JAMES MOLONEY
Reviewed by Jill Smith - March 27, 2024
Marcel woke up in a home for foundlings in Fallside. Mrs Timmins and her son Albert ran the home. He felt confused, he couldn’t remember anything of his previous life.
He believed his name was Robert, but, that felt wrong. A little girl had told him his name was Marcel. He didn’t know she had put wax in his ears so the retelling of his life from the Book of Lies could not be heard. Now he couldn’t be anyone else. Lord Alwyn, the ageing, wizard who lived in the tower, told him he would no longer be offered for adoption. He would be hidden away and no one outside the home would know his name.
The rhythm of the work at the orphanage kept him busy. A man nicknamed ‘Belch’ had him working in the stables. There he met a wild horse called Gadfly. When Fergus, another boy in the home, challenged him to race outside the grounds and into Fallside, where the old wizard warned him not to go. Marcel still went with his new friend on a wild and exuberant journey. The other boy called out to him, ‘Marcel’ when they were in the village. That was enough, he’d been seen and his name heard. Everything would change after that.
Two strangers approached him, a man called Starkey and his weapon-wielding friend Hector. Starkey wanted Marcel to leave with him. The old wizard had threatened Marcel with sending a loud and fearful creature from the tower to recapture him if he moved over the walls. If he trusted these two men, perhaps, he would discover who he really was. He was too afraid to find out.
The Book of Lies had cast a spell that gave him a false life. The journey he would take led him into danger, he discovered who his friends were, who his brother and sister were. Once he could believe who his father and mother were, he would discover his destiny, within the Book of Lies.
There is so much about this book that I love. Anyone who loves fantasy will enjoy this story and be carried along by the characters.
