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A review by mackenzi
In Calabria by Peter S. Beagle
adventurous
emotional
lighthearted
fast-paced
- Plot- or character-driven? Plot
- Strong character development? Yes
- Loveable characters? Yes
- Diverse cast of characters? No
- Flaws of characters a main focus? Yes
3.0
This book was very nearly two stars for me, on a personal level. I loved every scene with the unicorns, until it got into a personal squicky place for me (pregnancy, eek, sorry). And then it was only kinda half about unicorns, and it became a kind of soft, meandering novel, which wasn't terrible, if a little weird with the age difference thing (I like May/December romances fine, but the characters for a ~while~ were acting closer to 80/15 than 47/25 or however old they actually are).
BUT
The END of this short novel brought it all back. Because at the climax, we see a little more of the nature of unicorns. And they are cosmic horror entities equal or surpassing cthulhu itself, with the ability to bend both time and space around them, move dimensionally, instantaneously, open tears in our own time and move through them with a thought. They are too great in power for humans to look directly at. They can change form into clouds, if you stare into one's eyes you are transported to a different dimension for a moment, and they can possess the bodies of humans and blur the line between this world and the next (maybe we get confirmation of some kind of afterlife, at least the confirmation of ghosts, possibly, but what other great and terrible confirmations do we get? That unicorns are from space, or possibly space is from them? That a unicorn might show up in your farm to give birth because it is a pleasant place, but she is so vast and different than us that she doesn't actually care that you may be murdered. And unicorns can split a human being in two, absolutely killing them before they can register fear or pain.
Anyway, that last bit made the book absolutely worth reading even though the rest didn't strike me as enjoyable.
BUT
The END of this short novel brought it all back. Because at the climax, we see a little more of the nature of unicorns. And they are cosmic horror entities equal or surpassing cthulhu itself, with the ability to bend both time and space around them, move dimensionally, instantaneously, open tears in our own time and move through them with a thought. They are too great in power for humans to look directly at. They can change form into clouds, if you stare into one's eyes you are transported to a different dimension for a moment, and they can possess the bodies of humans and blur the line between this world and the next (maybe we get confirmation of some kind of afterlife, at least the confirmation of ghosts, possibly, but what other great and terrible confirmations do we get? That unicorns are from space, or possibly space is from them? That a unicorn might show up in your farm to give birth because it is a pleasant place, but she is so vast and different than us that she doesn't actually care that you may be murdered. And unicorns can split a human being in two, absolutely killing them before they can register fear or pain.
Anyway, that last bit made the book absolutely worth reading even though the rest didn't strike me as enjoyable.
Content Warnings
Moderate: Pregnancy