English get these names), buying his horse, showing him the sleeping riders, etc. Garner grew up on the Edge, and so I can see him having played with his friends or maybe alone, making up some of these stories.
That makes these books feel better to me.
You can also see how these stories start to get conflated. Perhaps the sleeping knights were a separate story from King Arthur, originally.
This is a re-read (unpacking my library). I never heard of these books till adulthood. Perhaps Garner is more widely read in Britain. He's better than Cooper and deserves more of an audience here. -
I know this is considered classic fantasy, but I really did not enjoy it all that much. The first title (Weirdstone) was better paced than this one. Both books suffer from endings that are incredibly abrupt. Garner seems to have felt that once the story was over, stop at once. No tying up of loose ends, no congratulations that the good side won, just stop as soon as victory was won. In fact, I didn't even realize at first that I was at the end. It was only when I started to read the next page that I realized I had finished and was reading the afterword. The 2 kids take turns being attacked by the Morrigan and her allies. Considering that in the last book, it was explained that nothing could come back easily from the force that defeated the bad guys in that book, it is rather irritating to see the Morrigan back as nasty as ever, apparently never harmed at all by her complete defeat in book 1. It was just plain frustrating. At least Garner could have come up with a new baddie or something!
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Continuing on from
The Weirdstone of Brisingamen: A Tale of Alderley, The Moon of Gomrath sees Susan and Colin continuing to be drawn into the magical issues which entangled them. They have made an enemy, and victory in one battle has not won any wars.
Again the tone of the story is high legend, the magic overwhelming, frightening, inexorable. A series of frightening events, and the kind of throbbing, highly-cadenced description which is rarely found in more recent stories.
A good tale for children who like a thrill of horror, though again without any particular individuality from the two main characters who are "the children" rather than bringing forth any noteable personality. -
Nowhere near as good as The Weirdstone of Brisingamen and filled with fantasy tropes like fighting dwarves, aloof elves, and evil creatures like goblins, wild-cats and a shapeshifter. The story started out in a promising and creepy way, with a devilish creature called the Brollachan being released from its pit by men doing excavation work. But things got convoluted quickly with too many different magical folkloric beings to keep track of and no backstory to make you care about any of them. Even Colin and Susan, child heroes of the first book, were no more than vehicles for the story here. I'll be curious to read the third book, Boneland which was written 49 years later.
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Once again Alan Garner has written a book,where magic comes alive, I enjoy these books, as Alderly Edge is one of those places, where you can walk, and imagine all kinds of creatures, from Fairy, to witch,,
Though they are written for children, don't let that put you off,, they are amazing and he has now written the third, Boneland,, saving that one, for the Summer.. -
It wasn't either of our faults, book. Really. It just didn't work out. Maybe it was the age difference, maybe our different cultures. But I'm sure you will meet lots of wonderful readers soon, and have long and happy relationships with them.
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Returning to this beloved book, I am struck by how much stranger it is than its predecessor, with an air of inscrutability and melancholy that would further inform Garner's subsequent work. It does not have the same quality of enchantment as his first novel, but is a marvel in its own right.
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Not sure why this series seems so challenging for me — too many weird names and confusing mythological creatures? And I don’t seem to totally understand the plot. Hoping that #3 in the series will make everything clear. Why did Garner wait so long after publishing #2 to come out with the third??
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I've been eye-balling this book on my shelf, wondering if I actually want to read it, and since I've been having a hard time reading anything lately, I naturally thought it was the perfect time to try this. At the very least, I thought, it would be really easy to put the book down if I didn't like it, given my current mood. Except that this was so short and nostalgic, I ended up reading it in a single afternoon.
I won't say it's great literature. But if you're looking something to remind you of Lord of the Rings, Narnia, and The Dark is Rising, this might be right for you. It's not quite as good as any of the examples I mentioned, but it definitely has a similar vibe. Susan and Colin are two kids who keep getting involved in magical escapades with their foundations in Arthurian myth. They meet tons of mythical creatures, and yet remain silly British children, with that peculiar mix of common sense and tolerance for the fantastical.
The story itself does feel quite rushed, but I was pretty okay with it. There wasn't a lot to draw me to the characters, so if it had dragged on at all, I would have enjoyed it considerably less. As it was, I breezed through on the strength of the shortness and the fast pace. I do think it's something I would have enjoyed considerably more if I was in the target age range, but it was still a good way to spend a slumpy Saturday afternoon. I didn't enjoy it enough to say that I'll go out and read the rest of the series, but it was just fine for what it was. -
A sequel to
The Weirdstone of Brisingamen, written soon after (early 1960s), often held up as an example of fantasy that was flourishing before the influence of Tolkien came to dominate the fantasy literature landscape. Garner definitely draws from some of the same sources as Tolkien but does very different things with the source material. The story continues the story of two British kids in the 1960s staying in Cheshire, England, exploring a nearby wilderness (the Edge) and discovering that fantastic creatures and magic have deep roots there. I look forward to reading the 3rd book,
Boneland, which was not published until the 21st century but continues the story of some of the characters from the 1960s . . . -
People seem to be divided over this and Weirdstone when it comes to early Garner, but personally I prefer Weirdstone. I can see the appeal of Gomrath - there's a lot more folklore here, and you can see Garner starting to become intrigued by strange local lore more and more as the Tolkein influence recedes - but for me this novel just doesn't hang together in the same way. Still, it's an excellent read, and an intriguing bridge between his early fiction and his later books for adults. This edition also has an afterword by the author, in which he explains and shares some of his folkloric sources.
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The second of Garner's 'Alderley' trilogy. In some respects a continuation of the first, in the same area, with many of the same characters, but while this is another book primarily for children (and I think kids of about 7 to 14 will really enjoy it- if they like fantasy adventure), it has a more 'grown-up' feel to it. Perhaps this is because the protagonists have become the targets of the Morrigan's need for revenge, or maybe because it involves the 'Old Magic', which is altogether wilder than 'High Magic' and less concerned with good and evil.
I am fascinated to see how these two books lead onto 'Boneland', which I will read next. -
I'd read The Weirdstone of Brisingamen and retain some hazy memories of it, though it wasn't that long ago I read it, after loving The Owl Service as a child, and thought to read this. A lot of names. A mishmash of Celtic cultures, and some lingering sorrow and awe that makes it momentarily worth while - as it is a book for children, I'd say children would have more time for it. The rapid pacing would allow for a child's more expansive sense of time, I think.
