Category: Camellias on Moss, Snow Flower, Apple Blossom
Genre: Fantasy
I just finished reading this book yesterday, so perhaps it is too soon to claim this book is “Camellias on Moss”—one that will keep its place as life changing once the sword settles back in stone and the bees stop buzzing around my head. But I can guarantee that this book is an Apple Blossom—seducing you with the intricacy of its interwoven plots, “just one more chapter,” you say, already forgetting that promise by its end. On Monday, I read a couple chapters before bed; by Wednesday, I was heading to bed an hour early to read; on the weekend, I opened to page 273 and didn’t stop reading until I closed page 498, holding the book to my chest in wistful satisfaction. I can assure you that this book is a Snow Flower. We all need a journey right now. We need the joy of fellow book lovers, we need the nostalgia of our favorite lullabies, we need the magic inspired by foolishly falling in love, and we need to know our heartache serves a purpose. We need to know fate and time are in love and that we will come out okay in the end.
So, what is this book about? It’s about an underground library beneath a starless sea that you need a key, a bee, and sword to open. It’s about doors hidden at the bottom of the forest floor and at the back of the dresser and painted on the wall of the freeway overpass that open to the starless sea. It’s about pirates, and The King of the Wild Things, and secret authors, and a dollhouse, and it’s about none of those things. The Starless Sea is what Mr. Anderson would have found had he followed the white rabbit through the hidden door in his cubicle instead of through the phone booth to the Matrix. Alice would have found the Starless Sea had she disregarded the white rabbit and instead followed the compass in Cheshire Cat’s smile. Paloma will find the Starless Sea in Kakuro Ozu’s apartment when she’s ready to believe he is from a place outside Time.
Elegance Press 