The Greenstone Grail

January 3, 2005
British author Hemingway draws on classic mythology and her fertile imagination to create a refreshingly different Arthurian fantasy, the first in a trilogy about a contemporary grail quest involving many endearing, if occasionally trite and predictable, characters. Nathan Ward is just your typical 11-year-old of supernatural parentage, until he stumbles on a hidden altar that gives him visions of a green stone cup filled with blood. Soon he begins dreaming of Eos, a world that needs the grail for a spell to ward off a terrible plague. As the dreams become astral excursions, the grail surfaces in Nathan's world, but then is stolen and sent to Eos, at the wrong time and into the wrong hands. While Nathan goes to the rescue, his mother and the venerable grail guardian, Bartlemy Goodman, fend off the village witch, an antiques trader, police and a malevolent river spirit. Despite being almost self-consciously British, the book glows with a blend of ancient magic and wide-eyed wonder that should captivate audiences on both sides of the Atlantic, especially readers weary of more conventional Arthurian epics. Agent, Anthony Harwood. (Mar. 1)

FYI:
Under the pseudonym Jan Siegel, Hemingway is the author of
Prospero's Children and other fantasies.