Books: Master of the Ghost Dreaming and Others

Master of the Ghost Dreaming is a magic-realist-ish novella by indigenous author Mudrooroo, best known for his landmark 1965 novel Wild Cat Falling. It follows the inhabitants and caretakers of an aboriginal colony at the turn of the twentieth century. Perspective and the limits of reality are always shifting, much in the way that Carpentaria by Alexis Wright sets no clear line between what's real and what isn't. Unlike that sprawling novel, Master of the Ghost Dreaming is much more contained and explicitly "dream like". So much so that some of it reads like someones dream diary, with all the attendant indulgences. Mudrooroo manages to keep it fresh, though in the end the actual plot is naturally only loosely drawn. The best dream sequence involves the caretakers wife having nightmares of fanciful clothes sticking to her skin like armor. After schlepping about the Brisbane summer in tight black jeans, it's a notion I can easily relate to.

I read The Borrowers for my review of the latest Miyazaki film, on which it is loosely based. Very loosely, much like Studio Ghibli's interpretation of Howl's Moving Castle - did you know that Howl is really Welsh? - read the fabulous book by Diana Wynne Jones to find out. Plus the novel, written 1952 by Mary Norton, is a hallmark of children's literature.

It's a "classic" children's novel in lots of ways. The narrative is retold to a young girl by her grandmother, much like the best children's books, or the worst children's movies - like Trolls 2. Likewise the action scenes are recounted either in past or future tense. There are no spine tingling moments, cinematic scenes or cliffhanging chapter endings. This is a story for parents to read their kids, rather than to frowningly purchase after reading blurbs that promise low grade porn and high quality gore.

Clive Barker is one of my absolute favorite authors. He's best known for his super violent, super sexual adult novels, which have spawned a plethora of (mostly trashy) films and games. Hellraiser 4, for instance.

Abarat is his children's series, with Absolute Midnight  being the third in a proposed series of five. Proposed because Barker is known for leaving huge works unfinished partway through. His "Books of the Art" series, a trilogy began in 1989 and still yet to be concluded. The first Abarat was released in 2002. But the delay is easily understood. Each novel is accompanied by dozens of  gorgeous paintings, all created by the author himself.

The story follows Candy Quackenbush, former resident of Chickentown USA, now a seasoned traveler of the Sea of Izabella, a parallel universe populated with a series of islands represent an hour of the day. 

What makes the series so fabulous is it's originality. There are no Classical mythological creatures here. No staid wizards and  witches in cloaks. Whatever tropes he does use are swiftly turned on their heads.

Having said that, Absolute Midnight is the weakest of the three novels so far. It introduces too many threads and characters, and it's pace is frantic, even for someone has attention challenged as I am. Plus the author introduces a bland love interest (called "Gazza", telling, no?) in a situation more far fetched than any of the wild magic he describes throughout the series. I think everyone was rooting for Candy to end up with Malingo, the bright orange, fin-headed geshrat. Instead we get this "beautiful-eyed" nobody from nowhere, in a romance as contrived as anything by Stephanie Meyer. 

One series that isn't lacking in detail is D.M. Cornish's Monster Blood series. Lamplighter, the second in the series, delves further into the complicated world of Rossamund, the apprentice lamplighter. For those not in the know - and I don't blame you, the book contains an appendix of terms, figures and maps almost thicker than the story itself - lamplighters patrol the highways of the Half-Continent, a realm where mankind is struggling to contain the ingress of monsters.

The book is complex. Not only is it a massively imagined world, the political machinations and bureaucratic intrigue are labyrinthine. The novels takes it's due time in setting scene and day to day activities before bursting everything apart with a sudden and violent upsets. While I found the first book, Foundling, a little bit plodding and predictable in structure (the blameless Rossamund becoming victim to the big bad world) this addition finds the young apprentice and most likely part-monster (not a spoiler) getting his hands dirty.

Everything is murky in the Half-Continent, and everyone has their faults, their secrets and prejudices. I love the fact that Rossamunds mentor is the fierce and ethically dubious bounty hunter, the femme fatale and monster-exterminator extraordinaire Europa. After finishing this I can't wait to read the next in the series.