Mahy, Margaret - The Tricksters
Mon, Oct. 18th, 2004 09:18 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
oyceterFirst things first: Lookit my pretty new Calvin and Hobbes icon (courtesy of ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
thinkum)!
It was very interesting reading this right after East, which I felt was good but not enough. The Tricksters is written in this very precise sort of language that I like. At least, it feels precise because it manages to sketch out the characters and the setting very clearly and idiosyncratically.
Harry Hamilton and her family are spending their Christmas at Carnival's Hide, which is rumored to be haunted by the ghost of Teddy Carnival. But something is sparked by the (really quite horrid) story Harry is writing, along with the ghosts of the past, and the Hamilton family is visited by Ovid, Felix and Hadfield Carnival, who may or may not be all together real. It doesn't feel like all that much happens in the book because most of the "action" is emotional, and Mahy really manages to capture family dynamics. I especially... not liked, but appreciated the way she wrote Christobel, who is one of those larger-than-life siblings who are always the center of attention, and yet, vulnerable and bratty and brilliant and hurtful at once. And I appreciated the friendship between Christobel and Emma, which felt like a real friendship that's taken place over many years -- some years are better, and some years, like in the book, all the secret resentments buried for so long come bubbling to the surface. Actually, that's very much what the book is about -- secret resentments and secrets unearthed and how they tear people apart or bind them together, or both at once.
Other small touches that I loved: Harry's story, and how bad it was in just the right way, because I know that's exactly how I used to write (hopefully things have changed a little). The complicated interplay of relationships within Harry's family, how Christobel would get most of the attention and Harry would not, and how the events of the summer don't miraculously change that. The family lingo, as made up by the two youngest siblings. I also really loved how one horrible cliche in Harry's story was taken and used seriously and effectively a few chapters down.
And the final confrontation and how it played out was perfect and painful.
Bits I liked:
Harry on a book that would change the world:
"It woudl be just little changes to start off with, and nothing would move while you watched it. but each time you looked up, the world would have altered more and more. Things would get brighter and brighter, and the moon would come down, inch after inch, until it broke into a thousand little moons. Mirrors would begin to cry silver and leak out rainbows, and the glass people would come out searching for the one they belonged to. You'd look up from a page and see the reflections getting about, peering into people's faces, and when they found the right one they'd hug them, and from then on that person would be seen in their true beauty."
"Her cry could not be heard, but rose in silver bubbles before her eyes, just as if she were a screaming girl in a comic book. 'Eeeeeek!' would be written in the heart of each bubble, but it would stay unheard until the bubbles burst on the surface of the sea."
thinkum)!It was very interesting reading this right after East, which I felt was good but not enough. The Tricksters is written in this very precise sort of language that I like. At least, it feels precise because it manages to sketch out the characters and the setting very clearly and idiosyncratically.
Harry Hamilton and her family are spending their Christmas at Carnival's Hide, which is rumored to be haunted by the ghost of Teddy Carnival. But something is sparked by the (really quite horrid) story Harry is writing, along with the ghosts of the past, and the Hamilton family is visited by Ovid, Felix and Hadfield Carnival, who may or may not be all together real. It doesn't feel like all that much happens in the book because most of the "action" is emotional, and Mahy really manages to capture family dynamics. I especially... not liked, but appreciated the way she wrote Christobel, who is one of those larger-than-life siblings who are always the center of attention, and yet, vulnerable and bratty and brilliant and hurtful at once. And I appreciated the friendship between Christobel and Emma, which felt like a real friendship that's taken place over many years -- some years are better, and some years, like in the book, all the secret resentments buried for so long come bubbling to the surface. Actually, that's very much what the book is about -- secret resentments and secrets unearthed and how they tear people apart or bind them together, or both at once.
Other small touches that I loved: Harry's story, and how bad it was in just the right way, because I know that's exactly how I used to write (hopefully things have changed a little). The complicated interplay of relationships within Harry's family, how Christobel would get most of the attention and Harry would not, and how the events of the summer don't miraculously change that. The family lingo, as made up by the two youngest siblings. I also really loved how one horrible cliche in Harry's story was taken and used seriously and effectively a few chapters down.
And the final confrontation and how it played out was perfect and painful.
Bits I liked:
Harry on a book that would change the world:
"It woudl be just little changes to start off with, and nothing would move while you watched it. but each time you looked up, the world would have altered more and more. Things would get brighter and brighter, and the moon would come down, inch after inch, until it broke into a thousand little moons. Mirrors would begin to cry silver and leak out rainbows, and the glass people would come out searching for the one they belonged to. You'd look up from a page and see the reflections getting about, peering into people's faces, and when they found the right one they'd hug them, and from then on that person would be seen in their true beauty."
"Her cry could not be heard, but rose in silver bubbles before her eyes, just as if she were a screaming girl in a comic book. 'Eeeeeek!' would be written in the heart of each bubble, but it would stay unheard until the bubbles burst on the surface of the sea."