Into the Green
- Book Review,
by Charles de Lint
From Publishers Weekly
De Lint's ( Spiritwalk ) latest is like an old car on a cold morning--slow to start. The first third of the book follows Angharad--tinker, harper and witch--as she travels through the Green Isles seeking to awaken the inherited magic ("Summerblood") in those "Summerborn" who have forgotten it. This bit is frustrating. But fortunately readers soon come to the main event, the story of a puzzle box with the power to destroy the fey Middle Kingdom, "the green" that is the source of the witches' magic. Its current possessor appears to be a wealthy merchant whose hobbies already include collecting the fingerbones of Summerborn (wherein lies their power). Seeking to both defuse the puzzle box and free other witches from the merchant, Angharad travels to the town of Cathal where, with the questionable aid of a reluctant, lame, partially blinded, alcoholic Summerborn war veteran and a vicious, tortured mercenary, she confronts the puzzle box in a smartly executed battle between the characters and their own weaknesses. Although the bulk of the book is engrossing, occasionally de Lint gets sappy, as at the end when "the green" is reduced to a 12-step healing device, or in the recurring expletive "broom and heather" or when he gets to harping. Then again, de Lint is a musician specializing in Celtic folk music, a fact underlined by an appendix of 13 of de Lint's "Tunes from the Kingdoms of the Green Isles" complete with lyrics and music. Copyright 1993 Reed Business Information, Inc.
From Library Journal
Harpist, witch, and tinker--Angharad is all of these and more as she embarks on a quest to save the little magic left in the Kingdom of the Green Isles. A master storyteller who excels in crossover fantasy, de Lint here grounds himself firmly in an imaginary land where hardened ex-soldiers, street urchins, prostitutes, and witch-hunting dogs become heroes when touched by the music of a young woman's sorrow. Fantasy lovers will not be disappointed.Copyright 1993 Reed Business Information, Inc.
From Booklist
Angharad, a young woman gifted--as tinker, harper, and witch--with three strains of magic, is sent, against her own misgivings, on a quest to find, open, and banish a puzzle box that threatens to destroy the people of the mythical Middle Earth. As she wanders the Green Isles in search of others with a touch of witch blood to be allies in her task, Angharad fans hatred in those fearful of witchcraft and loyalty in unexpected quarters. De Lint has again woven a tale rich in Celtic myth and magic and featuring memorable characters and tight plotting. Also a musician, de Lint intends to append some "Tunes from the Kingdoms of the Green Isles" for "small harp and other melody instruments" to the published book. Candace Smith
From Kirkus Reviews
The Green is how de Lint (Dreams Underfoot, The Little Country, Spiritwalk, etc.) recasts Faerie, accessible to those with the (now many times diluted) Summerblood that confers magical abilities. Young Angharad is thrice magical: a witch through her Summerblood, born and raised a tinker, and a harper after an encounter with a wizard dwelling within a tree. The sands of a nearby desert momentarily retreat to expose a puzzle-box, an ancient artifact of vast and evil power; the Lords of the Green charge Angharad with locating and destroying the puzzle-box, lest it annihilate the Green itself. After various adventures--and aided by an assassin who seeks vengeance upon the aristocracy--Angharad prepares to make the ultimate sacrifice; but matters do not go entirely according to plan.... Thin as tissue paper, insubstantial as air. -- Copyright ©1993, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.
Review
"De Lint can feel the beauty of the ancient lore he is evoking. He can well imagine what it would be like to conjure the Other World among ancient standing stones. His characters have a certain fallibility that makes them multidimensional and human, and his settings are gritty. This is no Disneylike Never-Never Land . . . . Life and death in de Lint's world are more than a matter of a few words or a magic crystal. The Sidhe are beguiling, terrifying folk and their Otherwold a realm from which no mortal returns unchanged. De Lint knows that, regardless of what names he uses."-The Philadelphia Inquirer
Review
"De Lint can feel the beauty of the ancient lore he is evoking. He can well imagine what it would be like to conjure the Other World among ancient standing stones. His characters have a certain fallibility that makes them multidimensional and human, and his settings are gritty. This is no Disneylike Never-Never Land . . . . Life and death in de Lint's world are more than a matter of a few words or a magic crystal. The Sidhe are beguiling, terrifying folk and their Otherwold a realm from which no mortal returns unchanged. De Lint knows that, regardless of what names he uses."-The Philadelphia Inquirer
Book Description
The harp was a gift from Jacky Lanter's fey kin, as was the music Angharad pulled from its strings. She used it in her journeys through the kingdoms of Green Isles, to wake the magic of the Summerblood where it lay sleeping in folk who had never known they had it.
Harping, she knew, was on third of a bard's spells. Harping, and poetry, and the road that led . . .
Into the Green
Charles de Lint takes us once again into lands infused and transformed by magic. Magic that grows in the roots of old oaks and dances by moonlight among standing stones. Magic that sleeps in an old soldier's eyes and glows in the gaze of a phantom stag. Magic that pumps through the heart and the veins of those born to the Summerblood-to be stolen at knife point, burned, destroyed, in danger of fading back into the green and disappearing forever from the world.
About the Author
Born in Holland in 1951, Charles de Lint grew up in Canada, with a few years off in Turkey, Lebanon, and Switzerland.
Although his first novel was 1984's The Riddle of the Wren, it was with Moonheart, published later that same year, that de Lint made his mark, and established him at the forefront of "urban fantasy," modern fantasy storytelling set on contemporary city streets. Moonheart was set in and around "Newford," an imaginary modern North American city, and many of de Lint's subsequent novels have been set in Newford as well, with a growing cast of characters who weave their way in and out of the stories. The Newford novels include Spirit Walk, Memory and Dream, Trader, Someplace To Be Flying, Forests of the Heart, The Onion Girl, and Spirits in the Wires. In addition, de Lint has published several collections of Newford short stories, including Moonlight and Vines, for which he won the World Fantasy Award. Among de Lint's many other novels are Mulengro, Jack the Giant-Killer, and The Little Country.
Married since 1980 to his fellow musician MaryAnn Harris, Charles de Lint lives in Ottawa, Ontario, Canada.
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