I read and enjoyed Marcus Sedgewick's The Dark Horse a few years ago. It was a relief to come across a fantasy novel that wasn't part of a trilogy or even longer series (it's rare that a series is consistently good from the first book to the last. Trilogies have a better chance of maintaining a high standard throughout and I also am less likely to lose interest, which I usually do after book three or four).
My Swordhand is Singing is another of Sedgewick's standalones. His other books are Floodland, Witch Hill and The Book of Dead Days.
Come on, scare me silly
I’VE been trying to remember what it was I used to like about vampires
and vampire novels. Of course, I still think Bram Stoker’s Dracula is
one of the best gothic novels ever written, but it’s been a while since
I called myself an Anne Rice fan. Was I ever in love with Louis, the
central character in her Interview with a Vampire? I think I might have been!
In a recent article about Stephenie Meyer’s vampire trilogy, teenage
readers gush about Edward Cullen, the heroine’s vampire boyfriend.
There are online forums dedicated to him. One girl, in a review posted
on amazon.com, describes him as “one of those male fictional characters
like Mr Rochester you can’t help but fall in love with”.
In the article (published on Arizona State University’s website, www.asu.edu/news/stories/200705/20070504_prom.htm),
a professor discusses how teenagers are drawn to vampires because they
identify with these characters and the conflicts they face.
A vampire is an outcast, an outsider, and teens often
feel similarly misunderstood and alienated. Vampires are also often
depicted wrestling with their conscience and trying to decide between
right and wrong – again, just the way teens are.
Finally, vampires are usually drop-dead gorgeous and most of us (girls, especially) find handsome, mysterious men irresistible. Throw forbidden love into the mix and we’re sold. Until, that is, we grow up and realise that handsome mysterious men (non-fictional ones, anyway) are usually just hiding something (usually a girl friend) and will, invariably, want to borrow large sums of money.
Personally, I’m tired of the recent spate of novels about well dressed, immaculately coiffed teenage vampires. I like vampires to scare me, not make me stress about my mismatched wardrobe. The vampires in Marcus Sedgewick’s My Swordhand is Singing (Orion, 228 pages, ISBN: 978-1842555583) are bloated corpses who tear out their victim’s hearts and couldn’t give a toss about the latest Parisian fashions. They scare me. Silly.
The book is set in a small village at the edge of a vast forest. In the first chapter, a man is being pursued by another through the trees. Through the haze of his fear, he realises that he is being hunted by someone who is dead.
It is winter, a few days before St Andrew’s Eve, which the villagers believe is the start of the dark time of the world, when evil walks freely. The woodcutter Tomas and his son Peter, however, do not share in the old beliefs and superstitions. Tomas is an abusive drunkard with a past he hides, obsessively, from his long-suffering son.
Peter is lonely, raised a cynic but naturally curious. He is in love with Agnes, the daughter of the village draper; her father recently died but, it is whispered, he returns nightly to visit his family.
Unfortunately, Agnes is chosen to be the bride of a recently murdered man (a ritual that was once practised in Transylvania). As the bride of a corpse, she has to spend 40 days in isolation, mourning for her husband. This, of course, makes her easy prey for vampires and forces Peter to consider that the stories he has been raised to scoff at are not entirely a load of poppycock.
As Peter tries to separate fact from myth, sense from superstition, a band of gypsies arrive and reveal the truth behind his father’s past.
In his “author’s note”, Sedgewick describes how he researched his story, even travelling to Eastern Europe to learn more about the region’s superstition and folklore. Apart from the supernatural elements, Swordhand probably comes close to describing the life in a typical 17th century village Transylvanian village.
Although it’s unlikely that vampires ever roamed the forests of that land (Transylvania actually means “land beyond the forest”), belief in them was strong and real. So, while we can read Swordhand knowing all along that it is merely a spooky story, the author so successfully conveys the terror experienced by a community that believes in the possibility of falling prey to the undead that even the most sceptical of us might still experience shivers and goose bumps when reading this book.
And while there are no moody, mysterious and devastatingly handsome vampires in My Swordhand is Singing, Peter’s not to be sniffed at either. These days I prefer my men (even fictional ones) alive and kicking.
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