Luckily the Snook was there to assure me that all the loose ends would eventually be explained. I was also worried that Barker was setting up a lot of enigmas that were never going to be solved. It reminds me a lot of China Mieville’s Perdido Street Station in that respect: The author is just in love with his own vision and spends so much time describing it that you’re sick of the whole world by the time the actual plot rolls around. Barker has a great imagination but I can’t stand to read 500 pages of fantastical landscape and character description. I mean, things are happening that you eventually figure out tie into the plot, but without a sense of dramatic tension to propel the story forward I found myself wanting to set it aside several times. But I persevered…My biggest problem with the story is that it takes so long to get any plot action going.
My sister would’ve immediately sneered, “I don’t read books with people named Pluthero in them,” and kicked him in the bum. “It was the pivotal teaching of Pluthero Quexos, the most celebrated dramatist of the Second Dominion, that in any fiction, no matter how ambitious its scope or profound its themes, there was only ever room for three players.” Anyway, I dived into Imajica trusting that the Snook wouldn’t steer me wrong only to pull up short at the first sentence: The only Barker I’ve ever been able to get through before was The Thief of Always (which I enjoyed, to be honest). I had a dorky boyfriend in high school who read nothing but Barker and Piers Anthony and it pretty much soured those authors for me for life.
I was less than enthusiastic about the prospect (as he was well aware). Most recently he handed me his old paperback copy of Clive Barker’s Imajica. Periodically the Snook and I – in an effort to better ourselves – take turns recommending books to each other that the recommendee is obligated to read.
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