Most helpful customer reviews
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5.0 out of 5 stars
Come into my parlour, April 2 2009
Angela Carter wrote seriously weird yet truly captivating and intelligent magical realism. This was her second book. It is the heroine Melanie's coming of age story packaged in a fairytale-like sense of unreality.
Melanie and her two siblings are suddenly orphaned at the very beginning of the novel and ripped from their genteel upper-class way of life to live in the slums of a large city with their brutal Uncle Philip (a toymaker) and their silent Aunt Margaret.
Melanie finds herself increasingly drawn to the young man Finn who has the bedroom next to hers. He is a quietly subversive, freakish character who sides with Melanie in her growing dislike of Uncle Phillip. The household is full of submerged tension that centres around Aunt Margaret and which comes to a head when Melanie is forced to play the part of Leida in Uncle Phillips dark puppet version of Leida and the Swan. Melanie is metaphorially raped, Finn defies his uncle to come to her rescue and the repressed members of Uncle Phillips swiftly family spiral into chaos.
The ending is a little unexpected (like a train wreck when the rails run out!)and not as well controlled as the rest of the novel but this is a book you read for images, ideas and spectacular use of language as much as for the plot.
Carter excelled at writing bizzare details that fascinate at the same time as they repell...and this makes for a compelling read. This is a book I first read in my early twenties and one I re-read every couple of years or so and always find something new.
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3.0 out of 5 stars
Magical stumbling, Feb 23 2007
Angela Carter was a master of really weird magical realism. Her second book "The Magic Toyshop," is basically a forcible coming of age/first love story, wrapped in a fairy-tale ambience and exquisitely detailed writing, but it's hard not to be frustrated by the abrupt, bizarre finale.
Melanie and her two siblings are suddenly orphaned, and whisked away from the beautiful country house and idyllic life they've always known. Soon they're living in a slummy area of the city, with their brutish toymaker Uncle Philip, wraithlike mute Aunt Margaret, and her two brothers, in a house that is crammed with the magnificent toys that Uncle Philip creates.
Melanie finds herself increasingly drawn to her aunt's brother Finn, a feisty Irish boy who hides an artistic soul and a punk attitude -- and he and Philip are locked in a silent war. As the family tensions come to a climax, Melanie learns of a dark secret that Aunt Margaret is hiding, and which can only end in a horrific tragedy.
"The Magic Toyshop's" title would make you think that it's about... well, the toys, or the toymaker. Instead, it's all about Melanie's maturation into a young woman, and how she leaves her childhood behind. Unfortunately it starts to stagger toward the finale, as if Carter didn't know how to deal with all this stuff.
What makes this novel so intoxicating is the lush writing. Carter fills her prose with a ripe sensuality, rich in colours, sensations, feelings and impressions (such as the horrifying attack by a swan puppet, a la Leda). And she accurately captures a young girl's dreams and exploration, such as Melanie posing before a mirror, pretending to be a classic artist's model.
Unfortunately, the plot goes downhill in the last lap -- the shocking revelation is shocking mainly because it was never hinted at. And the ending feels tacked on, as if she just had to find SOME way of ending the plot quickly and took the most flamboyant one. It's also incredibly depressing and unsatisfying.
The characters are also unevenly portrayed -- Melanie and Finn are compelling as the young future lovers, one romantic and disgusted by the place she now finds herself, and the other a tough, kindly urchin. The other characters are rather underdeveloped -- Melanie's brother and sister are basically props, Finn's older brother is a shadow, and Philip is an ogre.
"The Magic Toyshop" is an exquisitely written novel, with a likably real teenage heroine, but marred by a contrived ending. Definitely worth a read, but not Carter at her best.
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5.0 out of 5 stars
OMG! What a book!, Jun 15 2004
By A Customer
Being the same age as the main character, Melanie, I simpathise with her situation, however feel that she is strong enough not to need it.
A young hopeful girl coming to terms with her self, and relishing in fantasies of life and love yet to come. She feels traped and held back, only realising what she had when her life comes tumbling down around her.
Orphaned and empoverished Melanie and her two younger siblings are sent to live with their 'Uncle Philipe' in London.
When Melanie arrives at her uncles home (The Magic Toy Shop), she finds him living in the squalor of down trodden London, running his houshold on next to nothing. There she meets 'The red people', Uncle Philipes mute wife, Auntie Margaret and her two brothers, Francie and Finn.
Her fantasies destroyed she must stay strong under the harsh, misogynistic, and violent reign of the puppet obsesed Philipe. Her only comfort being the strong yet strange bond between 'the red people'.
Gradually Melanie, finds herself falling, angainst her own will, for one the quirky and mysterious brothers Finn. Discovering that love is not way it seems in magazines and books.
However, Melanie's not so simple life takes a bizarre turn. Edding in a chaotic climax. You'll be itching for more when you've finished, and like my self wishing Angela had written a sequel.
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