Tanglewreck

So, the other week, I was in a reasonably local independent bookshop that I'd go to more often if it was open at the times I usually go past on the way to a pub, on a day when I was feeling a bit flush with funds, and I saw Jeanette Winterson's Tanglewreck for only $18. Strangely, nowhere on the cover or the front papers did it say "acclaimed feminist/lesbian author of Oranges are not the Only Fruit, The Power book, The Kiss, that book about the library with lots of Latin or any of those other books I've read without thinking I really understood them at all but enjoyed on at least one level because of the way I could let the language flow from my eye to my brain and just adore the magic of the imagery or rhythm and not really care that I can't tell what's going on in a strictly literal sense."

Nowhere did it say that. Importantly, it also didn't say "book for young readers" because I probably wouldn't have picked it up.

The friendly bookseller commented on how reasonably priced the book was and I said that was why I'd bought two books but she didn't ask me if I liked Ms Winterson. I confess I had moments of doubt, thinking maybe there were TWO authors with the same name published by Bloomsbury or maybe there was a slight difference in the spelling.

In any case, on Tuesday night, when I was stuck for something to read and thinking I'd like a slow book for a change, that would take a long time to read and that I could savour, I picked it up. After the first paragraph I realised that this in fact was by the same Ms Winterson as wrote all those other books.

But I read on and discovered that for once, I wasn't buried in poetic obscurity and I could FIND THE PLOT!! Unfortunately, that meant I read it really quickly and finished it the next day.

Tanglewreck is a beautifully written fairy tale-science fiction quest for young readers that reminded me of a combination of Neil Gaiman and Phillip Pullman's His Dark Materials because it tells a compelling adventure story in a sensitive but unsentimental way. The central figure is Silver, an eleven-year-old girl who, at the beginning of the story, lives in an Elizabethan manse under the care of a crotchety aunt. England is plagued by time tornados, one of which stole her parents and sister away. What can Silver do to fix this?

Winterson, like Peter Ackroyd, seems to be in love with the history of London. She draws on the historical city for some of the more magical characters. Delightfully, a woolly mammoth lives in the world beneath the city.

Maybe I should go and read some reviews now and work out what I was meant to think of it...

At the moment I'm ploughing through The Ballad of Desmond Kale because the ABC is having a book club program on "this year's Miles Franklin Winner" next week. So far, it's an awful lot like The Nutmeg of Consoltation except without the ship. I'm sure I'll throw stuff at the telly if I manage to watch the show.