Abarat
by Clive Barker
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Book Summary Information
Author: Clive BarkerIllustrator: Clive Barker
Edition: Mass Market Paperback
Audio: English (Unknown); English (Original Language); English (Published)
Published: 2004-08-31
ISBN: 0060596376
Number of pages: 496
Publisher: HarperCollins
Book Reviews of Abarat
Book Review: A Story of Art and Art of Story
Summary: 4 Stars
A lot of people have been waiting for Clive Barker to unveil his newest creation since Coldheart Canyon earlier this year. We all knew it was going to be for kids, but we also knew it was going to be classic Clive Barker, and would be a great first book in the series. Having read this first installment, I concur with every fan's automatic assumption.
Abarat is the first book in the series about a young girl, Candy Quakenbush, who lives in Chickentown, USA. She has never felt she truly belongs in the dead end town which prides itself on maintaining the industry of its name. And so one day she heads out into the fields, where he finds what looks like the ruin of an old lighthouse and an old pier. Soon she meets a couple of characters, one good and one bad, and she has just seconds to start up this old lighthouse using a magic she never knew she possessed. Suddenly the sea comes rushing in from nowhere and she is whisked away to the Abarat, a vast archipelago where every island is a specific hour of the day. And so Candy is taken on many different adventures, both good and bad, where each time she comes close to losing everything, she somehow manages to break free.
With a vast cast of crazy and unusual characters, any reader would be struggling to deal with what they all look like and how to separate all these places. Fortunately, Barker hasn't only been busy writing, but he has also been busy painting for this series. Abarat features over one hundred original designs and paintings by Barker which he has spent the last four years creating, all to do with the current book at hand. The result is a visual opening into an impossible world that could only exist within the mind of one man.
The book ends with Candy alive and well on towards another adventure, as Barker ends with a familiar phrase: "So Ends the First Book of the Abarat." With three more to come in the series, one can only wonder what Candy is going to get up to next.
Originally published on December 9th, 2002.
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Summary of Abarat
A journey beyond imagination
is about to unfold. . . .
is about to unfold. . . .
It begins in the most boring place in the world: Chickentown, U.S.A. There lives Candy Quackenbush, her heart bursting for some clue as to what her future might hold.
When the answer comes, it's not one she expects.
Welcome to the Abarat.
In Abarat, accomplished novelist and artist Clive Barker turns his considerable talents to creating a rich fantasy world for young adults.
Candy Quackenbush is growing up in Chickentown, Minnesota, yearning for more--which she finds, quite unexpectedly, when a man with eight heads appears from nowhere in the middle of the prairie, being chased by something really monstrous. And so begins Candy's epic adventure to the islands of the Abarat. Peopled by all manner of creatures, cultures, and customs, the islands should prove a fertile setting for the series that Barker is calling The Books of Abarat. Candy is an intelligent and likable heroine, and the many supporting characters are deftly drawn, both in words and in the full-color interior art that Barker has produced to give the story an extra dimension.
Abarat delivers the rich and imaginative storytelling that Barker is known for, with less overt horror or violence than one of his adult novels might include. However, Candy's path isn't an easy one, and young adult readers should appreciate the hard choices she must make along the way. --Roz Genessee
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