Whilst in a fugue recently, trying to find my reading mojo and searching the library catalogue for something that sounded even remotely original, I came across Slade House by David Mitchell. I'd read Mitchell's Cloud Atlas and Ghostwritten and hadn't been disappointed so this looked like the one for me. On reading the blurb it turned out to be the sequel to The Bone Clocks, and I had remembered a friend reading this and saying it was really weird so, not wanting to read the books out of order, I decided to give it a go.
OMG I loved this so much! Like Cloud Atlas and Ghostwritten the story is actually made up from intertwining short stories. Mitchell is so good at this style of story telling. Characters like Immaculee Constantin harked back to my favourite Clive Barker reads of Weaveworld and Imajica.
What I really liked about this novel though was the amount of time I spent with it, following Holly Sykes' journey from a feisty teenager suffering bizarre hallucinations to a selfless grandmother in a dystopian future caring for her orphaned grandchildren.
When Holly finally met Marinus, I really enjoyed going back to the start with her and with Marinus' explanations finding out what she, and her missing brother, had been a witness to.
Mitchell is very much a 'show, don't tell" kind of writer and never once treats his readers like they don't understand what's going on.
Characters from Mitchell's previous novels make an appearance here also, it's all so beautifully interwoven I am in awe of his writing.
Characters from Mitchell's previous novels make an appearance here also, it's all so beautifully interwoven I am in awe of his writing.
Next up is Slade House and I so hope I'm not going to be disappointed, it has much to live up to.
Maxine
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