Galilee [Mass Market Paperback]

Clive Barker (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: February 3, 1999

As rich as the Rockefellers, as powerful and glamorous as the Kennedys, the Geary dynasty has held subtle sway over American life since the end of the Civil War. But they are a family with secrets. Dark, terrible secrets about the roots of their influence, which the Gearys have successfully concealed over the generations.

Little do the Gearys understand that their world is about to shatter when an innocent young woman enters their glittering fold. Rachel Pallenberg never dreamed she'd ever meet--much less marry--the most eligible bachelor in America, Mitchell Geary. Swept off her feet by this all-American prince, Rachel falls madly in love, lost in a romantic dream that ends with their wedding day. Though she knows she is marrying into an extraordinary family, Rachel is not prepared for the nightmare she faces when she begins to uncover the secret life of the Geary clan.

For the Gearys are a family at war. And their adversaries are the members of another dynasty--the Barbarossa family, whose origins lie not in history but in myth, a family whose influence is felt not in Washington or on Wall Street but in the intense, sensual exchanges of flesh and soul.

When the prodigal prince of the Barbarossa clan, Galilee, who sails the world, seldom setting foot on land, meets Rachel, they fall in love--an all--encompassing passion that unleashed the long-simmering enmity between the families. Old insanities arise, old adulteries are uncovered, and what seemed to be a great American success story begins to erode, exposing its unholy roots...

"Galilee" is an epic from a master storyteller at the peak of his creative career, mingling powerful realism with the eroticism, magic, andgrand metaphysical visions for which Barker is known worldwide. He stunningly encompasses the themes of his greatest works in this masterpiece: a tale of intertwined bloodlines that reflect our own divided selves. The battle between the Gearys and the Barbarossas is a battle between the human and the divine, between the natural and the supernatural. And as such, it reflects the struggle played out in every one of us, as we struggle to comprehend the mystical possibilities in our secret souls.

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

Over many years and many books, Clive Barker has earned a reputation as the thinking person's horror writer. His novels have mixed fantasy, psychology, and sheer creepiness in almost equal quantities, and while the gore quotient remains relatively low, the tension always runs high. In Galilee, however, Barker soft-pedals the ghoulish in favor of the gothic. His novel (or as the author would have it, "romance") tells the tale of two warring families caught up in a disastrous web of corruption, illicit sexuality, and star-crossed love, with a soupçon of the supernatural thrown in as well. On one side are the wealthy Gearys--a fictional stand-in for the Kennedys--and on the other are the Barbarossas, a mysterious black clan that has been around since the time (quite literally) of Adam. Galilee chronicles the twisted course of this centuries-old family feud, which centers around the magical Barbarossa matriarch Cesaria and her son Galilee. Indeed, it's the latter figure--one part Heathcliff to one part Christ--whose relationship with the Geary women sets a match to the entire powder keg of hostility and resentment. Mixing standard clichés of romance with his own peculiarly deep-fried version of the Southern gothic, Baker has come up with an intelligent and shamelessly amusing potboiler. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

From Publishers Weekly

A family saga isn't what we'd expect from Barker (Sacrament), the most ambitious dark fantasist of our time, but that's what he delivers in his most elegant, and most conventional, novel yet. A Barker family saga is perforce unlike othersAand so not only are two entwined families chronicled here but one, the Barbarossas, descends from voracious divinities, "two souls as old as heaven"; the other, the Gearys, are modeled roughly on the Kennedys. The story, an intricate mosaic of first-person and third, is narrated by the reclusive Maddox Barbarossa as a history he writes in the family manse hidden in the Virginia woods and designed long ago by Thomas Jefferson, one of his divine stepmother's countless lovers. Its canvas stretches from New York to Hawaii to the Middle East, from the "ancient day" when Maddox's half-brother, Galilee, was baptized through the American Civil WarAduring which Galilee joins forces with the impoverished Southern founder of the Geary dynasty, whose cruelty and greed ensures the Gearys' immense wealth and power. Most of the story rests in the present, however, concentrating on the newest Geary, n?e Rachel Pallenberg, who marries a callow Geary scion only to witness the outbreak of "war" between the Gearys and Barbarossas and to become the latest Geary woman to fall under the spell of the near-immortal, sexually mesmerizing Galilee. The novel's scale is smaller than that of previous Barker effortsAmissing are the titanic battles of form vs. chaos, good vs. evil, the riot of wonders and terrors. But it's less cluttered, too, despite abundant inspiration and invention and satisfying smatterings of Barker-brand sex, scatology and violence. Above all, there is a new richness of character, of its warpings and transfigurations by hatred and love, blood legacy and death. $150,000 ad/promo; simultaneous HarperAudio; author tour; U.K., translation, dramatic rights: Clive Barker.
Copyright 1998 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

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Product Details

• Mass Market Paperback: 656 pages
• Publisher: HarperTorch (February 3, 1999)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0061092002
• ISBN-13: 978-0061092008
• Product Dimensions: 6.7 x 4.3 x 1.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 9.6 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 3.3 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (128 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #738,810 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Clive Barker was born in Liverpool in 1952. He is the worldwide bestselling author of the Books of Blood, and numerous novels including Imajica, The Great and Secret Show, Sacrament and Galilee. In addition to his work as a novelist and short story writer he also illustrates, writes, directs and produces for the stage and screen. His films include Hellraiser, Hellbound, Nightbreed and Candyman. Clive lives in Beverly Hills, California.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

15 of 17 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars It's like a dream, January 20, 2000

By 

Travis Huffman (Erlanger, Kentucky) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Galilee (Hardcover)

I am a huge fan of Clive Barkers work and have read a large part of his collection. After reading Galilee, it is easily one fo my favorites. Once you begin to read, you immediately become immersed in the lives of the novel's narrator and those characters that he chronicals. The novel involves two families; The Gearys and the Barbarossas. They have been in contempt of each other for over one hundred and fifty years. The Barbarossas are an ancient clan who's mother and father originated with the creation of Earth and have the ability to seemingly live forever. The Geary's are a dynasty of American royalty that came into power following the civil war. Their lives are then intertwined by one person; Galilee Barbarossa. The book is lavish in its detail of sex and violence. Once you pick it up, it will be hard to put down. It seems that in no portion of this novel that it drags on. This is a must read for fans of history, intrigue, romance, and the inside lives of the rich and powerful.

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Barbara lives on, July 29, 2000

By 

Michelle Vigar (Sliema, Malta (Southern Europe)) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Galilee (Hardcover)

I read Imajica (both volumes) last year, and I must say I was gobsmacked by the sheer brilliance of Barker's narrative and imagination. So I started reading Barker's Galilee with relish, expecting an intriguing and fascinating tale of mysterious gods and goddesses, etc. But, woh! After some 200 hundred pages, it felt like I was fourteen again, reading my daily Mills & Boon paperback! I mean, the Rachel character was just soooo predictable and how on earth did Galilee decide she must be the one and only after sooo many (women...and men...and children...)? Nope, your standard Barbara Cartland yarn here: from rags to riches lass finds out her handsome John John Kennedy look-alike husband has somehow turned into a monster, but fortunately is bedded by the super-endowed Galilee who whisks her off (eventually...) to his "kingdom". Boring....and Barker must definitely have a sequel in mind.....

8 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Captivating, September 10, 2001

By 

Richard Williams (Worcester, MA USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Galilee (Mass Market Paperback)

I have always seen Clive Barker novels sitting alongside novels by Anne Rice and Stephen King at airport bookshops and, as such, have been relatively disinclined to spend my cash and time reading them.

However, during a stop at London's Gatwick airport I was thumbing through the usual selection of Turow, Grisham, and Crichton when I noticed this book sitting out of place next to the aforementioned.

Picking it up, I was first impressed by the size of the book. "Alas", I thought, "This must be some tale". Turning the book over, I read the covernotes and was instantly drawn to the concept of these two warring families. A hinting towards the supernatural intrigued me and I realized that, upon reading this epic, I may not find myself swallowed into some goreish nightmare.

I put the book down and bought a Grisham novel.

A few weeks later, I was back at Gatwick airport and with the repulsive thought of another 6 hours air time ahead of me, I sauntered back into the bookstore. My mental association sprung into action and I picked up Galilee and walked straight for the counter.

Before the aircraft doors had been closed, I had already started reading the tale of the Gearys and the Barbarossas and soon found myself completely immersed in the world that was being weaved around me.

It is plain to see the value of writing a story from a fictional storytellers persepective. With a novel of this size and complexity, it is refreshing for the reader to be taken back into the home of the fictional writer and listen to his ramblings which, as well as being highly entertaining, contain some very significant plot markers.

However, the bulk of the story revolves around the potential battle between the Gearys and the Barbarossas. These two families of who I will say little are linked. This link is obvious from the start but it's nature is not revealed until much much later in the story.

The story is told with so much depth and conviction that I was left wondering why I had never seen the Gearys in the newspapers! Lightly peppered with grotesque eroticism and supernatural violence, this is a story that held me from the first page to the last.

*** Spoilers Ahead ****

As the story ends, I was only slightly disappointed that the violent viscious clash between these two families never emereged and that the promised downfall of the Barbarossa's home L'Enfant never materialized.

My suspicions of a potential sequel have been confirmed on reading Mr. Barkers notes on this novel.