Angelica Lost and Found

by Russell Hoban

A vertiginous and dazzling spin on the classic quest story.

Genres: Fiction, Fantasy, Novels, Contemporary, Literary Fiction

237 pages, Paperback

First published November 1, 2010

About the author

Russell Conwell Hoban was an American expatriate writer. His works span many genres, including fantasy, science fiction, mainstream fiction, magical realism, poetry, and children's books. He lived in London, England, from 1969 until his death. (Wikipedia)

Reviews

[Marcus Gipps · Rating 5 out of 5]

Hoban is absolutely one of my favourite authors, and one who I think is cruelly neglected. Yes, Bloomsbury keep on publishing him, and Riddley Walker (which is an outstanding book, and will change the way you look at life) is well-regarded, but I just feel that a new book from him is only a truly exciting moment for a handful of people. Perhaps I’m wrong, perhaps there are loads of readers out there waiting with bated breath for Hoban to churn out another one, but I don’t think so. Even some of the people who work for his publishers acted surprised when I got worked up about this book, and admitted that they didn’t really know who he was. I’m not complaining, honestly, I just think he should be praised to the rafters.

Anyway, I convinced Bloomsbury to send me a copy of the manuscript for Angelica, which I then bound on our Espresso book-printing machine, leaving me with a slightly odd-shaped book. I don’t know if there are official proofs out there, but I do know that I have a one-of-a-kind edition of this, and I’ll do my best to get Hoban to sign it, which will make me quite unreasonably happy. It may not be among his best work, but the fact that this eighty-plus year old man is still writing pleases me intensely.

Angelica is a hard book to describe, purely because it’s so wonderfully, insanely odd (perhaps not quite as odd as Linger Awhile http://marcusgipps.livejournal.com/17..., but not far off). Our main character is a hippogriff, sprung from a painting based on an epic poem, able to inhabit people and control them, searching through time for the beautiful woman who, in the painting, he helped to rescue. This Angelica is, the hippogriff is sure, out there somewhere, and when he finds her he may be able to win her affection. Hoban doesn’t actually much use the person-inhabiting bit of magic realism he has invented, which surprised me a little – I was ready for a sequence of vignettes – but locates the story in San Francisco in the early twentieth century, introduces a woman who may or may not be the personification of Angelica, and then heads out to wherever his imagination takes him. We have some bestial sex, some psychoanalysis, some art appreciation, not a few chapters of the hippogriff fading into nothingness, some sailing, some opera appreciation and much much more. If you’ve never read Hoban before that might seem like quite a shopping list, but I’m probably only covering half of it.

The reader has to be prepared to accept Hoban’s way of writing, which is quite distinctive. His most recent novels have all been similar in style – a deceptively simple prose that propels the plot but also manages to get under the skin. Hoban has an astounding ability to turn a phrase (I actually have a quote from him on the back of my business cards), but doesn’t let the language distract from his ideas. As long as the reader will go with the flow and accept a little magic realism in their lives, the book is a magnificent success. As I said at the beginning of this overly gushing tribute, this isn’t his best work (Riddley Walker is, or perhaps Linger Awhile of the later novels), but it is still wonderful. Buy it, support one of our best authors, because he won’t be around for ever.

I read a cobbled together proof at the beginning of August, and finished it on the train to Wales. Out in November, ISBN: 9781408806609

[Norrin2 · Rating 4 out of 5]

Russell Hoban was obsessed with art, mythology and sex. His writing is filled with references to opera and haute cuisine. But he was also something of a dirty old man who loved to pun. In short. he was my kind of writer. Here the hippogriff (basically half eagle, half horse) from Ludovico Ariosto's epic 16th century poem "Orlando Furioso" basically wills himself into our "dream of reality" because he wants to rescue Angelica himself, not just carry the hero on his back -- the eternal Angelica, the beauty in mortal peril, chained to the rock of her ethereal loveliness. Against all odds he manages to find her - in San Francisco, and that's where the trouble starts. As always when you read Hoban you want to be near a computer so you can look up all the artistic and musical references,

[Lindsay · Rating 5 out of 5]

I have liked Russell Hoban's novels ever since I happened on TURTLE DIARY in a Bethesda, MD, used bookstore way back when. ANGELICA LOST AND FOUND is a wild and weird fantasy about a hippograf named Volatore that escapes from a 16th century poem and tries to track down the heroine of the poem, a girl named Angelica. Somehow he gets to 21st century San Francisco, where he is drawn to an art gallery owned named Angelica. They immediately get down to business.

In the hands of a lesser writer, this story would be whimsical in a lead-footed way and absurd. In Hoban's hands, it is funny and entrancing the way a good fantasy should be.

[Tristan Hawthorn · Rating 3 out of 5]

I really liked this book. It was bonkers. It was weird and wonderful and for the most part I didn't know which way was up. Yet, I loved it not in spite of its weirdness but because of its weirdness. The worldplay and use of language in it thrilled me, and the story of Angelica and her hippogriff was oddly touching. A wild ride on a sea of words, highly recommended.

[Andrew Scott · Rating 4 out of 5]

Another extraordinary Hoban book: the protagonist being the Hippogriff from Ariosto's Orlando Furioso, who is seeking his eternal Angelica. As os often, Hoban's world is seriously weird, but his language and wit are as as fresh as ever.

[Catriona · Rating 4 out of 5]

An interesting, funny, altogether unusual story of a mythical creature from a painting who believes himself into being and then travels through layers of 'reality' to reach the 21st-century incarnation of the woman of his dreams. At once enjoyable and thought-provoking (and slightly bonkers).

[Andy Goss · Rating 4 out of 5]

Russell Hoban is one of a short list of writers who I admire greatly. I was going to give Angelica Lost and Found three stars as it is, or seems to be, while a delight to read, inconsequential, a piece written for the fun of it, going nowhere. But I had to change that to four stars. Everything Hoban wrote, including his childrens' books, came from a deep philosophical base, and although I can't pin it down, the scent is there in Angelica, and I shall have to re-read it some day. But not yet, there is too much else to read.

[Misha Herwin · Rating 5 out of 5]

I loved this book. It's weird and wonderful. Volatore a hippogriff from Ariosto's poem "Orlando Furioso" comes to life. Wondering about whether or not he exists, he makes his way to San Francisco in search of Angelica. Here he meets modern day Angelica Greenberg and the unlikely couple fall in love. But events conspire to separate them and shape changing Volatore must find the perfect shape to consummate their love.
This book works on so many levels. Apart from the love the writer explores themes of reality, creativity and aesthetics. It's also funny and witty.

[Meg Onthemove Reading · Rating 4 out of 5]

It took me quite some time to get into this book, more than 50 pages had gone past before the slow mist of the classical narrative tale started to lift and the story morphed into a surreal semi-philosophical story of hippogriff meets girl. Weird, crazy and fascinating. A real odd-ball of a novel, and well worth reading.

[Terry Mark · Rating 4 out of 5]

I think this was the last book that Russell Hoban wrote which was such a shame as he was a great talent. One of the reviewers on here described this book as bonkers and I have to agree but most of his books are but I love them. He writes with great imagination and you always feel a little bit more knowledgeable on the arts after reading them.

[Ruth Brumby · Rating 4 out of 5]

Absolutely fascinating riff on reality and perception, based on Orlando Furioso, and serendipitously referring to Wallace Stevens who I am currently reading. Slightly marred by unchallenged sexism.

[Jason Mills · Rating 3 out of 5]

This ben parbly the last of Hoban's novels, so I'd been hoarding it, and I'm pleased to report it's quite decent. His later novels, mostly London-based, have rambled amiably through galleries, museums and mythology, and have sometimes ended up forgettably insubstantial. (In this book's afterword Hoban says he writes without a plan.) Angelica Lost and Found won't change the world, but it's a satisfying yarn.

The novel begins in the same mythic territory that launched Angelica's Grotto, the story of Ruggiero rescuing the eponymous maiden bound to the rock (of her beauty, Hoban cleverly adds). Our (first) narrator is Volatore, who introduces himself (Pilgermannishly) as Ruggiero's hippogriff, who has himself developed the hots for Angelica. Voyaging through time and space, he comes across her (literally...) in modern-day San Francisco; but even in our supposedly enlightened times it is frowned upon for a woman to take up with a mythological steed. How will they find a way to be together that is acceptable to polite society?

Hoban hops cheerfully, if sometimes a little confusingly, between several narrators. Whilst his text is much concerned with the nature of attraction and peppered with artistic references, his tone is always engaging and frequently amusing, and his choppy chapters guarantee a lively read. If he didn't quite go out on a high, at least he went out on a hippogriff.

Perhaps, when Drop John's riding on my back and I take the chimpanzee's hand, I can swim towards the golden-green light, tread the Trokeville Way, pass through the hidden lion and meet Mr Hoban beyond the last visible dog, there to sing to him through the head of a cabbage about what a treat his books were. Nnvsnu! Tsrungh!

[Adam Connors · Rating 4 out of 5]

I read this because I loved Ridley Walker (it's one of my favourite books) so I came in with rather too high expectations and also read with a sympathetic eye... I'm not sure how a non-fan would do with this, although there are some lovely ideas. There is a sense of the author *trying* to say something, or understand something... Not always successfully, but still an ambitious goal... He talks about the dream of reality and the many millions of people who've lived and died, and by the end it's strangely affecting... But not, I don't think, for anyone who isn't already a fan.

[Katy · Rating 4 out of 5]

A short and somewhat odd book i picked up in the library on impulse. I think this one may percolate around my brain for a while. A hippogriff escapes from a sixteenth century Italian poem. He's sick of carrying the hero to rescue the girl, and goes to find her himself. In modern San Francisco. I have no idea what else to say about this.

[A · Rating 3 out of 5]

I really liked this book. It was bonkers. It was weird and wonderful and for the most part I didn't know which way was up. Yet, I loved it not in spite of its weirdness but because of its weirdness. The wordplay and use of language in it thrilled me, and the story of Angelica and her hippogriff was oddly touching. A wild ride on a sea of words, highly recommended.

[Sarah · Rating 2 out of 5]

Can't really describe it and that means I don't think it was great because I can't be bothered to try.

It was weird. but hard to follow. Life's too short. Find another book.

[Martin · Rating 4 out of 5]

Very nice. Not at all what I was expecting. Nice Green Apple cameo as well.

[Tim Hollo]

Another brilliantly bizarre and bizarrely brilliant book by surely one of the strangest minds of the 20th century. Yeesh, that was a trip :-)