Platypus of Truth

It's a dark and stormy day here and that feels like a good background for discussing dark fantasy. So here we are at installment 6 of my read-through of Garth Nix's Sabriel . Earlier posts can be found by visiting the blog and scrolling down. Prior posts on Clariel  can be found by following the Nix label on the blog and scrolling down. I will give you the ritual warning that I will be discussing details of the novel. If you want to avoid knowledge of a 23 year old book (please stop trying to set it up with that awkward cousin of yours, he's not misunderstood, just creepy) then do not keep reading. Ok, that said, today's drawing is on a bit of boarding pass I found (yep, I'm down to portions of boarding pass now) and features Touchstone imprisoned as the figurehead of a ship (the king is the figurehead of the ship of state? Nice one, Garth). We'll begin our analysis of the book at Chapter 13 where... Glory, Hallelujah, it's raining men! You know it! ...

Today's post is the fifth in a series examining Gath Nix's fantasy classic, Sabriel . If you are spoiler sensitive about a 23 year old novel (yeah, I know, you're going through that mental rolodex looking for religious friends it might have something in common with...) then don't keep reading. I warned you! Ok, so today's drawing feature Mogget assuming his Final Form. It reminds me a bit of Dead Hand in The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time . This is the last boarding pass I have to beautify with my marker collection, though the pictures should continue with each post. Chapter 11 opens with another seemingly unreliable aid for Sabriel: The Paperwing. Evidently, Abhorsens fly about in magical paper airplanes! The paperwing is another of Nix's wonderfully novel fantasy elements. It is believable in execution and unlike anything in Tolkien, Lewis, Le Guin, Dunsany, MacDonald, or Howard. It is delightful, ambiguously trustworthy, and feels real . Interest...

Today's post contains part 4 of my read-through of Garth Nix's Sabriel , the first book in his Abhorsen Series. Due to the popularity of this book, I need to speed read from here forward in order to get it back to the library on time. That will make future posts more condensed, but perhaps that will make them more interesting. Either way, here we go! Do not continue reading if you have qualms about spoilers on a 23 year old book (that wants you to please stop asking it to hold babies at church; they're children, not an infectious disease). Chapter 8 begins with what should be a pleasant scene: in a nice soft bed with a fluffy white cat sitting at the foot. The first discomfiting fact is that Sabriel is naked (violation/vulnerability) and that the cat is really an imprisoned being of unimaginable power and malignancy. Things get creepier when the cat speaks and asks Sabriel to remove its collar. Mogget, for that is who the cat is, is unscrupulous as well as cle...

This is the third post covering my reading of Garth Nix's 1995 Dark YA Fantasy Sabriel . Prior posts in the series can be found here and here . Posts from 2014 on Nix's prequel, Clariel , can be found by using the Nix tag at the bottom of this post or on the side bar. As with the prior two posts, this one features my depiction of Sabriel encountering the Shining Spirit along the river of death. It is done with pitt pens and felt markers on the back of an airline boarding pass. In the meantime, let's get on to the review. As always, don't keep reading if you don't want spoilers on a 23 year old novel (That likes beer, hard liquor, and binge-watching Parks and Rec?). From my notes: Chapter 6 opens with a sudden shift in perspective, an odd choice that still plagues Nix in Clariel . We find ourselves in the head of one of the lesser dead, Thralk. The jump in perspective is meant to enhance the tension as we watch Thralk creep up on Sabriel's broken war...

Today, we continue my blog-through Garth Nix's 1995 dark fantasy sensation: Sabriel . The first post in this series can be found here . As an added bonus, I'm attempting to doodle my way through Nix's world and hope to provide a different drawing with each post. Today's features Sabriel setting out from the wall into the borderlands between the technological world of Ancelstierre and the magical world of The Old Kingdom. As this is a liminal place, her gear is appropriately liminal with modern and medieval touches. I think Sabriel as pictured here owes more than a little to Trish from the Eldritch Horror  games, though the sword is definitely John Howe and the bells are church handbells (nine tailors make a man). Anyhow, if you wish to remain spoiler free on a 23 year old book (is it in grad school or a temp at Dunder Mifflin?), don't read on. From my journal notes: Chapter 2 opens with a set-piece that reinforces the leitmotif of boundary-crossing: The W...

This poor post has been a long time in coming (hopefully Liz and Joi will forgive me). My first live blog through one of Nix's Old Kingdom books was Clariel   in 2014. LIFE has intervened since then. Anyhow, I finally have space to pick the poor project up again starting at the start of The Abhorsen Trilogy: Sabriel . In each post, I will share my thought from the previous spate of reading. I will also endeavour to accompany each post with a drawing giving a little glimpse into my experience of Nix's world. The first two drawing are done with bic pen on boarding passes as I began reading Sabriel  on a trip to Tulsa. As a final word: if you haven't read Sabriel  and want to remain spoiler free, don't read on. Ok, you're still reading, so from here on out your blood be on your own head. From my journal: I've read Clariel  at Liz's suggestion, so I know a little of what goes on in Nix's world. Still, we don;t ever get to see a trained Abhorsen in ...

H.P. Lovecraft excelled at creating visions of evil that were believable in a materialistic age. His witches, cultists, and eldar gods require no supernatural explanations, and yet resonate every bit as much as anything found in Cotton Mather or Algernon Blackwood. It is no wonder then, that H.R. Giger and screenwriters Dan O'Bannon and Ronald Shusett turned to H.P.L., particularly his At the Mountains of Madness , in creating the film Alien . Ridley Scott's direction of Alien , Prometheus , and Alien Covenant  consciously bathes in the arctic light of Lovecraft's novella. So after another viewing of Prometheus  and Alien Covenant  this summer, here are my own interpretations of the alien: part corpse, part machine, part dragon, part demon. It is a secular antichrist, man's failed attempt to become God.

We're already past July 4th, and I haven't addressed the critical issue of Summer Reading. In part, that's because I'm applying to grad schools and six to eight hours of each week day is devoted to language study and catch-up reading. So, right now, most of my Summer Reading is Wheelock's and Hanson and Quinn. Other things have managed to slip in, however. If you've been following this blog, you may have noticed the Neil Gaiman binge. It started with Troll Bridge , moved on to The Neverwhere , gained steam with The Sandman  vols 1-6, The Dream Hunters  and Overture , and finished up with Fragile Things  and The Ocean at the End of the Lane . That's a lot of Gaiman! To break up the flow of goth drama and tragic sexuality, we've also been listening to Stephen Fry read the Sherlock Holmes novels and doing our own read-through of Frank Herbert's Dune . We're looking forward to watching the Sci-Fi channels mini-series after we're done with tha...