Customer Reviews

The Road to Lisdoonvarna

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As a longtime fan of de Lint's books I was a little wary of his change in focus from mythic tales to a "hard boiled" detective story (in Charles' own words "a mystery novel with a PI as a lead character"). But I quickly changed my mind as I read this in less than a day and found myself not willing to put it down (as I really wanted to know what happened to the characters). And, since I took time to read the introduction, I knew that Charles de Lint himself found that he too became caught up in the story and wanted to find out "what happens!" (he originally wrote this story in 1984/85 and re-wrote it for this edition). He has again proven himself to be a master story teller of many genre and he has created a cast of characters that would fit in almost any of his current urban mythic stories (and I hope he makes sure to fit them in sometime in the future). He makes reference to some very well known mystery authors (Mickey Spillane, Andrew Vachss, and Dennis Lehane) as being some of HIS favorite authors and you can clearly see the similarities in the story. Yet, it remains a true Charles de Lint book in the way he makes the characters come alive. My only real complaints about this book would have to be its' title (which is a bit on the long side albeit totally appropriate to the story) and the fact that I think the book is too darn short (and I do acknowledge the fact that it is as long as was needed to get the story told). I was just hoping to enjoy it for a few more days. Luckily, I can just go to my overstuffed bookshelves and pull out one of his older books and enjoy more of his fine writing.