On a world dominated by a Northern
Kingdom and a Southern Kingdom divided by a large river, a late
spring day brings surprises to an eccentric home near the village of
Brakespeare. Inside lives an old wizard named Prospero (expressly
stated to NOT be the one you're thinking of). He gets a sense that
something would very much like to kill him but isn't strong enough.
His friend Roger Bacon (yes, THAT one, the monk who made a talking bronze head) arrives to pay a friendly call
and the two get caught up in a magical mystery of who is trying to
kill Prospero and why.
1969's The Face in the Frost
is a curious book from John Bellairs, a fantasist who mainly wrote
young adult gothic mysteries about young heroes overcoming some
supernatural threat to the world. Those all came after this novel,
however. Here, two old men have to solve a supernatural threat that
might threaten the world, or at the least throw two kingdoms into
chaos and war.
It is
a short book, but very dense in descriptions. The two kingdoms are
lushly described as they are visited, and Prospero's house is a
marvel of whimsical engineering. The overall level of whimsy in the
story is incredibly high, as is the comedy, such as when Prospero and
Roger visit King Gorm the Wonderworker, a hobbyist wizard who spends
his days happily tinkering away with a cosmic pinball machine that
uses miniature galaxies as pieces. Prospero has a passive-aggressive
magic mirror that likes to show him baseball games of the Cubs
losing. Christianity is woven into the fabric of this world, as are
other assorted mystical traditions, and there's even what's very
obviously a Jewish wizard who helps out later on with the powers of
the Kabbalah.
If
this kind of free-flowing kitchen sink approach to worldbuilding
annoys you, you're probably going to have a bad time. Especially
since Bellairs is able to smoothly transition from whimsical charm to
supernatural horror. This is not Lovecraftian horror, but much more
like unvarnished fairy tale horror. Creepy, but in a different, much
more chaotic way.
The
two biggest standout scenes are the false village of Five Dials
(named after its clocktower), and the haunted forest where an evil
wizard and former colleague of Prospero's named Melichus was supposed
to have been killed in.
A
voice breathed in Prospero's ear with a wet-leaf smell, and
what that
voice said, Prospero has never told anyone. He turned,
and he
grasped an arm, but his hand sank into mud—mud with a
center like
bone.
Descriptions
like this abound, and therin lies the strength, and weakness of the
book. Details are lovingly described, filling out what is in
actuality a thin plotline. The bulk of the book is made up of
episodic subplots full of magic that lead toward a final
confrontation (that's a little bit anticlimactic). The descriptions
are dense, and the paragraphs are too, and often quite long. Its not
really pulp in that it frequently takes the time to stop and smell
the roses, but it also describes the roses in excellent and
entertaining detail.
Bellairs
writes the pretty words good, is what I'm saying.
While it may not be to everyone's taste, I do recommend the book.
(Don't let the “Ursula Le Guin loved it!” put you off. Stuff
actually does happen in this story.) The wizards are suitably
wizardly and solve their problems in a way that makes sense (by not
making sense, this is magic, after all). Come for the charming
setting and stay for the supernatural horror. Its a fun little
palette cleanser between TALES OF TWO-FISTED ADVENTURE!
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