#Review: Footsteps of Galatea

What the hell were you thinking? #Review Planet Purgatory

#Review: Footsteps of Galatea

Footsteps of Galatea by Robyn Cain

ASIN:B00Y5Q2YPY

Sequel to Goods By Hand ASIN:B00ES2P236

Review by Geoff Nelder

This is a delightfully weird book of the paranormal cleverly utilising an ancient mythical premise that is born from Galatea. She was a milky-white statue that came to life, possibly on Cyprus. I looked for her in the Paphos region where she was seen, apparently, and I kind of felt her presence in many coves, caves and crevices. Her presence in this book is more ethereal than a statue although a bloodline may have descended through to Saffron and her daughter, Omikia. How this ancestral inking of life manifests itself in the contemporary scene comes through this novel like jagged veins.

Richard is the criminal here: we see him plotting, scheming yet he is normal compared to the incandescent Omikia. Her character is terrific, grips you by the throat, her intelligence coruscating compared to the rest – as exemplified by the wordplay between her and Richard. Like verbal chess, move and countermove, check and mate. In spite of the mythical undercurrent with the mysterious ‘ink’, there are wonderful thrusty conversations just as you might overhear. I did today, on the #7 bus from Broad Green, Liverpool. A girl, maybe 6, on the back seat gave a running commentary to her dad near the front, on everything she observed. Loved it, especially when she uttered to a boy near her, “My ma is bigger than your da.” Haha, images unfurl as they do in the well-crafted dialogues in Footsteps of Galatea.

Sometimes it is the simplest of descriptions that reveal such craft, as in when Mina walks by something: ‘…the case near their front door caught her eye. And yet, she almost didn’t see it. Turning to look at it directly, it was as if nothing was there.

Convinced she’d been mistaken she turned to go and from the corner of her eye, she saw it again.

“I can see you,” she told it. The dilapidated leather case was upright, giving the impression it would be ashamed to lean in any way.’

You might need patience to get into this novel. Become accustomed to the names and absorb their relationships. It’s not like a thriller with a hook to grab you in the first page, paragraph and yet keep going and it will take you. There’s a free chapter of a prequel at the end. In some ways I guessed Footsteps wasn’t the first book and perhaps the author should say in a preface that it is a sequel. Perhaps reading the prequel segment is a better preparation for its sequel but I don’t know because I didn’t find it until afterwards. Either way, this is a book of intriguing characters and ancient plot I’m thrilled to have read.

Robyn Cain’s author page is here

I met up with Robyn Cain this week at a writers’ moot in Tarporley. She lives in Cheshire so that’s just a quick hour and a quarter bike ride for me. She was early – if I’d known I wouldn’t have stopped to chat to some horses at Hargrave. Hey here’s a picture of me and Robyn in the cafe.