A Mid-Winter Tradition

For as long as I can remember (okay - certainly for the last 10 years, and possibly for more than that) I have re-read Susan Cooper's magnificent 'Dark is Rising' sequence over the Christmas period.  I start the first book, 'Over Sea, Under Stone', a few days earlier so that I can begin my favourite book: the eponymous 'Dark is Rising', on Mid-Winter's Eve.  This latter is THE Christmas book as far as I am concerned, the juxtaposition of the warm, traditional family Christmas in the main character's large and chaotic family and his growth into realisation that he is the last of the Old Ones: beings from outside Time whose whole purpose is to protect mankind from the Dark just emphasises the traditions and customs of an English Christmas-tide.

One of my favourite passages is the description of Christmas Eve:

"Christmas Eve.  It was the day when the delight of Christmas really took fire in the Stanton family.  Hints and glimmerings and promises of special things, which had flashed in and out of life for weeks before, now blossomed into a constant glad expectancy."

The books evoke in me the magic of myth, in the same way that Alan Garner's The Weirdstone of Brisingamen and The Moon of Gomrath and the amazing Hounds of the Morrigan by the late Pat O'Shea do.  There is, in each case, a familiarity blurred by each author's use of the elements of British myth, so that elements such as The Wild Hunt, The Morrigan (incidentally my nickname for my elder daughter!) and Cooper's 'The Lady' make perfect sense in each book.

I am halfway through Silver on the Tree, the final book of the Dark is Rising sequence, and my discovery that Alan Garner published the final part of the Brisingamen trilogy last year has determined what I will be reading next.  Boneland is apparently the mature Garner's conclusion to the series and I am looking forward to receiving it.

Monkeys with Typewriters - Scarlett Thomas

Finished Scarlett Thomas’ (@scarthomas on twitter) book Monkeys with Typewriters last night.  Too many ideas to get my head around at the moment – think I’m going to have to go back over most of it again. Particularly like the idea of the novel matrix to get ideas flowing.  Already have some ideas about using one of the (many) first pages I have written as the start point of a project to dive into.

To describe the book in a few words - Challenging and thought-provoking.  I find that (even though I still speed-read - a practice Ms Thomas admits to have used in her youth, but of which she now disapproves) I am analysing books much more than I did, wondering why certain things are left in - proving the point that Monkeys with Typewriters is for readers as well as aspiring writers.

If I can only apply the same critique to my own attempts to write I can only get better. (I hope!)