I’ve just finished reading Clive Barker’s Abarat. I picked it up at the St. Barney’s Fair book sale for $1.50 last winter. I knew nothing about it and the cover was pretty boring (in fact, the font on my copy made me think it was called “Ararat” until I actually cracked it open), but I remembered enjoying Barker’s The Thief of Always so I thought I might give it a shot. I’m glad I did. It was great! Well, except for the first chapter. I understand that it’ll probably pay off later, but man, it’s completely different in tone to everything else that comes afterwards. It felt very “Wizard of Earthsea” (i.e. BORING) to me, so it was a relief to turn the page and meet Candy Quackenbush from good ol’ Chickentown, Minnesota. The story reminds me of Labyrinth and Alice in Wonderland, and it’s got some extremely memorable characters. In fact, one of my only complaints is that it introduces so many of them, and oftentimes Candy’s only with that person for a chapter or two. That got a bit frustrating and repetitive. I was so glad to see John Mischief and his brothers return to the tale. (I want a John Mischief action figure. Seriously.) So there I was, grooving on the story and not having any idea where it was going to go, when suddenly — it ended. Whaaaat? Yep, the last, like, twenty pages of my copy were just appendix. What the hell? So I go to the Internet, and it turns out that this is the first book in a SERIES OF FIVE. I feel a bit sucked in. Nowhere on my copy did it indicate that this was a series! And while I did enjoy it, I’m a little annoyed that I’m now hooked for four more books (only one of which has actually been published so far). But anyway, if you like fantasy but you find a lot of it boring and humourless, this is a great story.