Amph Here, There Be Dragons

This book was recommended to me by a book rep that visited my college, and she sent me a copy a couple weeks ago.

It's by a guy named James Owen, his first novel, falls squarely into the Young Adult catagory.

From Amazon:

The unusual murder of an Oxford professor brings together three strangers in World War I London: John, a soldier and the professor's correspondence student; Jack, a young Oxford student; and Charles, an editor at the Oxford University Press. One rainy night they meet a curious man called Bert who tells them that they are the caretakers of the Imaginarium Geographica, an atlas of imaginary lands. Forced to flee in Bert's ship, the group sails to the Archipelago of Dreams, where a battle over Arthur Pendragon's throne threatens to place the evil Winter King in charge. Owen brings together elements from well-known works of fantasy and legend: the lands and characters lean heavily toward Greek and Arthurian myth, while clues from the caretakers' works point to the legendary writers they will become. Although the episodic plot is overlong, and the period narration's formality occasionally slows things down, there's still plenty of action, and Owen's amazingly detailed pen-and-ink illustrations, dark and atmospheric, lend a real storybook flavor. This is the first volume in the Chronicles of Imaginarium Geographica series.

Anyone else read this?

 

Haven't read it. Finding it tough not to giggle a little at the premise.

John, Jack and Charles, eh? I think that I have an Inkling about where this is going.

 

Heh, I'm thinking you're right, considering that two are from Oxford and another from Cambridge. Plus, John has just returned from WWI.

 

Finished it earlier today, and pretty disapointed. Writing was eh, and the story wasn't the greatest. Cool concept, little to support it. The LOTR and Narnia references were very blatent throughout, along with a couple other things there as well.

 

Huh, why am I not surprised:

Goyer Developing Dragons Film

Writer-producer-director David Goyer (Blade: Trinity) told SCI FI Wire that he and Harry Potter producer David Heyman are co-producing a big-screen version of the James A. Owen fantasy novel Here, There Be Dragons, based on the real and fantasy lives of J.R.R. Tolkien, C.S. Lewis and Charles Williams. The book is the first volume in Owen's The Chronicles of the Imaginarium Geographica franchise, and Goyer revealed that Owen is currently writing his own adaptation of the tale, hinting that he might direct the ensuing film if the timing works out.

"That will probably be a long, lengthy process," Goyer said in an interview while promoting his upcoming film, The Invisible, which he directed. "I'll be producing it for sure, and we'll see [what else]. You just never know. These things take so long to get going, and you never know what your schedule's going to be like at the time they come to fruition."

Here, There Be Dragons brings together three strangers?John, Jack and Charles?in London during World War I, where they become entrusted with the Imaginarium Geographica, an atlas of all the lands that have ever existed in myth, legend, fable and fairy tale. They end up traveling to the Archipelago of Dreams, fighting the dark forces that threaten two worlds. It is later revealed that the three are future fantasy authors Tolkien (The Lord of the Rings), Lewis (The Chronicles of Narnia) and Williams, who met in real life at Oxford and enjoyed a competitive friendship.

"I'm a fan of what I guess I would term 'meta-fiction,' and James just came up with this really wonderful device that [brings together] all these characters, real-life people [like] Tolkien and C.S. Lewis and Charles Williams," Goyer said. "At one point in time they all did really know each other, so he backdated that relationship between them and posited that they shared some real-life adventures in another land that became the source material for all their subsequent fantasy writings. The land that this takes place in is the land that gave birth to Narnia and Middle-earth, etc., etc. So it's just a wonderful concept."

I'm not sure this would make a good movie. Not really the best book to begin with...