It actually does the book something of a disservice to describe it as the first in a trilogy (though to be fair, it's only labelled as such inside, and not on the cover), because it's quite unlike the stereotypical images that the words 'fantasy trilogy' almost inevitably conjure up. It's thematically similar to Prospero's Children, with its child protagonist and its firm anchoring of myth and magic in the present day; but be assured that it isn't the same book in different guise.
The action begins in 1991, when Annie Ward, pursued by something, arrives with her baby son Nathan at the door of Bartlemy Goodman, a fabulous cook who lives in the big house of Thornyhill. Fast-forward to the present day, and Nathan discovers a hidden underground chapel in the forest, where he has a vision of a green grail filled with blood. And that's just the start of a sequence of mysterious events that will change Nathan's and Annie's very conception of reality...
One of the things I really appreciated about this novel is how dense it is with fantasy elements. There are far too many 'fantasies' out there that barely even scratched the surface of what is possible in the genre; so it's immensely pleasing to see that Hemingway gives us at least six or seven mysterious events or characters. Besides Annie's unknown pursuers, there's the woodwose that Nathan befriends as a young child; his friend Hazel's great-grandmother Effie, who might just be a witch; a new star in the night sky; and Rianna Sardou, the beautiful but aloof actress who is more than she seems. Even Nathan himself appears to have been conceived supernaturally.
Most impressive, though, is the way Hemingway handles Nathan's dreams of a distant, futuristic world where the sunlight is poisonous and soldiers fly on the backs of giant lizards. It's the kind of setting that we find more often in Saturday morning cartoons than anywhere else these days; but the author's strong sense of place makes it thoroughly believeable. It is no mean feat to combine fantasy of the English wildwood with 'Dragon Riders from Outer Space', and Hemingway does it superbly.
Much of the pleasure of reading The Greenstone Grail comes from discovering how all the disparate elements fit together; and I don't wish to spoil that pleasure by giving too much away. But the cup of the title is the Grimthorn Grail, an artefact belonging to the Thorn family, whose ancestral home is the house where Bartlemy now lives; and whose current descendant, Rowena, wants the Grail back from the German graf who currently owns it. But the cup has far greater significance than anyone in the village of Eade can imagine... and that is as far as I go.
The Greenstone Grail is not entirely without fault. Some of the secondary places and characters aren't as vivid as one would wish; for instance, the monastic school that Nathan attends never really comes alive as a school, which is a shame when Hemingway's depiction of other places, such as the forest and the world of Nathan's dream, is so strong.
There are also unwelcome hints that the series may turn into a standard hunt for what fantasy critics sometimes term 'plot coupons'; the generic magical items that fantasy protagonists assemble in exchange for an ending. I hope that doesn't happen. I hope the story continues to expand into something extraordinary. But even if the trilogy does become generic, its first volume is a delight. The Greenstone Grail is the kind of book that makes you look in the corner of your eye, and wish there were something there. It is the kind of book that fantasy is all about.
This review first appeared in The Alien Online.
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