A Fairytale for the Ages

4. A Kingdom Far and Clear: The Complete Swan Lake Trilogy by Mark Helprin

Genre: Fiction/ Fantasy
Rating: 5/5

Once upon a time there was a young maiden with rose coloured hair, she simply could not resist a book with a beautiful cover...

I would be remiss if I didn't acknowledge the fact that I 100% bought this book purely for the beautiful illustrations, but thankfully the writing was even more dazzling than the storybookesque pictures that were sprinkled throughout the engaging narrative.

A Kingdom Far and Clear by Mark Helprin is actually a collection of three brief novellas that make up the Swan Lake Trilogy. The first novella, Swan Lake, tells the  story of young girl of about eight who lives in the mountains with a man we are lead to believe is her grandfather. As the story progresses he begins to tell her a story of two young people who lived long before her time, a princess whose parent's were murdered and the young prince of the emperor. This particular novella visits the classic story of Swan Lake that many of us are familiar with, but re-imagines it with more detail and back story. It is Helprin's inventive and emotionally engaging sense of narrative that captivated me from the start and drew me into the world of Swan Lake.

The second novella, A City in Winter, tells the story of the young girls quest into the city. After finding out that the young prince and princess had in fact been her parents, making her the rightful heir to the throne, she journey's down from the mountains, the only place she has ever known, to the plains to begin her mission of rallying the city to her cause and overthrowing the usurper. Helprin fills out the girl's character not through description of her attributes but through the details of her actions. Upon first arriving in the city, the girl witnesses the horrors of the usurpers rule first hand, and so do we as readers. This is where we first meet the devoted Astrahn and Notorincus, who will protect and counsel the young queen throughout the rest of the story. Helprin chooses to use slaves and slaves of slaves as this young queens confidants which helps to instil in the reader the sense of moral rightness that she posses in juxtaposition to the usurper that has created these slaves in the first place.

The final novella of the book, The Veil of Snows, is told from the point of view of an old singer. Who has been freed from the prison in which the Usurper placed him for refusing to bow to his demands to sing of only the glories of the Usurper. The tale picks up where the last novella left off with the young queen reigning over her kingdom until the day that the Usurper rises again. What I loved so much about this last novella is that Helprin wasn't afraid to go to a darker place with his storytelling, it is reminiscent of the original Grimm fairytales, although maybe not quite so twisted. He weaves the story leaving you guessing right to the end; I was disappointed when I finished this book, only because I had enjoyed it so much. It reminded me of reading fairytales as a child, yet the writing was complex enough to be engaging for adult readers as well. This is a book that truly transcends age and bares rereading throughout your life.