THE CORN KING AND THE SPRING QUEEN [Hardcover]

Naomi Mitchison (Author)

Product Details

• Hardcover
• Publisher: Jonathan Cape (1960)
• ASIN: B001E36XAS
• Average Customer Review: 5.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

27 of 28 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A magical book which is as brutal as it is dreamy, May 27, 1999

By A Customer

This review is from: Corn King and the Spring Queen (The Hera Series) (Paperback)

Naomi Mitchisonšs masterful recreation of ancient Scythia must surely stand as one of the most enduring historical novels of the century. In clear, pristine prose (which reminds me of Ursula LeGuin), Mitchison describes the mystical, sometimes horrible, world of her protagonist Erif Der (Red fire backwards). I first stumbled across this long novel in 1988 while at university. Rereading it last year was a sheer pleasure. The old-fashioned, very British, tone of the writing is not in the slightest bit off-putting. Here is a remarkable writer at the height of her powers. Like Ursula LeGuin, again, Mitchison has the uncanny ability to transport her readers to alien cutures and to make these foreign worlds, and the people who live there, as relevant as they are mesmerising. If you havenšt experienced Naomi Mitchison before, then I canšt think of a better place to start than with The Corn King and the Spring Queen.