6/9/2023 0 Comments Thursbitch by Alan Garner![]() ![]() ![]() Not, perhaps, "more adult": even the first books of fantasy, with their grimness, their density of language, their weight of mythological and historical allusion, are grown-up in a way JK Rowling, CS Lewis or even Philip Pullman have never been. Ever since, his writing has become deeper, darker, more compacted and allusive. The 18th century and the present, the ancient and the timeless, intermingle and echo.Īlan Garner is still best known for his earliest work, a series of books "for children" - although he says he has never considered himself a children's writer - that begins with The Weirdstone of Brisingamen. ![]() Carved stones have been brought from far away. There is a single ruined farmhouse, a holy well and a cave. ![]() The place is Thursbitch: the valley of the demon: a haunted and dangerous place a mythic landscape a place of sacrifice. But this is nothing so banal as a ghost story. He is wrestling with his God, and his disbelief. She is a geologist, dying of some degenerative illness. Now, 250 years later, a couple walk the same Pennine valley where Turner died. Beside his body is a woman's single footprint in the snow. John Turner, a travelling merchant who is also a visionary, perhaps a magician, is found frozen to death near his home. The Independent London (UK) 17 October 2003 Thursbitch By Alan Garner Valley of the shadow of death ![]()
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