Creepy Reads Review: Cruel Beauty by Rosamund Hodge

This months Creepy Reads Review is of a novel a friend gave to me. I had visited her at Tampere and on my way back home I needed something new to read on the train. My friend had a pile of books she wanted to give away. So, these book were not her favourites but I still decided to read one of them. I admit it was because of the pretty cover and the promise that it has intertextual references to may fairy tales. The novel I chose was Rosamund Hodge's Cruel Beauty.

My copy's cover is already a bit worn.

A mash-up of genres

As promised, the novel draws inspiration from several myths and fairy tales, the most obvious ones are the Blue Beard and the Beauty & the Beast. These two have a straight impact on the plot. On the thematic level the novel is more close to the ancient Greek myths (mostly tragedies) which clash amusingly with the 'happily ever after' mentality of the Beauty and the Beast fairy tale. There are also strong references to the story of Rumplestiltskin and a more recent fantasy story the Labyrinth, a film starring David Bowie.

Greek tragedies and fairy tales not being enough, Cruel Beauty is also a chic-lit romance story and at some points it almost seems like one of the Harlequin novels. I do not often read romance stories but Cruel Beauty combines successfully some sense of humor and wicked dialogues to the romance, so I found it mostly entertaining.

However, there was a bit too much repetition with these romantic scenes. Some times there seemed to be no point, why some elements and lines and deeds were repeated in several scenes. One could always argue that repetition is an important motif from the fairy tales. I thought that sometimes the repetition stated to resemble the way a soap opera has constantly repeating romantic situations and how the soap opera characters dwell in their feelings.

A tiny bit about the story

Since I do try to avoid spoiling the possible future reading experience of  the books I introduce in the Creepy Reads Reviews, I am not going to speak about the plot twists of Cruel Beauty. But I do wish to present some of my impressions and thoughts about the story.

The starting situation of the novel is the following: The narrator and the main character is a 17-year-old girl named Nyx. She lives in a world ruled by a demon lord. Nyx is to be marry that demon because of a plot made by her father. Nyx is trained to be an assassin and her destiny is to free the world of its evil demon ruler. Of course, not everything goes according to Nyx's father's plan nor are all characters what they first seem.

I very much enjoyed that the narrating main character Nyx is not a nice person. She is not the usual pure hearted heroine. Instead her childhood has molded her into a vengeful and disappointed creature with a heart filled with grudge towards her own family ('the good ones') and a sharp tongue. And who can blame her? She is treated coldly by her father and trained to be a vessel of revenge, a knife others want to use. The hidden anger inside Nyx makes her a much more interesting character than what teenage heroes or heroines usually are.

Conclusion 

All in all, I thought this was a nice reading experience and I especially liked the way the world of this fantasy novel was constructed. The characters had a religion mostly inspired by the Ancient Greek and Roman traditions and it is evident Hodge knows a lot about ancient Greece and its myths. The story-world of Cruel Beauty was estranged but welcoming for the reader, and I probably will read more Hodge's novels in the future.

I can recommend this novel, if you occasionally enjoy a good chic-lit, like to read fantasy and like to read descriptions of magical castles and their beautiful rooms.

Creepy Reads Review: The Graveyard Book by Neil Gaiman

I recently read a novel by Neil Gaiman and wanted to feature it here in the blog. The name of that novel is The Graveyard Book. It tells the story of a little orphan boy who ends up in the graveyard and the ghosts raise him up, with some help from another person or creature living in the graveyard. I really liked that the narrator never actually says what this guardian type of character is. It is implied that he has many traits of a vampire, though.

The Finnish translation's cover

The world of this novel has supernatural and fantasy elements straight in the beginning. As is typical for the novels and graphic novels of Gaiman, around the fantasy elements there looms the normal magic free reality, but none of the main characters belong strictly to the normal world. I liked this book and want to encourage others to read it too, so I try my best to avoid spoilers.

The story begins with a scene in which a man named "Jack" kills a family, but their toddler manages to escape to the graveyard close by. The toddler is found and rescued by ghosts. He does not speak yet and hence has no name. The ghosts decide to call him Nobody. It is clear that the toddler is very important for some reason. The story of the boy Nobody and his family opens up slowly during the novel. Strong themes in this novel are loneliness and personal growth.

The Graveyard Book is categorized as a fantasy novel for children. I agree that children and teenagers are clearly the target audience, which is a slightly younger audience than what many other novels by Gaiman have. As an example I could mention Neil Gaiman's graphic novel series The Sandman and the novel Anansi Boys. It's been years since I read that one, but I have this faint memory that if considering ethics and who is evil and who is not, Anansi Boys was a lot more 'gray area' than The Graveyard Book. Which is great like that, since in Anansi Boys the characters are adults but in The Graveyard Book the main character is a boy growing up from being a helpless toddler to a youngster. The narration kind of leans towards the cognitive skills of a young boy, without being infantile.

The illustrations in this Gaiman's novel are made my Dave McKean, who has illustrated many other goth-y stories and books too. One featured before in this blog is The homecoming by Ray Bradbury. If you check that post out, you'll notice that in The homecoming the illustrations are more tightly knitted to the text than in The Graveyard Book.

I really liked The Graveyard Book. The plot structure was a mix of a growth story and a swashbuckler or an adventure story. They are both rather predictable plot structures but the novel was still very enjoyable and did not use any really stereotypical cliches. Strongly recommend!

Creepy Reads Review: The Sleeper and the Spindle by Neil Gaiman

Today I am going to write about Neil Gaiman's book, or a new fairy tale, The Sleeper and the Spindle, which I found in the department of children's books in Tate Modern's museum shop. I must say that when I was in London, the museum shop of Tate Modern was the best book store I visited.

Many of you certainly know Neil Gaiman's works, the more familiar ones are perhaps The Sandman graphic novels, Neverwhere novel and tv-series, and of coarse Stardust and American Gods. The illustrator of The Sleeper and the Spindle is British Chris Riddell, who has been writing and illustrating books for children and youth since the 90's. I checked his webpage and was thrilled by his The Sleep of Reason series and also added one of his books to my reading list due to its title: Alienography or How to spot an alien and what to do about it.

The elements of Gaiman's fairy tale are familiar. A young queen, who has skin white as snow and hair black as raven, learns from a group of dwarfs her kingdom is threatened by a plague of sleep, that is emerging from the neighboring kingdom. Everybody who doesn't flee falls asleep for all eternity, unless a curse is broken. The curse is coming from a castle, surrounded by roses and thick thorns. Sounds familiar, right? It would seem that Snow White has defeated her evil stepmother and the Sleeping Beauty is still sleeping, and no prince is coming to save the day. I do not want to tell the whole plot because I really liked it and would not want to spoil it from you. Therefore this review too is a bit short.

Since I found this book with children's books, I would like to address the matter of this fairy tale actually being a children's story. That might not be the case though it is a picture book. Illustrator Chris Riddell has made stunningly beautiful pictures that fit perfectly the slightly gloomy atmosphere of Gaiman's writing. As you can see of the photos, the illustrations are black and white with a little highlight of gold. The style is more appealing to people twelve-years-old and up than small children.

As you can see from these two previous photos, the cover is made interestingly out of two layers. The illustration shimmers from underneath, making an eerie and haunting impression.

Another thing that makes this fairy tale less a children's story is the narration. Firstly the narrator is a bit jumpy, and instead of mostly linear story from the beginning to the end, there are flashbacks and meta remarks like the one about names.

"Have you noticed," asked the shortest of the dwarfs, "something unusual?" They had names, the dwarfs, but human beings were not permitted to know what they were, such things being sacred.
The queen had a name, but nowadays people only ever called her Your Majesty.
Names are in short supply in this telling. 

Now that is really untypical for a fairy tale. Of coarse, this tale is written or at least published 2013 so it is not a slave for the conventions of folklore and old fairy tales. Remarks like the one about names interfere with the immersion of the reader and are way more often used in stories for mature readers than for kids. Immersion happens when a reader is caught up in the story and I think The Sleeper and the Spindle systematically estranges the reader from the story's world. The whole kingdom is falling asleep and so the narration becomes more and more like a dream. I loved that the story gets weirder and creepier the longer one reads it.

I am not saying a child would not like this story because of the estranged narration but I do think an adult would enjoy it. I mean that this short novel is fit for people of different ages who like creepy stories. This indeed is a creepy tale, with its sleeping people who move around a bit like zombies, with the heroine who does not submit to the traditional pattern of a fairy tale, and with the evil that is behind the whole curse. Everything is not the way it seems in this story and that is really refreshing for the reader!

Finally, I would like to concentrate attention to what is partly already said; the way the story is narrated is quite unique and the language is beautiful. It is an intriguing clash of a fairy tale and modern suspense. The character of the queen is strong and definitely not just a girl anymore. She has seen so much and suffered so much and the whole atmosphere of the story is somehow extremely melancholic and agonizing. Still, the narration is light and fine, like a girl sleeping in a glass coffin.

All in all, I do recommend reading The Sleeper and the Spindle and I must say that the rich illustrations can keep one in marvel for many views and reads.

Creepy Reads Review: The homecoming by Ray Bradbury, illustrated by Dave McKean

In November's Creepy Reads Review I am going to introduce a short story by Ray Bradbury (1920-2012). Bradbury's best known work is Fahrenheit 451, a novel that describes a dystopian society, in which books are considered dangerous and are therefore outlawed. I shall not talk about it any longer but it is a classic when it comes to novels describing fictive dark futures. The short story of Bradbury I am going to write about is The homecoming, which was first published 1946, though I have a copy published in 2006. The homecoming is a tale for both adults and children thanks to its universal themes and almost poetry-like language and of coarse pictures; this new edition I have is illustrated by Dave McKean, a well known artist.

You are probably familiar with the illustrator's other works especially the ones in which Neil Gaiman has also been participating. Dave McKean has for example made the cover for Neil Gaiman's Coraline, and McKean has directed MirrorMask (screenplay by Gaiman) and he has made a lot of art (covers, illustrations and so on) for Gaiman's Sandman graphic novels. He was also a concept artist in two Harry Potter movies.

The main character of The homecoming is a 10-year-old Timothy, who is the only human member of a family of ghouls. It is All Hallows' Eve and all the creepy and odd family members are coming to celebrate together at the home of Timothy's parents. The story is about a heartbreaking situation of a little boy, longing to belong but realizing his own difference. I really like this set-up, because usually goth-y stories are about the spooky one (a teenage werewolf or a vampire), who is different in the creepy and alluring way the readers would like to be themselves.

Many goths and other darkly inclined people like mythical horror creatures and would like them to be true. In The homecoming those creatures are true but the poor protagonist still can't be completely included into the creatures' dark world or to really take part in all the activities of the huge party on All Hallows' Eve. He is not even sure if he really wants to be exactly like others. Though Timothy loves his family, his little pounding heart allows him to see the sun, which he loves too.

This short story reminds us that you can't have everything you want and more importantly, all things you want are not good for you.

Another big theme beside the theme of "not belonging" is death. The story is also about Timothy realizing his own mortality in a family of ghouls. His blood circulation is the sign of life and also of the inevitable death. By accepting his fundamental difference, Timothy can come in terms with his own mortality and even more importantly, by accepting his own mortality, which makes him different, he can also belong. With the mortality Timothy also finds that part of himself that is same with the other family members and allows him to participate to ghoulish life, even if just for a fleeting moment.

Thanks for reading my review, I hope some of you get inspired and if you see The homecoming somewhere, you'll grab it and read it!