Alan Garner - The Weirdstone of Brisingamen

I thought it was time to revisit this ahead of the imminent arrival of 'Boneland', a third 'Tale of Alderley' a mere 42 years after the first.

My first problem was nothing to do with Garner at all, it was the dreadful edition of the book that I have.  For me, the image above 'is' the cover to this book, not this monstrosity;



I have, it appears, a US young adult edition that commits a heinous sin in the blurb on the back cover. It describes the action as taking place in 'the mountains of Wales', because some good citizen of the States has picked up that it is riffing on Celtic myth, put two and two together and got it very wrong indeed.  Alderley Edge, Mobberley, Macclesfield and the like are all in Cheshire, a very great distance from the Welsh border.

On to the book itself, I raced through it and it was like meeting an old friend again.  When Cadellin exhorts the 'Maggot breed of Ymir' to scarper, I found myself wondering why this never made it on to the big (or even small) screen, it's gripping stuff.

The early sequences with Selina Place are unsettling and the general sense of foreboding is palpable.  I enjoyed the scenes in the mines with the Svarts but thought they went on a bit too long and lost the tension a little.

The second half of the book is essentially the 'quest', when they travel from A to B with X to give it to Y with many exciting events on the way.  So far, so Hobbit or Lord of the Rings, but the difference here is that the fantastical events are grounded in a very real bit of British countryside, not a weird otherworldly realm.

Another thing that always puzzled me was why Gowther went along with them.  The usual deal for children's fiction is that their 'appropriate adults' are in the dark about what is going on, whereas he literally goes for the journey.

The various episodes of peril are well done and who could fail to appreciate a character called 'Angharad Goldenhand'?  We go along for a bumpy ride and then, all of a sudden, it's all over.  The ending comes as bit of a jolt and we are reminded that this is a very slim volume for those brought up in the Harry Potter generation.

Overall, is it a classic of its genre? Yes.  Is it well-written? Up to a point.  Some of Garner's other work I would rate more highly - particularly 'The Owl Service', but this book is far better than the second volume 'The Moon of Gomrath'.

I look forward to reading 'Boneland', which much surely be the last Alderley Tale that he will write.  I'm still hoping for that film adaptation though; perhaps 'Weirdstone: Closer to The Edge' would appeal to the younger cinema-goer today?

Midnight Riot - Ben Aaronovitch

A slightly strange selection this.  I'm not really a big fan of fantasy, science fiction or magic and wizards.  I do like police procedurals with a twist though and this was both in the bargain bin and looked a decent size for a novel. No doorstop this.

Overall, my main problem was that it could have been several excellent books.  The basic nuts and bolts detective story was absolutely fine.  The characters and location worked well and the story zipped along nicely.  For me though, the fantastical elements didn't sit so well.  Our hero seems to take to magic and involve himself in the whole world rather quickly and easily.  The youth of today are supposed to be extremely cynical, yet our man just goes along with it all.

I liked the characters of  Mother and Father Thames and their relations based on the lost rivers.  I quite liked the Covent Garden locations too, good descriptions of the area rather than a lazy generic London setting. The pace was pretty dizzying, with something happening on every page.  Aaronovitch knows a thing or too about plotting and some of the pretty grim things happen to people are excitedly described.

After I finished reading, I did a little research and discovered that I have the US mass-market edition aimed fairly and squarely at the fantasy and sci-fi crowd.  The cover also sparked controversy apparently, mainly due to the hue of the figure pictured.  UK readers got a completely different title - Rivers of London - and a cover more firmly aimed at the Booker/Orange prize crowd.  The UK version would sit well alongside something like 'Jonathan Strange & Mr Norrell', whereas the edition I have would be better up against 'Zombie Slashers From Hell'.

Did I judge the book by its cover? Yes.  Was that fair? No.  I think if I had picked up the British edition, I might have taken it a bit more seriously as a piece of work.  I plan to pick up the second in the series soon and will approach it with that in mind.

My overall view was that there was too much in there.  Trying to do a classic police caper mixed with history, magic, social comment and humour in  a couple of hundred pages is a tough call.  In an ideal world I would love to see a writer as talented as Aaronovitch create two separate strands, one in the 'real' world and the other in the 'magical' alternative reality.  They would appeal to both the two competing markets and to those that can devour both.

I don't think this first book quite worked, but I will be persevering to see how the characters develop and where the stories go.

Just finished writing this and I came across this article; http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2012/jul/19/crime-fiction-clash-of-genres . Interesting stuff.