I recommend this book heartily to all storyreaders, wherever you went to college. It really should be a Yale SR long, although it might be a little too long for that. Anyway, that's what I was thinking when I dashed off the following Goodreads.com review:
This is one of the most imaginative works I've read in a long time. Whimsical, dark, frightening, hilarious... mash up a late Harry Potter book with The Phantom Tollbooth and Terry Pratchett's DiscWorld (w/ a dash of Patricia A McKillip). Did I mention it's set in a world where books and authors are venerated? Eh, just read it!
From the Publishers Weekly review, for those who like a little plot summary with their recommendations (edited to remove MASSIVE spoilers):
German author and cartoonist Moers returns to the mythical lost continent of Zamonia in his uproarious third fantasy adventure to be translated into English (after 2006's Rumo)... Optimus Yarnspinner, a young saurian novelist, embarks on a quest to track down the anonymous author of the most magnificent piece of writing in the whole of Zamonian literature.
Description from Goodreads.com: The author of 13 1⁄2 Lives of Captain Bluebear transports us to a magical world. Optimus Yarnspinner finds himself marooned in the subterranean world of Bookholm, the City of Dreaming Books, where reading can be dangerous, where ruthless Bookhunters fight to the death.
This is one of the most imaginative works I've read in a long time. Whimsical, dark, frightening, hilarious... mash up a late Harry Potter book with The Phantom Tollbooth and Terry Pratchett's DiscWorld (w/ a dash of Patricia A McKillip). Did I mention it's set in a world where books and authors are venerated? Eh, just read it!
From the Publishers Weekly review, for those who like a little plot summary with their recommendations (edited to remove MASSIVE spoilers):
German author and cartoonist Moers returns to the mythical lost continent of Zamonia in his uproarious third fantasy adventure to be translated into English (after 2006's Rumo)... Optimus Yarnspinner, a young saurian novelist, embarks on a quest to track down the anonymous author of the most magnificent piece of writing in the whole of Zamonian literature.
Description from Goodreads.com: The author of 13 1⁄2 Lives of Captain Bluebear transports us to a magical world. Optimus Yarnspinner finds himself marooned in the subterranean world of Bookholm, the City of Dreaming Books, where reading can be dangerous, where ruthless Bookhunters fight to the death.