A retired doctor and bookaholic since childhood, for me reading has always been more than just an escape into other lives. Rather, as with all art forms, I find it helps me better understand our topsy-turvy world. The Alice books were my introduction to the use of fantasy in storytelling that embraces a deeper meaning. Reading such imaginative fiction can be like stepping back from reality only to return with a better insight into what it means to be human in the real world. For me, as a doctor, this has always been so important. Each of the books I have recommended achieves this in the author’s own, unique way.
Following the adventures of Maskull (My skull?) on Planet Tormance, the reader is pitched into an allegorical journey in search of truth where nothing is quite what it seems. Disillusionment is a matter of course. Self-enlightenment and self-destruction merge, and the Devil even masquerades as God. Surely one of the greatest philosophical novels of the last century, it made me ponder about our place in the universe. The stark ending, focusing on the importance of ‘self’ in defining reality, is curiously disturbing.
A stunning achievement in speculative fiction, A Voyage to Arcturus has inspired, enchanted, and unsettled readers for decades. It is simultaneously an epic quest across one of the most unusual and brilliantly depicted alien worlds ever conceived, a profoundly moving journey of discovery into the metaphysical heart of the universe, and a shockingly intimate excursion into what makes us human and unique. After a strange interstellar journey, Maskull, a man from Earth, awakens alone in a desert on the planet Tormance, seared by the suns of the binary star Arcturus. As he journeys northward, guided by a drumbeat, he encounters…
Pi, an Indian zookeeper’s son, is marooned in a lifeboat with an orang-utan, a crippled zebra, a hyena, and a tiger. The tiger eats the hyena who polished off the zebra and orang-utan, and the relationship between Pi and the tiger, representing two sides of the protagonist, becomes a tale of endurance and survival shared by man and beast, turning mystical when they disembark on a floating carnivorous island. The prosaic beginning and ending, after the tiger vanishes into the Mexican jungle, link the reader with the real world, and enhance what is a deeply spiritual story.
After the sinking of a cargo ship, a solitary lifeboat remains bobbing on the wild blue Pacific. The only survivors from the wreck are a sixteen-year-old boy named Pi, a hyena, a wounded zebra, an orangutan—and a 450-pound Royal Bengal tiger.
Soon the tiger has dispatched all but Pi Patel, whose fear, knowledge, and cunning allow him to coexist with the tiger, Richard Parker, for 227 days while lost at sea. When they finally reach the coast of Mexico, Richard Parker flees to the jungle, never to be seen again. The Japanese authorities who interrogate Pi refuse to believe his…
The Victorian mansion, Evenmere, is the mechanism that runs the universe.
The lamps must be lit, or the stars die. The clocks must be wound, or Time ceases. The Balance between Order and Chaos must be preserved, or Existence crumbles.
Appointed the Steward of Evenmere, Carter Anderson must learn the…
In a tale involving entrepreneurial ruffians who exploit native Amazonian tribes, and corrupt officials, Alex and Nadia discover the ‘People of the Mist’ and the mystical sloth-like beasts of the title who are trying to protect their forest. The first, and for me the best book of this supremely gifted writer’s explorative trilogy, it deals, compellingly, with the self-seeking greed behind White Man’s destruction of the lungs of our planet, the Amazon. If we lose the Amazon Rainforest, we lose our planet. As simple as that. Mr. Bolsonaro, please read this book!
An ecological romance with a pulsing heart, equal parts Rider Haggard and Chico Buarque - one of the world's greatest and most beloved storytellers broadens her style and reach with a Amazonian adventure story that will appeal to all ages.
Fifteen-year-old Alexander Cold has the chance to take the trip of a lifetime.
With his mother in hospital, too ill to look after him, Alex is sent out to his grandmother Kate - a fearless reporter with blue eyes 'as sharp as daggers' points'. Kate is about to embark on an expedition to the dangerous, remote world of the Amazon…
The Silver Locusts (my preferred title) is a collection of linked short stories about Earthman’s destruction of a fragilely beautiful and ancient Martian civilisation. With profoundly poetic writing, there are real gems such as Night Meeting in which an Earthman and Martian meet up on a highway, neither seeing, nor believing in, the other’s world. The book is not pure fantasy, for it also reflects White Man’s destruction of the Native American civilisation, one that was in harmony with the natural world and which inspired my Eyes of Fire.
The Guardian of the Palace is the first novel in a modern fantasy series set in a New York City where magic is real—but hidden, suppressed, and dangerous when exposed.
When an ancient magic begins to leak into the world, a small group of unlikely allies is forced to act…
The stories of ageing, academic ex-spy, Lytton, merge with those of his young neighbour, Rosie, who, when searching for his cat in a basement enters another dimension where she embarks on a life-changing journey with young Jay, whilst in a dystopian future, scientist Angela Meerson, because of her latest invention, goes on the run from the corruptly controlling authorities. The reader just has to hang on there as past, present and future collide in a symphony of imaginative writing that challenges our concept of reality. And it all comes together in a brilliant conclusion.
Three interlocking worlds. Four people looking for answers.
April, 1960: In the cellar of a professor's house in Oxford, fifteen-year-old Rosie goes in search of a missing cat -- and instead finds herself in a different world.
Anterwold is a sun-drenched land of storytellers and prophecies. But is this world real -- and what happens if Rosie decides to stay?
Meanwhile, a rebellious scientist is trying to prove that time does not even exist -- with potentially devastating consequences.
As the three worlds come together, one question arises: who controls the future -- or the past...?
Adam cannot believe his luck when gorgeous Mexican classmate María dumps her boyfriend for him, nor understand why her grandfather said she must give him an ancient Mexican bracelet. Because of who the girl really is, the future of the world is in danger when the bracelet takes them on a terrifying journey through time, across North America. Adam’s sister, Chloe, has a telepathic gift proving vital in a struggle against the Death Lords of the Mayan underworld, Xibalba, and an ancient, evil Anasazi warrior, Coyote Spirit, all of whom want María for themselves. Later, with Adam and María married, their telepathic son, Pepe, knows, through Chloe, that they must return to Xibalba to learn the truth concerning his mother’s distress, plus rescue a special child.
Magical realism meets the magic of Christmas in this mix of Jewish, New Testament, and Santa stories–all reenacted in an urban psychiatric hospital!
On locked ward 5C4, Josh, a patient with many similarities to Jesus, is hospitalized concurrently with Nick, a patient with many similarities to Santa. The two argue…
Selected by Deesha Philyaw as winner of the AWP Grace Paley Prize in Short Fiction, Lake Song is set in the fictional town of Kinder Falls in New York’s Finger Lakes region. This novel in stories spans decades to plumb the complexities, violence, and compassion of small-town life as the…
