A wonderland of whimsy

Bestselling author Erin Morgenstern’s latest is an allegorical fairy tale that expertly weaves in illusory dreamscapes.

Let me make it clear at the outset, a 494-page book is an abomination. This ought to be the standard length for two-and-half books. If a writer can’t say everything he has to say within an outermost limit of 300-ish pages, an editor must step in. In the case of ‘The Starless Sea’, sympathies go out to the editor though.

In essence, this unusual book mimics that hoary tradition of travels, which billow to epic proportions. And the prose is so pretty, whimsical and at times flawless that you don’t mind the trees felled for these pages.

“Stories written in books and sealed in jars and painted on walls. Odes inscribed onto skin and pressed into rose petals. Tales laid in tiles upon the floors, bits of plot worn away by passing feet. Legends carved in crystal and hung from chandeliers.”

‘The Starless Sea’ is actually a land, an alternate kingdom if you please. A maze of subterranean passages and rooms, this is where a silent group of writers, keepers and lovers of stories dwell. It is almost like a secret cult, except the objects of worship are books that encompass fables, fantasy or good old fiction. And whatever else it may be, the acreage is ever expansive, limitless.

Central to this story is Zachary Ezra Rawlins — a student of Emerging Media Studies at a fictional university in Vermont and also a relentless reader — who chances upon a book named ‘Sweet Sorrow’.

“He flips to the back and there are no acknowledgements or author’s notes, just a barcode sticker attached to the inside of the back cover. He returns to the beginning and finds no copyright, no dates and no information about printing numbers.” To his shock and utter amazement, a part of the book is about him, filling in more memories than he ever remembers. Furthermore, he recognises the faded symbols on the book’s back cover; for he had seen them painted on a door in his childhood.

Pictorial diction

Author Erin Morgenstern writes as all fantasy fiction must be written — in a unique pictorial diction, in dreamscapes, shaped in rough cuts, and often, one makes sense of the scene only much later.

Numerous strands of the storyline alternate leaving the reader marooned on varying literal cliff-hangers. This book is an amalgamation of a series of beautiful vignettes, often unrelated, that cohere into this part allegory, part wondrous fairy tale. Odd people like those we know flit through the pages and its adventures. Others belong wholly to the world of make-believe: princes and princesses, bees, keepers, ginger cats, innkeepers, guards, owls, pirates, witches, Gertrude Stein, Harry Potter, even Calvin and Hobbes. Whimsical characters abound. Like Allegra, the protector of libraries who knocks Zachary out and ties him to a chair, but also gives him a cup of tea. There is an inner circle of course. Kat is an undergrad in Zachary’s department running a video game-themed cookery blog who feeds him her experiments. The older, handsome yet disturbing Dorian appears on a night of masked escapades at the Algonquin Club.

The arrestingly beautiful Mirabel paints doors and crosses his path multiple times before finally meeting him. There is Simon who has been bequeathed a key by his long-dead mother, a key that leads him to a cottage where he meets Eleanor.

Good versus evil

As the saga unfolds, it is clear a sinister mob is after the copy of ‘Sweet Sorrow’ in his possession. And those who fight the good fight must ally to keep dark forces at bay. Much of it is so enchanted and extraordinary that Zachary scarcely knows how to combat any of it.

The vicissitudes and discoveries form a video-game like quest. The drawback is the tone of the book. The omniscient narrator tends to address rather intellectually challenged pre-pubescents to whom everything must be spelt out and a monotone adopted.

Every other chapter begins with “Zachary Ezra Rawlins + predicate…” and this begins to jar. The experience is that of reading a book meant for children — one that hasn’t quite made that Disney leap of being meaningful to generations older.

Yet the positives far outweigh all. It’s absolutely rare to find a book this unique in concept and style. The glittering prose itself is its greatest reward. Symbols, metaphors and literary allusions flit in and out of the loosest plotline with great intellectual dexterity. Perhaps in this talent lies the ultimate fantasy!