[The Weirdstone of Brisingamen] was a remarkable first book by a young writer but hardly a successful one. The narrative is confusing and confused, always whipping itself into a further frenzy of activity. The terms of reference are Norse rather than Celtic, and the Norse gods were always a complicated lot. There are some fine moments, mostly marred by a turgid style. Where the book excels is in the use of an actual landscape whose topography plays an essential part in the action and in relating the nightmares of the story to commonplace figures of the everyday world. (p. 126)
This skill in harnessing the modern scene and its inhabitants was more marked in Garner's Elidor (1965) where the magic starts to work in Piccadilly, Manchester. It is not chance that when Roland spins the wheel which operates the index to a street plan it comes to rest at Thursday Street. For Thursday Street has disappeared into a heap of rubble in a slum-clearance scheme. And why is an old street Musician playing his fiddle among these inhospitable ruins? From this confusing scene, strange yet typical of a modern city, the Watson children are shot into 'a magic land and full of song' where Malebron of Elidor holds back the night. The children—it seems improbable—have been sent to 'bring back light to Elidor'. It is never quite clear why. As in the 'Narnia' stories [by C. S. Lewis], the weakness lies in casting such commonplace children as the agents of destiny.
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