Master storyteller Alan Moore (Watchmen) delivers twelve interconnected stories of lust, madness, and ectasy, all set in central England and spanning over six thousand years, the narratives woven together in patterns of recurring events, strange traditions, and uncanny visions. First, a cave-boy loses his mother, falls in love, and learns a deadly lesson. He is followed by an extraordinary cast of characters: a murderess who impersonates her victim; a fisherman who believes he has become a different species; a Roman emissary who realizes the bitter truth about the Empire; a crippled nun who is healed miraculously by a disturbing apparition; an old crusader whose faith is destroyed by witnessing the ultimate relic; two witches, lovers, who burn at the stake. Each related tale traces a path in a journey of discovery of the secrets of the land.In the tradition of Kipling's Puck of Pook's Hill, Schwob's Imaginary Lives, and Borges' A Universal History of Infamy, Moore travels through history, blending truth and conjecture, in a novel that is dazzling, moving, sometimes tragic, but always mesmerizing.
With an introduction by Neil Gaiman, a suite of full-color plates by Jos Villarrubia, and a cover design by Chip Kidd.
- ISBN10 1891830449
- ISBN13 9781891830440
- Publish Date 6 January 2004 (first published 10 October 1996)
- Publish Status Out of Print
- Out of Print 14 October 2016
- Publish Country US
- Imprint Top Shelf Productions
- Format Hardcover
- Pages 336
- Language English