Corbenic
Grade 7 Up&ndash;Seventeen-year-old Cal abandons his alcoholic, schizophrenic mother and shabby English town. On the train to his uncle's house in a posh suburb, he gets off at Corbenic, which he later learns is nonexistent. He makes his way to the court of the crippled Fisher King, who knows Cal is really Percival, the last hope to restore the king's wasteland to its former glory. When the teenager fails to identify a vision of the Holy Grail, he is banished back to modern England. Then, as the legend goes, he searches for Corbenic, but can only return when he comes to terms with the mother he's rejected. Along the way he meets Shadow and Hawk, Arthurian reenactors who may or may not be the real thing. The blurring of fantasy and reality is sometimes confusing but helps to sustain the mood of wonder and mystery. Both the real and surreal settings are lushly rendered, and Fisher's physical descriptions are especially evocative. The dialogue is sharp, but while Cal's conversations with Shadow and Hawk are natural and engaging, his inner monologue is repetitive and boring. Cal is drawn with a heavy hand as a materialistic, pretentious whiner, and while this portrait keeps to the myth, he's impossible for readers to care about. Minor characters are portrayed with subtle wit and sweetness and are unfortunately more compelling than the narrator or his quest. Though the plot moves steadily, those unfamiliar with the myth may find the journey tedious.&ndash;Johanna Lewis, New York Public LibraryCopyright &copy; Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.