Book Review: The War of the Flowers

Reviewed By: Harriet Klausner

The War of the Flowers     Amazon US PB Amazon US HC Amazon Canada PB Amazon Canada HC
Tad Williams
Class/Genre:   Fantasy
Daw, May 2003, $24.95, 686 pp.

Minor league California rocker Theo Vilmos feels he is at the bottom of the food chain when matters turn worse when he loses his pregnant girlfriend. Thirty, alone, and his music going nowhere, Theo feels down. He decides to get away to relook the direction of his life that seems to be in free fall. At his mother’s remote cabin, Theo finds an ancient looking tome handwritten by his weird Uncle Eamon about another realm, that of Faerie.

Soon Theo is shocked to learn Faerie exists when the sprite Applecore arrives at his abode. She escorts the reluctant musician through the gate to a magical land that quickly seems quite dismal to the visitor. War appears everywhere so much so that Theo feels his home planet seems relatively peaceful. While Theo begins to learn secrets about his gene pool, he falls in love, but this is a land in which life is not precious so he must show caution to survive especially when bombardier dragons attack.

This stand-alone fantasy is a great satirizing of current conditions on planet earth as seen through a looking glass mirror. The story line is extremely dark and grim yet often humorous as the plot shreds anything and everything of proud filled boasts about our compassionate great society. Theo is a fine character who serves as the center of the myriad of subplots, but it is the cantankerous, nasty Applecore who steals the show with her tinkering and editing of words of wisdom. A tad wordy, perhaps, but fans of Tad Williams, which probably includes Jonathan Swift, will appreciate this cutting faerie tale.

Harriet Klausner

Reprinted with permission. Do Not repost without permission from the author, Harriet Klausner

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