**
The dust jacket flap fairly summarizes the book's plot. That being said, the author can't seem to make up their mind if they're writing a realistic novel of British family life circa World War I or a fantasy novel. Readers expecting a realistic novel would certainly have found the last third of the book fantastic and perhaps incomprehensible. And someone wishing to be swept into a strange fantasy world is certainly going to find the overlong build up of a family's social dramas and disintegration a rather tedious slog before the fantasy element takes over.
Philip and Mary have enjoyed eleven years of happy married life in London when their family doctor tells them that their six year old son Michael must be moved to the country and a more hospitable climate. Along with his sister Sylvia, the family finds a country home in Wokeborough with well-timbered grounds and surrounding woods.
After walking with Philip every morning to catch his train to work, Mary wanders back home through the woods which are mysteriously calling her. Her rambles become longer and more frequent. She feels the woods are waiting to share something with her -- a vision, a revelation? She has a vein of sensuousness and modern day Pan worship underlying her small town social life. She distrusts these feelings, but they seem to be carried on in her sensitive son Michael.
As he grows older, he too is attracted to nature and the woods. Aside from feeling unknown presences and rejoicing in the solitude of the natural world, his life remains little changed.
The family's new life in the country with all its joys and trials are meticulously depicted. Philip the father has a long mental breakdown from unknown causes with embarrassing public scenes. Eventually he has to be committed. Sylvia, now eighteen, yearns for the city and more excitement, and leaves to make her way in London. Michael heads to university and for the first time finds friends and new horizons. He takes long walks into the nearby woods after dark and starts sleeping under the stars. His college friends good naturedly tease him about it, but something is calling him . . .
Sylvia falls in with a bohemian crowd. One of the poet's is named Dagon! She's drinking and missing work and eventually turns to prostitution to survive. Michael knows nothing of this until Mary the mother, and a widow by now, asks him to find out what's become of Sylvia. He finds her barely surviving in a slum, ill and destitute. He nurses her, they reconcile, but she dies.
If you've managed to read this far, you would be forgiven for wondering how Michael finds his true calling and puts all this misery behind him. Here is where the novel becomes compelling. On one of his college rambles Michael stays away for days, missing classes, sleeping out at night in the woods, worshipping pagan gods, foraging for food, and asking handouts at lonely farmhouses. One older woman who shares her food, with second sight sees a physical transformation in Michael taking place harking back to creatures out of pagan belief.
Michael has now become a faun. He meets a nymph, invisible to humans, a spirit of the place in the woods, and she tells him of her life and the other pagan creatures. They fall deeply in love in their idyllic existence, although she is frightened and cautions him permission to stay together must be sought from the god who rules over them all, presumably Pan. Michael's transformation into a pagan creature is almost complete, and he seeks to find, overcome and replace Pan as the new god of the woods and take the nymph as his mate. Running swiftly through the trees, he feels strong and invincible . . .
Meanwhile Mary has asked Philip's old boss, George Gresham, a close family friend,to try to find out what's become of Michael. George has watched Michael grow up and always wondered about his different ways. George with local trackers traces Michael to the woods, finds pieces of old discarded clothing, hears a shriek in the night, and the next day discovers Michael's faun body lying dead with an arrow in the throat. He brushes aside his hair and finds horns. He brushes the bracken aside and finds hoofs at the end of his brown legs.
He tenderly pulls out the arrow and hears half human wailing on the breeze. He whispers to himself in broken, awed words -- "Early Greek! --Ah, dear, this is what I wanted to prevent -- and yet -- I never really believed -- So hard dear, so hard you tried to return -- so nearly there -- But these things cannot be -- The anger of Dionysos -- Alas, the anger of Dionysos -- !"
I believe the last third of the book is compelling and the descriptions of the wood and pagan creatures are fascinating. There is more momentum as you follow Michael's pagan journey in modern times.
Steven Mayes
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