This postI finished Here, There Be Dragons last night. Remember how I said, “I’m a third of the way into it and liking it”? What I meant was that I liked the basic idea behind the book — the geography of the imagination, pulling in three of the Inklings and a host of mythical/fantasy/literary characters, etc. But I don’t know that I actually liked the book itself.
Problem #1: No depth. I felt like the tale was skimming the surface the whole time — moving too fast, leaving behind cardboard characters in its wake. It didn’t really grab me the way it could and should have. (In contrast, I was reading the Tale of Sigurd from one of Lang’s fairy books last night and while it was in saga format, it still felt deeper.) I wanted to care about the characters, but it was hard. Really hard.
Problem #2: It didn’t have the right tone — in my mind, of course — for a book of its nature. It felt too…modern. If you’re going to use Tolkien, Lewis, and Williams in a book, then I think it ought to have an Inklingesque feeling. This book didn’t. And that’s in spite of it being a fantasy book!
Problem #3: I didn’t like the font. It had no ligatures for ‘ff’ or ‘ffl’, and it was too vertical, and that subconsciously bothered me for a while before I pinned it down. And the paper was too stiff for my tastes. The illustrations were really nice, though.
I really wanted to like it, honest. But I doubt I’ll ever read it again. I will read the other books in the series because I have a hope that they’ll get better, and because I’m mildly interested in seeing where the story goes, but it’s not a book I’m going to be evangelizing or anything.
