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Goblin
Ian McEwan’s Atonement meets Guillermo del Toro’s Pan’s Labyrinth in this extraordinary debut.
A novel set between the past and present with magical realist elements. Goblin is an outcast girl growing up in London during World War 2. After witnessing a shocking event she increasingly takes refuge in a self-constructed but magical imaginary world. Having been rejected by her mother, she leads a feral life amidst the craters of London’s Blitz, and takes comfort in her family of animals, abandoned pets she’s rescued from London’s streets.
In 2011, a chance meeting and an unwanted phone call compels an elderly Goblin to return to London amidst the riots and face the ghosts of her past. Will she discover the truth buried deep in her fractured memory or retreat to the safety of near madness? In Goblin, debut novelist Dundas has constructed an utterly beguiling historical tale with an unforgettable female protagonist at its centre.
A novel set between the past and present with magical realist elements. Goblin is an outcast girl growing up in London during World War 2. After witnessing a shocking event she increasingly takes refuge in a self-constructed but magical imaginary world. Having been rejected by her mother, she leads a feral life amidst the craters of London’s Blitz, and takes comfort in her family of animals, abandoned pets she’s rescued from London’s streets.
In 2011, a chance meeting and an unwanted phone call compels an elderly Goblin to return to London amidst the riots and face the ghosts of her past. Will she discover the truth buried deep in her fractured memory or retreat to the safety of near madness? In Goblin, debut novelist Dundas has constructed an utterly beguiling historical tale with an unforgettable female protagonist at its centre.
296 pages, Paperback
First published May 18, 2017
19 people are currently reading
694 people want to read
About the author
Ever Dundas
5 books64 followersEver Dundas writes literary fiction, horror, fantasy and sci-fi. Her first novel Goblin won the Saltire First Book Award 2017. Her second novel, critically acclaimed sci-fi thriller HellSans, is shortlisted for Scotland's National Book Award's Fiction Book of the Year 2023.
Ever is on The List's 2022 Hot 100 and The Bookseller's 2022 Top 150 influential people in UK publishing.
Ever is on The List's 2022 Hot 100 and The Bookseller's 2022 Top 150 influential people in UK publishing.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 78 reviews
August 22, 2018
Goblin, now a librarian, grew up in London during WW II. Rejected by her mother and an outcast Goblin spent most of her time wandering around with her dog Devil rescuing other animals and amusing herself with her active imagination during her childhood. Now at the end of her life Goblin is being called back to the past, to answer questions about a picture she took of an animal massacre that took place in the middle of the war.
I didn't read any summaries before just picking up the book which might explain why it took me a while to understand what was going on. I'm actually surprised other people seem to have enjoyed the book so much more than I did. I found it bizarre and confusing at least until halfway through. I'm not sure if it was because there was Ben eating books and Goblin barely distinguishing between reality and make believe or because they're just being British. Side note why do people in the UK talk like that, it's not even English honestly who can understand what they're saying.
After I started to understand what was happening the book did become much more bearable but I still didn't really enjoy it. I don't have anything against eccentric characters but the weirdness took away from the actual story line for me. Also it just felt like there wasn't as clear of a pathway to the story line, like we follow Goblin through out her life and then get back to her in the present having to deal with the photo debacle and it wasn't clear to me where it was going or why everyone was so obsessed with a bunch of dogs being killed. It just didn't come together well for me and then we find out at the end that and then I was just bummed out and I felt cheated because I was depressed but I got nothing else out of the book.
It was just a confusing experience where I was unsure of the purpose of the book or what was happening for the majority of it and it just distracted me to have things like Monsta and people eating books thrown in so I didn't enjoy it. I seem to be the only one though because most of the other reviews of the book are positive so it might be worthwhile to read some of the other reviews as well.
I didn't read any summaries before just picking up the book which might explain why it took me a while to understand what was going on. I'm actually surprised other people seem to have enjoyed the book so much more than I did. I found it bizarre and confusing at least until halfway through. I'm not sure if it was because there was Ben eating books and Goblin barely distinguishing between reality and make believe or because they're just being British. Side note why do people in the UK talk like that, it's not even English honestly who can understand what they're saying.
After I started to understand what was happening the book did become much more bearable but I still didn't really enjoy it. I don't have anything against eccentric characters but the weirdness took away from the actual story line for me. Also it just felt like there wasn't as clear of a pathway to the story line, like we follow Goblin through out her life and then get back to her in the present having to deal with the photo debacle and it wasn't clear to me where it was going or why everyone was so obsessed with a bunch of dogs being killed. It just didn't come together well for me and then we find out at the end that and then I was just bummed out and I felt cheated because I was depressed but I got nothing else out of the book.
It was just a confusing experience where I was unsure of the purpose of the book or what was happening for the majority of it and it just distracted me to have things like Monsta and people eating books thrown in so I didn't enjoy it. I seem to be the only one though because most of the other reviews of the book are positive so it might be worthwhile to read some of the other reviews as well.
July 16, 2017
Ms. G. Bradfield aka Old Lady is a reader-in-residence at a library in Edinburgh. Her homeless friend Ben, a frequent library patron, could be found chewing books and sucking the ink off the pages, of course, in alphabetical order...rip, chew, spit! Ben presents the Old Lady with photos he has found in the library that record events occurring in World War ll London. Photos of bones, doll parts, a shrew head, evidence of animal carnage, and a camera have been unearthed. The photos suggest that the photographer was a child. In 2011, a Mr. Brian Mackenzie comes forward stating that a girl named Goblin snapped photos of an animal massacre during the London Blitz. A London detective contacts Goblin requesting that she shed some light on these photos. She is reluctant to revisit her harrowing wartime childhood memories.
When we meet Goblin, a street urchin, she is eight years old. By her own admission, she had a dirty face, short self-cut greasy blond hair, and believed she was ugly. Her mother told her directly that she did not want her and wished for her demise. Goblin's playground consisted of caves, tunnels, and visits to the cemetery. Her best friends were her dog Devil, her doll Monsta, and a slew of imaginary friends. She rescued wayward animals including a special pig she named Corporal Pig.
Goblin, with friends Mackenzie and Steve gathered daily at a worksite, eating apples by a fire while she created magical stories to entertain them. Some spooky stories included the Queen of Hearts wearing her husband's heart while it was still beating and dripping with blood. Often, Goblin slept in the cemetery where she kept a treasure box of oddities she stored in one of the mausoleums.
Goblin's journey alternated between WW ll London and the London of 2011. Now at age 81, she paints a picture of her family of animals and how she was parented during wartime. Her home life was devastating. How could a parent call her child a "dirty rotten Goblin -runt?" Goblin, however, found her way, making friends and finding a place in a new family,a circus family. "Goblin" by Ever Dundas was unlike any other book and defies genre classification. For a first novel, Dundas has created a superb tome!
Thank you Freight Books and Net Galley for the opportunity to read and review "Goblin".
When we meet Goblin, a street urchin, she is eight years old. By her own admission, she had a dirty face, short self-cut greasy blond hair, and believed she was ugly. Her mother told her directly that she did not want her and wished for her demise. Goblin's playground consisted of caves, tunnels, and visits to the cemetery. Her best friends were her dog Devil, her doll Monsta, and a slew of imaginary friends. She rescued wayward animals including a special pig she named Corporal Pig.
Goblin, with friends Mackenzie and Steve gathered daily at a worksite, eating apples by a fire while she created magical stories to entertain them. Some spooky stories included the Queen of Hearts wearing her husband's heart while it was still beating and dripping with blood. Often, Goblin slept in the cemetery where she kept a treasure box of oddities she stored in one of the mausoleums.
Goblin's journey alternated between WW ll London and the London of 2011. Now at age 81, she paints a picture of her family of animals and how she was parented during wartime. Her home life was devastating. How could a parent call her child a "dirty rotten Goblin -runt?" Goblin, however, found her way, making friends and finding a place in a new family,a circus family. "Goblin" by Ever Dundas was unlike any other book and defies genre classification. For a first novel, Dundas has created a superb tome!
Thank you Freight Books and Net Galley for the opportunity to read and review "Goblin".
August 5, 2017
The best thing about GR is since joining most of the fabulous little known (to me anyway) books I’ve read I’ve found through the eloquent and enthusiastic reviews of friends here – Chasing the King of Hearts (Roger and Angela), Moon Tiger (Julie), All But My Life: A Memoir (Julie and Marialyce), The Way Back to Florence (Elyse), So Long, See You Tomorrow (Teresa and Carol), In the Land of Armadillos: Stories (Elyse). The latest is this one (Fran). Though I didn’t love it quite as much as the books I mentioned above I did thoroughly enjoy it.
Goblin begins with a mystery that takes place in a London cemetery during the blitz in WW2. At 81 years old the woman who narrates her own story is about to find her troubling past catch up with her. She begins telling her story. The only name she has ever had is Goblin. The best part of the novel is her childhood as a misfit street urchin during the war. She has a beloved dog called Devil and a doll she animates called Monsta. In the narrative she flits over the mysterious event, unwilling, it’s clear, to dwell on or even understand it. We learn however that her dog was shot and her beloved older brother went missing at the same time. When she’s evacuated there’s a terrific depiction of adolescent love between her and another young girl.
The fizz went out of it a bit for me when WW2 ends and Goblin joins a circus. Suddenly the focus became a bit blurred. The plot was sidelined. It became more biography than novel. Lots of characters arrive who have no purpose. I never really believed in the circus. Until now the novel had been animated by a lively and compelling imagination at work. The circus though was oddly unimaginative. I’ve got a feeling you could skip twenty or thirty pages of the circus section without it mattering to your understanding of the novel. It picks up again when Goblin moves to Venice and the central mystery of the novel is reactivated. Now and again the novel strains a bit too hard to be quirky – as for example at the beginning when a character is depicted as ripping out pages of library novels and chewing them. For the most part though it’s animated by a delightful mischievous imagination and is especially impressive at evoking the secret inner life of a troubled child and the totems such children invent or collect to appease their loneliness. Wounded or neglected animals play a big role here. It’s also interesting with regards to female sexuality. All in all, a very impressive debut novel and I’ll be keen to read Ever Dundas’ next book.
Goblin begins with a mystery that takes place in a London cemetery during the blitz in WW2. At 81 years old the woman who narrates her own story is about to find her troubling past catch up with her. She begins telling her story. The only name she has ever had is Goblin. The best part of the novel is her childhood as a misfit street urchin during the war. She has a beloved dog called Devil and a doll she animates called Monsta. In the narrative she flits over the mysterious event, unwilling, it’s clear, to dwell on or even understand it. We learn however that her dog was shot and her beloved older brother went missing at the same time. When she’s evacuated there’s a terrific depiction of adolescent love between her and another young girl.
The fizz went out of it a bit for me when WW2 ends and Goblin joins a circus. Suddenly the focus became a bit blurred. The plot was sidelined. It became more biography than novel. Lots of characters arrive who have no purpose. I never really believed in the circus. Until now the novel had been animated by a lively and compelling imagination at work. The circus though was oddly unimaginative. I’ve got a feeling you could skip twenty or thirty pages of the circus section without it mattering to your understanding of the novel. It picks up again when Goblin moves to Venice and the central mystery of the novel is reactivated. Now and again the novel strains a bit too hard to be quirky – as for example at the beginning when a character is depicted as ripping out pages of library novels and chewing them. For the most part though it’s animated by a delightful mischievous imagination and is especially impressive at evoking the secret inner life of a troubled child and the totems such children invent or collect to appease their loneliness. Wounded or neglected animals play a big role here. It’s also interesting with regards to female sexuality. All in all, a very impressive debut novel and I’ll be keen to read Ever Dundas’ next book.
May 22, 2017
Goblin might very well be my favourite protagonist since Don Quixote. I cared for her, I laughed and cried with her, I saw myself in her.
I've just finished reading her adventures and I want to start all over again: Bones, doll parts, a shrew head, a camera.
I've just finished reading her adventures and I want to start all over again: Bones, doll parts, a shrew head, a camera.
January 11, 2018
A unique life, uniquely told...
Goblin is an old lady now, working as a Reader in an Edinburgh library. But when the newspapers report that a strange pile of objects have been unearthed – bones, bits of a doll, a shrew head and a camera – she is thrust back into memories of her early life as a street urchin in wartime London. The camera still works and when the police develop the pictures they determine they could only have been taken by a child, and now they want Goblin to come in for an interview.
Although there is a mystery around the photos and why the police want to interview Goblin, this is rather secondary. The book is really the story of Goblin's life – the events in it, but also her inner life, her imagined reality. This gives it the feel of some kind of magical realism though, in fact, there's no actual supernatural element to it. It is a strange book, dark in places and with some truly disturbing aspects, but because of the beautifully drawn central character it has a warmth and humanity that helps the reader to get through the tougher parts. There's also kindness here, and love, so while some parts are distressing, the overall effect is of compassion rather than bleakness.
Goblin's mother disliked and neglected her daughter, calling her Goblin-runt, hence the nickname that stayed with her throughout her life. As a result, she ran almost wild, spending most of her time outside playing with her friends and her beloved dog Devil. Dundas evokes this childhood superbly, showing how important imagination is in childish games, how children form little societies of their own with their own hierarchies, detached from the adult world, and how they view the life of the adults around them from a unique perspective, sometimes only half-comprehending, sometimes perhaps seeing more clearly than older people who have wrapped themselves in society's conventions. She also shows how scary the world can be and how children build their own mental defences from things they can't properly process. Goblin the child is a wonderful creation.
When war begins, Goblin is sent off as an evacuee to the country. Dundas presents a dark view of evacuation, with some of the children being used as no more than unpaid workers – one could almost say slaves – and subject to various forms of cruelty and abuse. I don't want to give away too much of the story, so I'll skip ahead to say that at a later point Goblin finds herself working in a circus, and later yet, as a woman, she spends time in Italy before ending up in Edinburgh. Each part of her story is told well, although for me adult Goblin never became as beguiling a character as the child.
As she grows, we hear far too much graphic detail about her sexual experiences for my liking, with the emphasis firmly on anatomical mechanics rather than emotion. There is also an unfortunate descent into repetitive foul language, sexual and otherwise, including frequent and entirely unnecessary use of the 'c'-word. (I've said it before, but I'll say it again – in years of reading thousands of reviews, I have never once seen a reviewer complain that a book would have been better if only there had been more foul language in it.) There's also a not entirely successful stream-of-consciousness or experimental section in the middle, but fortunately it's not too long. I admit I came near to abandoning it at this point, which would have been a shame because it returns to a high standard in the latter parts.
Goblin is an animal lover, her life filled from childhood with various creatures she has rescued. For those sensitive to the treatment of animals in fiction, there are some difficult scenes, a couple of which have left me with images I'd prefer not to have. But these are essential to the book and not presented in a gratuitous way. They go towards explaining who Goblin is, and they are grounded in the truth of wartime; aspects we may have chosen to sanitise or forget over the years, but which deserve to be remembered as much perhaps as the effects of war on humans.
Except for the section in the middle that I've already mentioned, the writing is of a very high quality and altogether this is an intriguing début. I enjoyed some parts of it hugely, some less so, and some not at all, but I thought that overall it shows immense promise and a refreshing originality. The author is clearly someone willing to take a risk, to avoid following the herd, and I am interested to see where she heads in the future. I suspect she may go to places too dark or too graphic for me to want to follow her, but I also think she has the talent and intelligence to develop into a major novelist of the future. This book won the Saltire Society Literary Award for First Book of the Year (2017) – a well-deserved winner in my opinion. Despite my somewhat mixed feelings, I recommend it not just for what it is but as an enticing introduction to an author with great potential.
NB This book was provided for review by the publisher, Saraband.
www.fictionfanblog.wordpress.com
Goblin is an old lady now, working as a Reader in an Edinburgh library. But when the newspapers report that a strange pile of objects have been unearthed – bones, bits of a doll, a shrew head and a camera – she is thrust back into memories of her early life as a street urchin in wartime London. The camera still works and when the police develop the pictures they determine they could only have been taken by a child, and now they want Goblin to come in for an interview.
Although there is a mystery around the photos and why the police want to interview Goblin, this is rather secondary. The book is really the story of Goblin's life – the events in it, but also her inner life, her imagined reality. This gives it the feel of some kind of magical realism though, in fact, there's no actual supernatural element to it. It is a strange book, dark in places and with some truly disturbing aspects, but because of the beautifully drawn central character it has a warmth and humanity that helps the reader to get through the tougher parts. There's also kindness here, and love, so while some parts are distressing, the overall effect is of compassion rather than bleakness.
Goblin's mother disliked and neglected her daughter, calling her Goblin-runt, hence the nickname that stayed with her throughout her life. As a result, she ran almost wild, spending most of her time outside playing with her friends and her beloved dog Devil. Dundas evokes this childhood superbly, showing how important imagination is in childish games, how children form little societies of their own with their own hierarchies, detached from the adult world, and how they view the life of the adults around them from a unique perspective, sometimes only half-comprehending, sometimes perhaps seeing more clearly than older people who have wrapped themselves in society's conventions. She also shows how scary the world can be and how children build their own mental defences from things they can't properly process. Goblin the child is a wonderful creation.
When war begins, Goblin is sent off as an evacuee to the country. Dundas presents a dark view of evacuation, with some of the children being used as no more than unpaid workers – one could almost say slaves – and subject to various forms of cruelty and abuse. I don't want to give away too much of the story, so I'll skip ahead to say that at a later point Goblin finds herself working in a circus, and later yet, as a woman, she spends time in Italy before ending up in Edinburgh. Each part of her story is told well, although for me adult Goblin never became as beguiling a character as the child.
As she grows, we hear far too much graphic detail about her sexual experiences for my liking, with the emphasis firmly on anatomical mechanics rather than emotion. There is also an unfortunate descent into repetitive foul language, sexual and otherwise, including frequent and entirely unnecessary use of the 'c'-word. (I've said it before, but I'll say it again – in years of reading thousands of reviews, I have never once seen a reviewer complain that a book would have been better if only there had been more foul language in it.) There's also a not entirely successful stream-of-consciousness or experimental section in the middle, but fortunately it's not too long. I admit I came near to abandoning it at this point, which would have been a shame because it returns to a high standard in the latter parts.
Goblin is an animal lover, her life filled from childhood with various creatures she has rescued. For those sensitive to the treatment of animals in fiction, there are some difficult scenes, a couple of which have left me with images I'd prefer not to have. But these are essential to the book and not presented in a gratuitous way. They go towards explaining who Goblin is, and they are grounded in the truth of wartime; aspects we may have chosen to sanitise or forget over the years, but which deserve to be remembered as much perhaps as the effects of war on humans.
Except for the section in the middle that I've already mentioned, the writing is of a very high quality and altogether this is an intriguing début. I enjoyed some parts of it hugely, some less so, and some not at all, but I thought that overall it shows immense promise and a refreshing originality. The author is clearly someone willing to take a risk, to avoid following the herd, and I am interested to see where she heads in the future. I suspect she may go to places too dark or too graphic for me to want to follow her, but I also think she has the talent and intelligence to develop into a major novelist of the future. This book won the Saltire Society Literary Award for First Book of the Year (2017) – a well-deserved winner in my opinion. Despite my somewhat mixed feelings, I recommend it not just for what it is but as an enticing introduction to an author with great potential.
NB This book was provided for review by the publisher, Saraband.
www.fictionfanblog.wordpress.com
June 13, 2017
An outstanding work! This is the best book I've read this year. It's beautifully written and plotted and manages to raise important issues without ever losing Goblin's voice and the wonderful story.
This is everything a truly great novel should be, all at once heartbreaking and joyous and spellbinding and funny and sad and hopeful.
I love it and I love Goblin, I don't want to let her go!
Prepare to laugh and cry and fall in love.
This is everything a truly great novel should be, all at once heartbreaking and joyous and spellbinding and funny and sad and hopeful.
I love it and I love Goblin, I don't want to let her go!
Prepare to laugh and cry and fall in love.
May 25, 2017
My favourite book of the year so far, this was spellbinding. I loved her adventures, her world and imagination. I cried, twice. The end came too soon, and I found myself back at the beginning and all so beautifully done. Truly a really special debut.
March 27, 2019
(Correct pagecount 294, not 272.)
Really liked this. Surreal and gritty at the same time. World War 2 and subsequent decades seen through the fey, somewhat warped mind of a very unusual child/person/being, with a present-day (well, 2011) storyline gradually putting together the pieces of what actually went on.
Reminded me a bit of Oranges Are Not the Only Fruit, I'm not quite sure why.
Content warnings: animal death, parental neglect + verbal abuse, occasional fairly graphic sex, suicide references, self-harm, .
Really liked this. Surreal and gritty at the same time. World War 2 and subsequent decades seen through the fey, somewhat warped mind of a very unusual child/person/being, with a present-day (well, 2011) storyline gradually putting together the pieces of what actually went on.
Reminded me a bit of Oranges Are Not the Only Fruit, I'm not quite sure why.
Content warnings: animal death, parental neglect + verbal abuse, occasional fairly graphic sex, suicide references, self-harm, .
Read
August 13, 2019Litfic with time jumping, magical realist weirdness, circus found family and other such Angela Carter. Also abused child protagonist, animal abuse, homelessness, terrible secrets, queer issues, murder, and the Blitz. Eh. Piling human tragedy on to the page certainly makes an impact, but does leave the lingering question of how much of that impact is the author's words/work rather than the events depicted, and in the end this didn't really resonate with me as a human story rather than a series of events. Hey ho.
May 16, 2017
Goblin is a sprawling coming-of-age story with a unique protagonist and a highly unpleasant atmosphere.
The novel starts in London, in 2011 and on the brink of WWII, as our spunky protagonist, the titular Goblin, runs wild with her two friends and Devil the dog, making up insane stories, constantly trying to hang out with her older brother David, and going deeper and deeper into her fantasies. And, in the times closer to the present, working in a library, hanging out with a homeless kid, and drinking copious amounts of whiskey. The rest of her family, mather and father, are infinitely less prominent, her father barely a presence and her mother a one-dimensional villain with no redeeming qualities. Lazy characterization notwithstanding, Dundas manages to turn the mother's wickedness into effective moments of spiteful hatred, occasionally terrifying even.
As the war finally descends, Goblin has to leave her less-than-kind surroundings and evacuate, starting a journey that will last longer than she anticipates.
All of this is just the beginning, maybe a third of the book or so, as locations and years pass by, Goblin growing into a more fleshed out person, becoming more self-aware, but also shutting out the horrible events of the past as much as she can. This unwillingness to admit the darkness in her younger years is a remarkable flaw, especially in contrast with Goblin's sexuality never being a problem for her, as she is never confused about liking someone, boy or girl, loving deeply and passionately, showing the softer side of her.
Goblin's life is unusual even in the more mundane aspects of it, but Ever tries to weave some surreal aspects into the tale in the form of monsters, ghosts, and the worship of lizars. This is successful only occassionally, as the passages where Goblin prays or rambles about "holy holy holy" and "sneak sneak sneaking" are more tedious than engaging and more taxing than rejuvenating in the midst of an otherwise strong narrative. The surreality does add a nifty personal touch, but the imagery works better than the words.
The mystery that eventually unfolds at the center of the latter part of the book is a cool one, though it's not what makes the ending soar. Goblin the novel is, at its core, very humane. With its infinite love of people and animals, the depiction of the protagonist's life in the circus manages to shine as a much needed beacon of hope in the bleak world of the book. Even the tragedies that do take place are just dark spots in the genuine pleasure the reader will derive from reading about Goblin's happiness after the awful things she lived through.
Overall, this is a stunningly well-made debut that will make you upset, angry, and tearful. It will also take a while to suck you in, but when the feeling hits - you will be captured for the duration of the wild ride that is Goblin.
The novel starts in London, in 2011 and on the brink of WWII, as our spunky protagonist, the titular Goblin, runs wild with her two friends and Devil the dog, making up insane stories, constantly trying to hang out with her older brother David, and going deeper and deeper into her fantasies. And, in the times closer to the present, working in a library, hanging out with a homeless kid, and drinking copious amounts of whiskey. The rest of her family, mather and father, are infinitely less prominent, her father barely a presence and her mother a one-dimensional villain with no redeeming qualities. Lazy characterization notwithstanding, Dundas manages to turn the mother's wickedness into effective moments of spiteful hatred, occasionally terrifying even.
As the war finally descends, Goblin has to leave her less-than-kind surroundings and evacuate, starting a journey that will last longer than she anticipates.
All of this is just the beginning, maybe a third of the book or so, as locations and years pass by, Goblin growing into a more fleshed out person, becoming more self-aware, but also shutting out the horrible events of the past as much as she can. This unwillingness to admit the darkness in her younger years is a remarkable flaw, especially in contrast with Goblin's sexuality never being a problem for her, as she is never confused about liking someone, boy or girl, loving deeply and passionately, showing the softer side of her.
Goblin's life is unusual even in the more mundane aspects of it, but Ever tries to weave some surreal aspects into the tale in the form of monsters, ghosts, and the worship of lizars. This is successful only occassionally, as the passages where Goblin prays or rambles about "holy holy holy" and "sneak sneak sneaking" are more tedious than engaging and more taxing than rejuvenating in the midst of an otherwise strong narrative. The surreality does add a nifty personal touch, but the imagery works better than the words.
The mystery that eventually unfolds at the center of the latter part of the book is a cool one, though it's not what makes the ending soar. Goblin the novel is, at its core, very humane. With its infinite love of people and animals, the depiction of the protagonist's life in the circus manages to shine as a much needed beacon of hope in the bleak world of the book. Even the tragedies that do take place are just dark spots in the genuine pleasure the reader will derive from reading about Goblin's happiness after the awful things she lived through.
Overall, this is a stunningly well-made debut that will make you upset, angry, and tearful. It will also take a while to suck you in, but when the feeling hits - you will be captured for the duration of the wild ride that is Goblin.
May 19, 2017
Goblin is the only name by which we know narrator, a reader-in-residence at Edinburgh Central Library whose best friend is a homeless Scot whose life goal is to eat (yes, eat) literature. In alphabetical order, of course. But news of a grisly discovery in London which dates back to the early days of the Second World War and Goblin's own difficult East End childhood. The news hits Goblin hard and she falls ill, with only Ben and his dog Sam to care for her. When her strength returns it is only to discover that the contents of the makeshift grave; animal bones, broken toys and a camera among them, have placed her at the site and identified her a the photographer. Eventually she must return to London to face her past, even while the riots of 2011 bring the city into chaos. Her journey in memory takes us even further, from the bombed-out streets of the Blitz, to a less-than-idyllic evacuation in Cornwall, a travelling circus, the canals of Venice and the tenements of Edinburgh.
The blurb is somewhat deceptive. While much of the novel hinges on that liminal area between dream and reality, imagination and the real world, Goblin is not magical realism in the way that that term is usually understood. Instead, Dundas teases us with unsettling penetrations of the impossible (and often nightmarish) into the light of day. Goblin's companion Monsta is unexplained for a long time, described only by a few confusing and and unpleasant features but its constant presence on the periphery adds suitable unease. The final reveal is both touching and troubling, a winning combination that Dundas manages with impressive flair.
This is not an easy read. It is dark and sometimes distressing (the aftermath of the pet massacre of 1939 sets the tone) with themes of war, delusion, abuse, neglect and violence. But it is also bold and baroque. Dundas has a real feel for imagery which is sometimes grotesque but always affecting and really put me in mind of Baudelaire's ability to disgust and invite at the same time. Some of the events are quite far-fetched but they are grounded in wonderful, warm characters and a vivid evocation of place in the wider context of Dundas's peculiar gothic atmosphere they do not feel out of place. Underpinning all of this is a deep understanding of the period of Goblin's childhood. Britain has a tendency to romanticise its wartime experience and expunge some of the darker tendencies of the Home Front experience. Evacuees did not always receive the warm welcome and kind shelter that CS Lewis's Professor gave to the Pevencies, the civilian population were not immune to excessive and violent reactions in time of panic and the need to pull together certainly did not erase all crime or overcome all divisions. Dundas acknowledges all of this without denying that there was also plenty of courage, kindness and sacrifice. It's a clever touch to contrast all of this with the London Riots of 2011. The comparison was made at the time (we always fall back on the rose-tinted idea of the "Blitz spirit) but in Goblin it is far more subtle and credible.
I loved Goblin. Despite all the potential pitfalls of a fantastical plot and monstrous (in every sense) characters it demonstrates Ever Dundas's confidence and a sure knowledge of herself-as-writer that is remarkable for a debut novel.
The blurb is somewhat deceptive. While much of the novel hinges on that liminal area between dream and reality, imagination and the real world, Goblin is not magical realism in the way that that term is usually understood. Instead, Dundas teases us with unsettling penetrations of the impossible (and often nightmarish) into the light of day. Goblin's companion Monsta is unexplained for a long time, described only by a few confusing and and unpleasant features but its constant presence on the periphery adds suitable unease. The final reveal is both touching and troubling, a winning combination that Dundas manages with impressive flair.
This is not an easy read. It is dark and sometimes distressing (the aftermath of the pet massacre of 1939 sets the tone) with themes of war, delusion, abuse, neglect and violence. But it is also bold and baroque. Dundas has a real feel for imagery which is sometimes grotesque but always affecting and really put me in mind of Baudelaire's ability to disgust and invite at the same time. Some of the events are quite far-fetched but they are grounded in wonderful, warm characters and a vivid evocation of place in the wider context of Dundas's peculiar gothic atmosphere they do not feel out of place. Underpinning all of this is a deep understanding of the period of Goblin's childhood. Britain has a tendency to romanticise its wartime experience and expunge some of the darker tendencies of the Home Front experience. Evacuees did not always receive the warm welcome and kind shelter that CS Lewis's Professor gave to the Pevencies, the civilian population were not immune to excessive and violent reactions in time of panic and the need to pull together certainly did not erase all crime or overcome all divisions. Dundas acknowledges all of this without denying that there was also plenty of courage, kindness and sacrifice. It's a clever touch to contrast all of this with the London Riots of 2011. The comparison was made at the time (we always fall back on the rose-tinted idea of the "Blitz spirit) but in Goblin it is far more subtle and credible.
I loved Goblin. Despite all the potential pitfalls of a fantastical plot and monstrous (in every sense) characters it demonstrates Ever Dundas's confidence and a sure knowledge of herself-as-writer that is remarkable for a debut novel.
June 11, 2017
A magical book, filled with eccentric and engaging characters. I've read nothing like this before. The author weaves an enchanting story, moving between Goblin as she is now and as she was during her many adventures, from being a child during the blitz in London, to being accepted by the circus. There is tragedy but there is also compassion and humour. Throughout it all is a deep reverence and love for the animals we share the world with. You will never forget Goblin or the world she shows us.
October 19, 2018
'She called me Goblin-runt from the day I was born and it stuck.' Aldus het vrouwenpersonage over zichzelf en hoe haar moeder fictie-overleveringen de wereld in hielp dat de vroedvrouw zich dood schrok om de blauwe geboortekleur van haar dochter. Ze had dan ook liever een andere zoon, zoals Goblin's oudere broer David. In deze magisch-realistische geschiedschrijving á la Angela Carter of Kurt Vonnegut herschrijft en fabuleert een volwassen Goblin haar oorlogsherinneringen aan haar eigen trauma's. Het ene moment banjerde ze zorgeloos met hond Devil en haar mensenvriendjes door een Engeland waar de oorlog steeds meer voelbaar werd. Het volgende moment raakte ze alle onschuld kwijt en kwam ze in een wreedaardige wereld terecht waar het weerloze en het eigene geen plek hebben. Of het om de British Pet Massacre (1939) gaat waar 750.000 huisdieren werden opgeofferd om mogelijke voedseltekorten voor te zijn. Of hoe Goblin met haar ontluikende biseksualiteit en jongensachtige uiterlijk niet in de juiste hokjes wist te passen, terwijl ze, in opmaat naar The Blitz (de bombardementenregen op London), naar een streng religieus pleeggezin werd gestuurd. Haar eerste vriendinnetje had het beduidend beter getroffen met haar pleegouders, maar deze onschuldige kalverliefde kon geen plek hebben in de patriarchale milieu in die tijd. Of broer David, dienstweigeraar, die geen affiniteit had met het legergebeuren, maar klappen moest opvangen van mannetjesmannen omdat de propagandamachine keurig ronkte.
Maar tijden veranderen en wie welke verhalen vertelt verandert mee. Een oudere, wijzere Goblin gaat vrouwmoedig de verstikkende tijdsgeest en haar eigen oorlogstrauma te lijf met een mengeling van autobiografie en fictie. 'Goblin' (2017) is namelijk niet alleen een zwaarmoedig verhaal over het verlies en de verwaarlozing van een opgroeiende vrouw in een tijd die haar niet goedgezind is, maar toch vooral een schelmenroman over een personage dat weigert te conformeren. Al is het maar hoe ze met haar verbeelding nieuwe werkelijkheden probeert te scheppen met mythische verhalen. Over een ondergronds reptielenkoninkrijk, over het onooglijke gedrocht Monsta dat achter haar aanzweeft, over de drie Victoriaanse geesten die te pas en te onpas advies geven of haar berispen. Dit postmoderne spel met een onbetrouwbare verteller maakt dat de kinderlijke, bijna naïeve logica van de roman soms echter lijkt dan de oorlogsgebeurtenissen zelf. Al had Ever Dundas dit vormspel nog iets gewaagder en experimenteler kunnen opvoeren, want nu stuurt de roman te eenduidig aan op alleen die psychologische lezing. Hier is nog geen Nederlandse vertaling van verschenen, maar ik raad mensen toch aan om voor het heerlijke volks- en streekdialecten van de oorspronkelijke versie te gaan. Ik moest in ieder geval vaak hardop lachen om zwartkomische dialogen die zich lastig laten vertalen.
Maar tijden veranderen en wie welke verhalen vertelt verandert mee. Een oudere, wijzere Goblin gaat vrouwmoedig de verstikkende tijdsgeest en haar eigen oorlogstrauma te lijf met een mengeling van autobiografie en fictie. 'Goblin' (2017) is namelijk niet alleen een zwaarmoedig verhaal over het verlies en de verwaarlozing van een opgroeiende vrouw in een tijd die haar niet goedgezind is, maar toch vooral een schelmenroman over een personage dat weigert te conformeren. Al is het maar hoe ze met haar verbeelding nieuwe werkelijkheden probeert te scheppen met mythische verhalen. Over een ondergronds reptielenkoninkrijk, over het onooglijke gedrocht Monsta dat achter haar aanzweeft, over de drie Victoriaanse geesten die te pas en te onpas advies geven of haar berispen. Dit postmoderne spel met een onbetrouwbare verteller maakt dat de kinderlijke, bijna naïeve logica van de roman soms echter lijkt dan de oorlogsgebeurtenissen zelf. Al had Ever Dundas dit vormspel nog iets gewaagder en experimenteler kunnen opvoeren, want nu stuurt de roman te eenduidig aan op alleen die psychologische lezing. Hier is nog geen Nederlandse vertaling van verschenen, maar ik raad mensen toch aan om voor het heerlijke volks- en streekdialecten van de oorspronkelijke versie te gaan. Ik moest in ieder geval vaak hardop lachen om zwartkomische dialogen die zich lastig laten vertalen.
October 24, 2018
Goblin promised a lot with an outcast female protagonist and a bewitching premise about surviving harsh realities by the power of imagination. For me, however, a confusion of themes and an emphasis on 'telling' rather than 'showing' meant that, for me, the novel did not live up to its promise. I often felt that something was missing from the characterisation of Goblin which prevented me fully connecting with her - she remained a character on a page rather than coming to life as a person. I felt that many of the characters were underdeveloped and perhaps the book suffered from too many themes which meant that none were concluded satisfyingly. I'm a little frustrated because I was ready to fall in love with this book after reading so many great reviews! I do feel that Dundas is extremely gifted in terms of imagination, and I was captivated by the references to Saki throughout the story (Sredni Vashtar being a favourite short story of mine), so with such literary tastes I and powers of imagination I am keen to see how Dundas develops as a writer.
January 30, 2022
3.5 stars because this was amazing and meh at the same time
The first thing to note is that this is really weird. The structure is super fragmented and basically the entire story is just a description of the main characters life which sounds really boring but Goblin was such a likeable character, and I honestly found the middle part of the book a lot more interesting than the bits where the actual 'plot was happening'. The characterisation in this was brilliant, the writing style fun, interesting and accessible (Dundas portrayed the differences in age really well) and the queer representation in this was wonderful, made even better by the fact I wasn't expecting it at all. However, I was confused a lot, which I think was the point but also it was offputting and the plot twist and central theme of illusion vs reality, while definitely present, fell short for me, which was a pity because this book had potential to become a lasting favourite. I'd like to read it again, as I think I'd enjoy it more a second time, but for now I'd still recommend.
The first thing to note is that this is really weird. The structure is super fragmented and basically the entire story is just a description of the main characters life which sounds really boring but Goblin was such a likeable character, and I honestly found the middle part of the book a lot more interesting than the bits where the actual 'plot was happening'. The characterisation in this was brilliant, the writing style fun, interesting and accessible (Dundas portrayed the differences in age really well) and the queer representation in this was wonderful, made even better by the fact I wasn't expecting it at all. However, I was confused a lot, which I think was the point but also it was offputting and the plot twist and central theme of illusion vs reality, while definitely present, fell short for me, which was a pity because this book had potential to become a lasting favourite. I'd like to read it again, as I think I'd enjoy it more a second time, but for now I'd still recommend.
October 28, 2017
Stunning book, and such a great debut. Dundas flits between times and settings with ease, painting a vivid, startling and occasionally harrowing picture of the life of Goblin, the titular hero. It's magical realism, but not, and brings to life people on the fringes - an unwanted child, a conscientious objector, circus performers, an elderly women, and a homeless man - in a beautiful, moving way.
This big old humanist and vegetarian (me!) particularly loved the examinations of animal rights and emotions, gender and sexual equality, and human kindnesses and weaknessess.
The more I think about it, the more wonderful Goblin is. So glad to read such a strong Scottish novel, and can't wait to see what Ever Dundas produces next. Go team Corporal Pig!
(Also, AMAZING cover.)
This big old humanist and vegetarian (me!) particularly loved the examinations of animal rights and emotions, gender and sexual equality, and human kindnesses and weaknessess.
The more I think about it, the more wonderful Goblin is. So glad to read such a strong Scottish novel, and can't wait to see what Ever Dundas produces next. Go team Corporal Pig!
(Also, AMAZING cover.)
December 4, 2017
4.5
Full review up at https://strange-ordinary.com/2017/08/...
A rarity for me, a contemporary novel that has become an instant favourite. I gobbled this book up and fell in love with the titular Goblin, a young girl growing up in WWII London who delves deeper and deeper into an imaginary world after she witnesses a traumatic event which she buries deep in her memory.
If you are a fan of Angela Carter's Nights at the Circus, Neil Gaiman's The Graveyard Book, and the Guillermo del Toro film Pan's Labyrinth, then this may well be the perfect novel for you. This manages to deliver magical realism in a believable, heart wrenching fashion so that it never feels twee or like simple pretty decoration for the YA crowd, as seems to be the trend with many modern so-labelled magical realism novels.
Loved it from start to finish. A novel I know I will be re-reading again and again.
Full review up at https://strange-ordinary.com/2017/08/...
A rarity for me, a contemporary novel that has become an instant favourite. I gobbled this book up and fell in love with the titular Goblin, a young girl growing up in WWII London who delves deeper and deeper into an imaginary world after she witnesses a traumatic event which she buries deep in her memory.
If you are a fan of Angela Carter's Nights at the Circus, Neil Gaiman's The Graveyard Book, and the Guillermo del Toro film Pan's Labyrinth, then this may well be the perfect novel for you. This manages to deliver magical realism in a believable, heart wrenching fashion so that it never feels twee or like simple pretty decoration for the YA crowd, as seems to be the trend with many modern so-labelled magical realism novels.
Loved it from start to finish. A novel I know I will be re-reading again and again.
September 2, 2017
A beautiful and brilliant debut. There are some very deliberate choices in the prose which I didn't quite gel with at times and I'm not in love with the frame narrative in the novel as a whole, but Goblin's story is just so distinctive and moving that none of that mattered in the end. An overall wonderful read.
September 2, 2023
I really wanted to like this since I was such a huge fan of Ever's other book HellsSans however I feel like the plot wanted to be multiple things at once? I will say I really like the ending and I liked the idea of the multiple jumps between time periods but the tone was just a bit all over the place and as much as I relate to Goblin taking in as many stray animals as possible it was just a bit meh, 2.5.
January 10, 2024
I was skeptical of this book to begin with. The views of a traumatised child were hard to keep up with but chapter by chapter you understand more. This has ended up being such a moving story of trauma and loss and I’m going to have to get my own copy so I don’t kidnap my mum’s anymore.
Read
October 14, 2017A colourful adventure of a life lived through war and tumult and the circus and the beautiful haunted city of Venice (these sections my favourite of the book). One for fans of the macabre and the marginal, animals and 'freaks' and self-making stories.
May 27, 2018
'You can't trust humans,' I said to the chickens. 'Apart from me, but I'm part-goblin so I don't count.'
This is such an assured, impressive novel. It's hard to believe this is a debut!
Goblin is a wonderful creation. She guides us through her life, from the streets of war-torn London to the romantic canals of Venice, always with at least one animal by her side. What I found so refreshing was that, despite the ongoing hardships the character faces, she is always opening her arms to people...well, mainly animals, but still. She is a fascinating, loving character, and I couldn't wait to find out where her life went next (I read the whole book in one sitting!). A LOT of things happen in this book, but it is expertly paced, and with an excellent supporting cast, there are no dull moments. (A portion of the book strongly reminded me of 'Geek Love', which is no bad thing!) I can't wait to read what the author does next.
This is such an assured, impressive novel. It's hard to believe this is a debut!
Goblin is a wonderful creation. She guides us through her life, from the streets of war-torn London to the romantic canals of Venice, always with at least one animal by her side. What I found so refreshing was that, despite the ongoing hardships the character faces, she is always opening her arms to people...well, mainly animals, but still. She is a fascinating, loving character, and I couldn't wait to find out where her life went next (I read the whole book in one sitting!). A LOT of things happen in this book, but it is expertly paced, and with an excellent supporting cast, there are no dull moments. (A portion of the book strongly reminded me of 'Geek Love', which is no bad thing!) I can't wait to read what the author does next.
December 7, 2019
This book has some of my favorite ingredients - a strong, unique, female protagonist; a hint of magical realism; and a list of oddball supporting characters. We meet Goblin as an old woman (or old lady, as she is affectionately called by her friend) and realize right away that there is something peculiar about her. Over a series of flashbacks, we learn about where Goblin came from, what made her so peculiar, and what the hell the Lizard King is. There is a circus, an exploration of bisexuality in war-time Europe, tons of animals, some interesting psychological insights, and an overall theme of what it means to be family. Oh, and of course there is a bit of a mystery, although to be honest I had it figured out relatively early. Perhaps my only criticism would be that the dialogue felt a bit unnatural and forced at times (particularly in the present-day parts). If you like books about freaks and oddballs, or enjoy a touch of the supernatural, this is a great read, and right now it's only $6.99 on Kindle!
Many thanks to the publisher for providing me with an ARC through NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.
Many thanks to the publisher for providing me with an ARC through NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.
July 21, 2017
When I started reading articles and previews about Goblin, I was smacked in the face with colossal ‘premise envy’. Oh, wow. Just… you read the blurb, or a summary, and there’s no possible way you’re avoiding reading this book. Hook, line, sinker.
The novel intertwines two weaving time threads, each telling the story of an elderly woman called Goblin. In the past, Goblin survived the Blitz, and was a witness to the Pet Massacre, a little-known but utterly devastating snippet of WW2 history. In the modern day, Goblin has been summoned to London during the 2011 riots, because she knows about a momentous crime, and the blood that was spilled cries out for justice. I’m being purposely vague, because the whole joy of reading “Goblin” lies in uncovering all the little quirks and twists of the character’s life story. She goes to Cornwall and befriends a pig. She rambles about the countryside, picking up lifts from soldiers. She climbs through bomb craters. She trains chickens to do tricks. She runs away with my favourite circus since Erin Morgenstern’s, has heart-crunchingly poignant adventures in Eastern Europe, and then emerges in a gorgeous, sun-warmed, red-wine-and-shady-bridges Venice. It’s not a case of Goblin’s present being bland while her past is vivid, though: they’re very different, but actually, the sections with 81-year-old Goblin were amongst my favourites, especially when she’s interacting with her homeless friend, Ben (their dialogue is superb). The prose is rich, sumptuous, colourful, but also earthy and intimate. It boils down into something boldly experimental when it needs to, when Goblin is trying to take psychic flight from the traumas and darknesses she’s encountered (and boy, there are a few).
Two more things delight. One is that “Goblin” is a novel about identity. Goblin is… a goblin. Sometimes she, sometimes he, sometimes they, in a sensitive, nuanced, fairly visceral and bodily portrayal. It’s not forced, it’s just lovely. What I like about it is that it’s not ‘the point’ of the book, but it is ‘the heart’. Goblin ‘narrates’ her gender and sexuality, by which I mean she conjures them into being and endlessly twists them via language, but then again, she also narrates herself a voodoo familiar called Monsta, and she narrates the inner lives of her animal companions, and she narrates fantastical folklore beings like Amelia and Queen Isabella, who may or may not be wholly imaginary. In the same way she ‘narrates’ (spins, twists, casts, conjures) World War Two, and this is interspersed with her own re-narration of HG Wells “War of the Worlds”. It’s all story-telling. What a beautiful, psychologically real way of showing up social constructs, and illuminating both the slippery and powerful nature of words.
The other is that “Goblin” is a novel predicated on a deep understanding of how a human can love an animal (or a whole collection of animals, in Goblin’s case). That might sound a bit twee, the way I’ve expressed it, but it’s not: it’s profound and very moving. Ever writes animals so well. I already knew this from hearing her read a short piece, “Northern Lights”, at a spoken word event: the way the cat moves and communicates in that story is so accurate, and in “Goblin”, chickens, crows, pigs, dogs and elephants all spill off the page in a similar fashion. The fierceness with which Goblin loves her animals, the ‘value’ they have (to give it so crass a term), and the meaning they give her life, are all extremely compelling elements of the book.
There are themes and, for lack of a better word, issues explored in “Goblin” that kinda creep up on you, and I’m not entirely sure how to write about them without spoiling aspects of the story, so expect vagueness here again. The issue of performing animals arises, and with this, plot and characterisation meld cleverly to ‘deal’ with it. Of course Goblin would have a view on the matter, and of course she wouldn’t just sit on her hands, but there’s no soapbox proselytising or easy fix here: just one person’s convictions gradually layering and fraying to a snapping point. Within Goblin’s highly unreliable narration, there is also the issue of how she perceives the ‘feeding’ of Monsta, and later how James (I’m not telling you who James is…) perceives this feeding, when it comes to light. So utterly sold was I on Goblin’s rendition, I hadn’t at all clocked how another character would interpret her actions (sorry, so vague! Read the book…). James ‘confronting’ Goblin – dispelling her magic as she’s literally casting a spell on him, grounding her back in the mundane – with his quiet empathy and care, was therefore a total suckerpunch. It was the second time during “Goblin” that I cried like a wee baby (the first being the central scene, where the pet massacre is revealed). For this reason, the reason of those ‘creeping themes’, this is such an important book. I wish I’d had it when I was a teenager.
I think “Goblin” is the ‘most real unreal’ book I’ve read. It has a beautiful truth, despite being so expressly a mermaid’s treasure trove of lies. Really, really special.
The novel intertwines two weaving time threads, each telling the story of an elderly woman called Goblin. In the past, Goblin survived the Blitz, and was a witness to the Pet Massacre, a little-known but utterly devastating snippet of WW2 history. In the modern day, Goblin has been summoned to London during the 2011 riots, because she knows about a momentous crime, and the blood that was spilled cries out for justice. I’m being purposely vague, because the whole joy of reading “Goblin” lies in uncovering all the little quirks and twists of the character’s life story. She goes to Cornwall and befriends a pig. She rambles about the countryside, picking up lifts from soldiers. She climbs through bomb craters. She trains chickens to do tricks. She runs away with my favourite circus since Erin Morgenstern’s, has heart-crunchingly poignant adventures in Eastern Europe, and then emerges in a gorgeous, sun-warmed, red-wine-and-shady-bridges Venice. It’s not a case of Goblin’s present being bland while her past is vivid, though: they’re very different, but actually, the sections with 81-year-old Goblin were amongst my favourites, especially when she’s interacting with her homeless friend, Ben (their dialogue is superb). The prose is rich, sumptuous, colourful, but also earthy and intimate. It boils down into something boldly experimental when it needs to, when Goblin is trying to take psychic flight from the traumas and darknesses she’s encountered (and boy, there are a few).
Two more things delight. One is that “Goblin” is a novel about identity. Goblin is… a goblin. Sometimes she, sometimes he, sometimes they, in a sensitive, nuanced, fairly visceral and bodily portrayal. It’s not forced, it’s just lovely. What I like about it is that it’s not ‘the point’ of the book, but it is ‘the heart’. Goblin ‘narrates’ her gender and sexuality, by which I mean she conjures them into being and endlessly twists them via language, but then again, she also narrates herself a voodoo familiar called Monsta, and she narrates the inner lives of her animal companions, and she narrates fantastical folklore beings like Amelia and Queen Isabella, who may or may not be wholly imaginary. In the same way she ‘narrates’ (spins, twists, casts, conjures) World War Two, and this is interspersed with her own re-narration of HG Wells “War of the Worlds”. It’s all story-telling. What a beautiful, psychologically real way of showing up social constructs, and illuminating both the slippery and powerful nature of words.
The other is that “Goblin” is a novel predicated on a deep understanding of how a human can love an animal (or a whole collection of animals, in Goblin’s case). That might sound a bit twee, the way I’ve expressed it, but it’s not: it’s profound and very moving. Ever writes animals so well. I already knew this from hearing her read a short piece, “Northern Lights”, at a spoken word event: the way the cat moves and communicates in that story is so accurate, and in “Goblin”, chickens, crows, pigs, dogs and elephants all spill off the page in a similar fashion. The fierceness with which Goblin loves her animals, the ‘value’ they have (to give it so crass a term), and the meaning they give her life, are all extremely compelling elements of the book.
There are themes and, for lack of a better word, issues explored in “Goblin” that kinda creep up on you, and I’m not entirely sure how to write about them without spoiling aspects of the story, so expect vagueness here again. The issue of performing animals arises, and with this, plot and characterisation meld cleverly to ‘deal’ with it. Of course Goblin would have a view on the matter, and of course she wouldn’t just sit on her hands, but there’s no soapbox proselytising or easy fix here: just one person’s convictions gradually layering and fraying to a snapping point. Within Goblin’s highly unreliable narration, there is also the issue of how she perceives the ‘feeding’ of Monsta, and later how James (I’m not telling you who James is…) perceives this feeding, when it comes to light. So utterly sold was I on Goblin’s rendition, I hadn’t at all clocked how another character would interpret her actions (sorry, so vague! Read the book…). James ‘confronting’ Goblin – dispelling her magic as she’s literally casting a spell on him, grounding her back in the mundane – with his quiet empathy and care, was therefore a total suckerpunch. It was the second time during “Goblin” that I cried like a wee baby (the first being the central scene, where the pet massacre is revealed). For this reason, the reason of those ‘creeping themes’, this is such an important book. I wish I’d had it when I was a teenager.
I think “Goblin” is the ‘most real unreal’ book I’ve read. It has a beautiful truth, despite being so expressly a mermaid’s treasure trove of lies. Really, really special.
August 13, 2018
Goblin is a phenomenal book. There.
No, I know, I can’t just leave it there. So: Goblin has flown under the radar a bit. It turned up in places where such books do turn up – in reviews by interesting book bloggers, on the Not the Booker Prize longlist, the occasional mention in a year-end best-of roundup – but there was never, as far as I can tell, much mainstream coverage, apart from a Guardian book-of-the-day review and some pieces in the Glasgow Herald and the Scotsman. I’m here to tell you that the neglect of this book was a travesty. It’s a novel set in WWII, during the Blitz, but it’s utterly unlike any other such novel I’ve ever read: scarier, fiercer, and infinitely more successful at conveying how completely and utterly the world has changed over the past seventy years. Like The Madonna of the Mountains, Goblin allows the reader to inhabit the essential strangeness of the past.
The title is our protagonist’s name: she has never known another. Her mother hates her, calling her “goblin-runt born blue” and other, less savoury names. Her father is kinder, but ineffective. Goblin finds sanctuary with her older brother David – cool in her eyes, but viciously bullied by neighbourhood toughs – her friends, Stevie and Mac, whom she tyrannizes without much difficulty, and her dog Devil. The great pet massacre – a mass culling of domestic animals that really happened – results in Devil’s death, and David disappears. Goblin articulates her loneliness and her mental distress through intense, surreal, sometimes horrifying imaginative play: the story she invents for David is charming (he has gone, she believes, to be a pirate, and to marry a mermaid), but the voodoo-like creature she constructs to help with her grief over Devil is, if harmless, disturbing: a doll with a shrew’s head, a pigeon’s wings, one clawed foot, and arms made of dried earthworms, whom she names Monsta. She also has visions of various London “characters”: Queen Isabella, who carries her husband’s heart pinned to her dress; Miss Amelia, locked up in Newgate for murdering the orphans in her charge; and the Lizard King, who wept tears of acid for his dismembered wife and took horrible revenge on humans.
It’s extremely difficult to disentangle Goblin’s imaginative capacities, and what we would now call her socioeconomic disadvantages, from the possibility that she has a form of mental illness. In fact, I think that is exactly Ever Dundas’s point. Goblin's literary pedigree includes ancestors like Lanark and Gormenghast, books whose magical worlds are composed in roughly equal parts of menace, fertile chaos, and a sense of having been constructed somehow out of the raw materials of consensus reality. The wartime England of, let’s say, Atonement, or of Bletchley Park, did exist, somewhere, but so too did experiences like Goblin’s. Self-sufficient, confident to the point of arrogance, so frequently muddied and tousled that she lives for months as a boy: there is joy in the chaos that surrounds her, but there’s also the gaping hole left by the neglect of parents and by David’s abandonment.
Evacuating herself from London (she hops on a train with children from various schools; the ruse is never discovered), she experiences another form of neglect when chosen to work on a farm run by a couple whose behaviour towards their refugee children moves from distasteful to abusive. But the countryside is also where she finds love, with a beautiful girl named Angel, and friendship, with a piglet that follows her around and whom she names Corporal Pig. Goblin’s queerness is a permanent point of contention throughout her life, but especially in this context: the farmer and his wife attempt an exorcism that looks very much like the torture suffered by Sierva Maria in Of Love and Other Demons. She survives, and escapes back to London, but the experience reinforces her love and trust of animals above humans; her later life as the adopted daughter of two circus performers helps to restore some of that balance, but it can’t make up for what wasn’t there at the beginning.
The crisis of the book is precipitated by the need to look back at the past. In sections set in 2011, Goblin is living in Edinburgh, very elderly but apparently all right. Her best friend, Ben, is a homeless man with a dog of his own, whom she adores because he reminds her of Devil, and they get along together until Goblin is contacted by a Met detective: they need her to return to London and give testimony regarding a crime that they think she witnessed seventy years ago, during the Blitz. Readers will piece together the nature of this crime, probably, fairly quickly, but it’s testimony to the sheer strength of Goblin’s voice, her conviction in the rightness of her own made-up stories, that the crime seems slightly incredible until the very end. It explains much of the preceding book, but it doesn’t hold much weight on its own; in another novel I would say that it feels rushed or underdeveloped, but here I think that’s exactly what’s intended. Ever Dundas has built a character whose own world may be part coping strategy, part untutored brilliance, but whose imaginative strength so far outstrips the reader’s own rationality that we are pulled with her, wherever she goes: even, at the very end, to acknowledging the real nature of her history.
Originally published on my blog, Elle Thinks.
No, I know, I can’t just leave it there. So: Goblin has flown under the radar a bit. It turned up in places where such books do turn up – in reviews by interesting book bloggers, on the Not the Booker Prize longlist, the occasional mention in a year-end best-of roundup – but there was never, as far as I can tell, much mainstream coverage, apart from a Guardian book-of-the-day review and some pieces in the Glasgow Herald and the Scotsman. I’m here to tell you that the neglect of this book was a travesty. It’s a novel set in WWII, during the Blitz, but it’s utterly unlike any other such novel I’ve ever read: scarier, fiercer, and infinitely more successful at conveying how completely and utterly the world has changed over the past seventy years. Like The Madonna of the Mountains, Goblin allows the reader to inhabit the essential strangeness of the past.
The title is our protagonist’s name: she has never known another. Her mother hates her, calling her “goblin-runt born blue” and other, less savoury names. Her father is kinder, but ineffective. Goblin finds sanctuary with her older brother David – cool in her eyes, but viciously bullied by neighbourhood toughs – her friends, Stevie and Mac, whom she tyrannizes without much difficulty, and her dog Devil. The great pet massacre – a mass culling of domestic animals that really happened – results in Devil’s death, and David disappears. Goblin articulates her loneliness and her mental distress through intense, surreal, sometimes horrifying imaginative play: the story she invents for David is charming (he has gone, she believes, to be a pirate, and to marry a mermaid), but the voodoo-like creature she constructs to help with her grief over Devil is, if harmless, disturbing: a doll with a shrew’s head, a pigeon’s wings, one clawed foot, and arms made of dried earthworms, whom she names Monsta. She also has visions of various London “characters”: Queen Isabella, who carries her husband’s heart pinned to her dress; Miss Amelia, locked up in Newgate for murdering the orphans in her charge; and the Lizard King, who wept tears of acid for his dismembered wife and took horrible revenge on humans.
It’s extremely difficult to disentangle Goblin’s imaginative capacities, and what we would now call her socioeconomic disadvantages, from the possibility that she has a form of mental illness. In fact, I think that is exactly Ever Dundas’s point. Goblin's literary pedigree includes ancestors like Lanark and Gormenghast, books whose magical worlds are composed in roughly equal parts of menace, fertile chaos, and a sense of having been constructed somehow out of the raw materials of consensus reality. The wartime England of, let’s say, Atonement, or of Bletchley Park, did exist, somewhere, but so too did experiences like Goblin’s. Self-sufficient, confident to the point of arrogance, so frequently muddied and tousled that she lives for months as a boy: there is joy in the chaos that surrounds her, but there’s also the gaping hole left by the neglect of parents and by David’s abandonment.
Evacuating herself from London (she hops on a train with children from various schools; the ruse is never discovered), she experiences another form of neglect when chosen to work on a farm run by a couple whose behaviour towards their refugee children moves from distasteful to abusive. But the countryside is also where she finds love, with a beautiful girl named Angel, and friendship, with a piglet that follows her around and whom she names Corporal Pig. Goblin’s queerness is a permanent point of contention throughout her life, but especially in this context: the farmer and his wife attempt an exorcism that looks very much like the torture suffered by Sierva Maria in Of Love and Other Demons. She survives, and escapes back to London, but the experience reinforces her love and trust of animals above humans; her later life as the adopted daughter of two circus performers helps to restore some of that balance, but it can’t make up for what wasn’t there at the beginning.
The crisis of the book is precipitated by the need to look back at the past. In sections set in 2011, Goblin is living in Edinburgh, very elderly but apparently all right. Her best friend, Ben, is a homeless man with a dog of his own, whom she adores because he reminds her of Devil, and they get along together until Goblin is contacted by a Met detective: they need her to return to London and give testimony regarding a crime that they think she witnessed seventy years ago, during the Blitz. Readers will piece together the nature of this crime, probably, fairly quickly, but it’s testimony to the sheer strength of Goblin’s voice, her conviction in the rightness of her own made-up stories, that the crime seems slightly incredible until the very end. It explains much of the preceding book, but it doesn’t hold much weight on its own; in another novel I would say that it feels rushed or underdeveloped, but here I think that’s exactly what’s intended. Ever Dundas has built a character whose own world may be part coping strategy, part untutored brilliance, but whose imaginative strength so far outstrips the reader’s own rationality that we are pulled with her, wherever she goes: even, at the very end, to acknowledging the real nature of her history.
Originally published on my blog, Elle Thinks.
September 17, 2019
Up front, I think it's important to mention, that I actually do know Ever Dundas. Certainly not well, but she is a friend of a friend, and someone I have spoken to in passing. That said, it has little bearing on my take on the book, but in the interests of disclosure...
I'd also like to say that despite giving it a mediocre score, and having a lot to say about it, I didn't dislike the book. It did engage me throughout, but constantly threw spanners into the machinery which stopped me enjoying it.
This is a strange book, one that feels very much like the "first novel" that it is. While the story of Goblin is often very interesting, it's one that isn't necessarily told in the best way possible. This is also something that, as someone who works in literature as a manuscript copy-editor, I feel is partly the result of a lack of a strong editorial hand; a definite necessity for most first time novelists.
The reason I note this, is that the story is told in two timelines, the older Goblin, who is a reader in residence in an Edinburgh library, and the recounted story of her life which she is typing out, as a means of dealing with and understanding the past. The trouble comes in the balance of these two sections. For great tracts of the book, the story remains resolutely in the past, often going into extreme detail about mundane aspects of Goblin's daily life, while also glossing over more interesting moments. The old adage of "show don't tell" really comes into effect during these moments, as the tale shifts wildly in location over the war years and then the decades afterwards.
That's not such an issue when the story is engaging, but by necessity, some sections will appeal more or less to different readers. That said, lenience should be given as this is a recounted life story being written from memory by a CLEARLY unreliable narrator. As such, some of the more supernatural elements, as well as the "I was always in the right" factor, should be expected.
One of the main issues however, which detracted in ways less technical, was that at very few points did I find myself empathising with Goblin, in part because she is so insufferably inflexible and self-assured of being right. A character trait, which is understandable in the form of a 9 year old blitz-era child with a cold abusive mother, a distracted father, and a tendency to get into fights where she apparently easily "pummels" everyone, rather a lot, should they disagree with her. The problem is there's little in the way of growth for Goblin, other than a burgeoning sexuality. Her inflexibility may be rather the point, but it doesn't make for engaging reading over a near-300 page novel.
There's another issue with "modern thinking" that suffuses this narrative. There's clearly a very 2010s mindset to the sexual and gender politics in the story, one that seems to only become addressed when some intentionally less-forwards thinking (and usually male) character will make some comment or toss an insult at Goblin about not dressing, looking or acting female, or appearing to be somewhat ambiguous as to presented gender. All of which is certainly something that would have happened, but the story never supports any reason why Goblin or her peers wouldn't question such activity with more vigour, as one might suspect in the 1940s, 50s and, perhaps less so, in the 60s. But that's likely also tied into the lack of a grounding sense of time and place, as aside from being told where Goblin is, it never feels like the 40s or even the 60s. The atmosphere of place and time isn't different. With Dundas far more keen to go on asides about whatever stray animals Goblin has taken in, and how much they defecate on things over any solid world building.
There's also a matter of the central mystery of the novel, which I shan't go into or spoil, suffice to say, I worked it out quite early on, and there is layering of information throughout the novel, but ultimately, it does little to explain (were it even trying to do so) why Goblin is quite so messed-up in the head.
To close, all I'll add is that I am keen to see what Dundas writes next, and as a first novel, this certainly is fascinating, but I can't be as praise-filled as some of the other reviews I've seen. Perhaps it simply didn't speak to me. Maybe there's something about the character and experience of Goblin that a falls outside my ken, but breaking through that sort of thing is exactly what a great book should do.
I'd also like to say that despite giving it a mediocre score, and having a lot to say about it, I didn't dislike the book. It did engage me throughout, but constantly threw spanners into the machinery which stopped me enjoying it.
This is a strange book, one that feels very much like the "first novel" that it is. While the story of Goblin is often very interesting, it's one that isn't necessarily told in the best way possible. This is also something that, as someone who works in literature as a manuscript copy-editor, I feel is partly the result of a lack of a strong editorial hand; a definite necessity for most first time novelists.
The reason I note this, is that the story is told in two timelines, the older Goblin, who is a reader in residence in an Edinburgh library, and the recounted story of her life which she is typing out, as a means of dealing with and understanding the past. The trouble comes in the balance of these two sections. For great tracts of the book, the story remains resolutely in the past, often going into extreme detail about mundane aspects of Goblin's daily life, while also glossing over more interesting moments. The old adage of "show don't tell" really comes into effect during these moments, as the tale shifts wildly in location over the war years and then the decades afterwards.
That's not such an issue when the story is engaging, but by necessity, some sections will appeal more or less to different readers. That said, lenience should be given as this is a recounted life story being written from memory by a CLEARLY unreliable narrator. As such, some of the more supernatural elements, as well as the "I was always in the right" factor, should be expected.
One of the main issues however, which detracted in ways less technical, was that at very few points did I find myself empathising with Goblin, in part because she is so insufferably inflexible and self-assured of being right. A character trait, which is understandable in the form of a 9 year old blitz-era child with a cold abusive mother, a distracted father, and a tendency to get into fights where she apparently easily "pummels" everyone, rather a lot, should they disagree with her. The problem is there's little in the way of growth for Goblin, other than a burgeoning sexuality. Her inflexibility may be rather the point, but it doesn't make for engaging reading over a near-300 page novel.
There's another issue with "modern thinking" that suffuses this narrative. There's clearly a very 2010s mindset to the sexual and gender politics in the story, one that seems to only become addressed when some intentionally less-forwards thinking (and usually male) character will make some comment or toss an insult at Goblin about not dressing, looking or acting female, or appearing to be somewhat ambiguous as to presented gender. All of which is certainly something that would have happened, but the story never supports any reason why Goblin or her peers wouldn't question such activity with more vigour, as one might suspect in the 1940s, 50s and, perhaps less so, in the 60s. But that's likely also tied into the lack of a grounding sense of time and place, as aside from being told where Goblin is, it never feels like the 40s or even the 60s. The atmosphere of place and time isn't different. With Dundas far more keen to go on asides about whatever stray animals Goblin has taken in, and how much they defecate on things over any solid world building.
There's also a matter of the central mystery of the novel, which I shan't go into or spoil, suffice to say, I worked it out quite early on, and there is layering of information throughout the novel, but ultimately, it does little to explain (were it even trying to do so) why Goblin is quite so messed-up in the head.
To close, all I'll add is that I am keen to see what Dundas writes next, and as a first novel, this certainly is fascinating, but I can't be as praise-filled as some of the other reviews I've seen. Perhaps it simply didn't speak to me. Maybe there's something about the character and experience of Goblin that a falls outside my ken, but breaking through that sort of thing is exactly what a great book should do.
May 8, 2017
I think calling this novel a blend between fantasy and reality might be a bit of a stretch. And the reason that I say this is because it misled me a great deal. From the premise, I thought that I would be reading about a girl who flits back and forth between different realms and it is up to the reader to discover which is the truth. The novel is better depicted as flitting between past and present, and there is always this feeling that something is being hidden from the reader and from the protagonist herself. Yes, she makes up things and creates her own reality, but I wouldn't go so far as to portray it as a fantasy because technically, not much of what she says is fake. Most of it is real. Aside from this contradiction, I really did enjoy this story. It is deep and complex, and you get lost in Goblin's world. She is a unique character, one that I have never really encountered and seeing things from her perspective is just such a bizarre and amazing experience. Her life is absolutely ridiculous in its trajectory but that's what keeps the story moving, and keeps the interest of the reader. As the story continued to build, and the digging for the truth begins, the author ramps up the tension - and this is done beautifully, by the way. I was holding my breath, turning the pages as fast as I could until I finally reached the end. And the ending was abrupt, I won't lie, but it worked because this is just one of those books that doesn't really follow the rules. In short, I think this was a very interesting novel that takes place during World War 2 and features a very unique female protagonist; however, if you are expecting some major fantasy elements, then you may find yourself disappointed.
I received this novel as an advanced copy from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.
For more reviews, visit: www.veereading.wordpress.com
I received this novel as an advanced copy from NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.
For more reviews, visit: www.veereading.wordpress.com
March 22, 2019
So this isn't the kind of book I'd usually read, because of its "life story" structure. It does tell someone's entire life, through the blitz in World War II London, various adventures, through to 2011. Because of this, the book can be somewhat 'plot lite' and instead move at a breakneck pace from location to location.
However, enough criticism. For what it is, the book is a massive success. The main character, the titular Goblin, is a total oddball protagonist, and the book delves deeply into the imagination of childhood, bringing alive monsters ghosts and demons that seem to us so real when we are kids. There are poignant moments from her somewhat abusive upbringing that you see soak deeply into Goblin's psyche and remain throughout her whole life. Even as an 81 year old living in Edinburgh, she has not yet escaped her past, and the way the book presents this is very real, someone who never throughout her life quite got the help she needed due to a traumatic childhood. However Goblin's kindness and resilience really shine through.
Another reason the book is a page turner is the central mystery, or framing device, that a Detective in 2011 is contacting her and dredging up the past. This mystery becomes more and more compelling the more we learn and really does make the second half of the book a page-turner.
While the book is fairly formulaic in its "I lived here for a while, met these characters, then moved on" structure, it is definitely a very affecting book and I would recommend based on its intriguing central character and compelling mystery element.
However, enough criticism. For what it is, the book is a massive success. The main character, the titular Goblin, is a total oddball protagonist, and the book delves deeply into the imagination of childhood, bringing alive monsters ghosts and demons that seem to us so real when we are kids. There are poignant moments from her somewhat abusive upbringing that you see soak deeply into Goblin's psyche and remain throughout her whole life. Even as an 81 year old living in Edinburgh, she has not yet escaped her past, and the way the book presents this is very real, someone who never throughout her life quite got the help she needed due to a traumatic childhood. However Goblin's kindness and resilience really shine through.
Another reason the book is a page turner is the central mystery, or framing device, that a Detective in 2011 is contacting her and dredging up the past. This mystery becomes more and more compelling the more we learn and really does make the second half of the book a page-turner.
While the book is fairly formulaic in its "I lived here for a while, met these characters, then moved on" structure, it is definitely a very affecting book and I would recommend based on its intriguing central character and compelling mystery element.
December 20, 2018
I found a link to this on an article I was reading about speciesism and was interested on the premise of the story being based around the massacre of family 'pets' at the start of WW2 which is something rarely talked about when we hear about the atrocities of war.
Honestly I nearly gave up on the first paragraph because it just seemed to be a collection of random words that made no sense and it really didn't make me want to read further. I did though and I'm so glad because actually it's a brilliant story of one woman's memories of a childhood and life when WW2 broke out and any confusion I felt about the opening paragraph was totally cleared up once she started to relive that childhood and the fantastical stories she made up which turned out to be a way of coping with a difficult life with a mother who never wanted her during a tragic period in history and the twists and turns that saw her evacuated to Cornwall where she was treated so badly that a return to the air raids of London was preferable to staying put.
She goes on to live a fascinating life with more than her share of sorrow all the while sharing it with a wonderful collection of animals she rescues and helps along the way. I don't want to give away the ending but it all comes together beautifully and casts an entirely different light on why she was such a fantasist and dreamer, making her stories all the more poignant. Definitely worth a read.
Honestly I nearly gave up on the first paragraph because it just seemed to be a collection of random words that made no sense and it really didn't make me want to read further. I did though and I'm so glad because actually it's a brilliant story of one woman's memories of a childhood and life when WW2 broke out and any confusion I felt about the opening paragraph was totally cleared up once she started to relive that childhood and the fantastical stories she made up which turned out to be a way of coping with a difficult life with a mother who never wanted her during a tragic period in history and the twists and turns that saw her evacuated to Cornwall where she was treated so badly that a return to the air raids of London was preferable to staying put.
She goes on to live a fascinating life with more than her share of sorrow all the while sharing it with a wonderful collection of animals she rescues and helps along the way. I don't want to give away the ending but it all comes together beautifully and casts an entirely different light on why she was such a fantasist and dreamer, making her stories all the more poignant. Definitely worth a read.
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