This post is part of a virtual book tour organized by Goddess Fish Promotions. M. Laszlo will be awarding a $25 Amazon/BN gift card to a randomly drawn winner. Click on the tour banner to see the other stops on the tour.
Longing to cure her deep, hysterical fears involving a diabolical dream fox living inside her womb, Anastasia T. Grace takes a post making occult mirrors in the hope that she may someday convince herself that she commands the power to banish her nemesis into one of her creations. However, when a troubled, young Englishman grows obsessed with her beauty, she is forced to confront the pressing, all-too-real, misogynistic danger of male psychopathy.
This books takes the reader on a strange, metaphysical psychological drama that plays out with Anastasia and Jack, both troubled by their own demons and delusions. This is a book that could be read several times over and still not be able to glean all the richness the author provides. Themes of aroma, of being alone and lonely, of loss... and many more... are pictured in this journey through a dream or through madness? There are no clear answers, and this reader believes that's what the author intends. Every reader will get something different from the book...and may even get something different each time they read it.
The reader can delve into the different motifs - the dream fox, the diadem spider, the ghost girl of Svetlana - not to mention the music that is introduced throughout.
This is not a quick or easy beach read, but it is a book to be savored and experienced. It reminds me a lot of magical realism bound up in a dream vision - where the things experienced may or may not be factual, but have a reality too deep to explain. For readers who want to think and not just be entertained, this is the book for you. 4 stars. Read an excerpt
London. 19 June, 1918.
In the darkness before dawn, a dream awoke Anastasia—it was a nightmare in which the dream fox inside her willed itself to metamorphose into a large, hideous diadem spider.
She did not fall asleep again for an hour, and once she had, a foul odour awoke her for good. What could it be? She sat up and pinched her nose shut. Sensing warmth against her face, she realised the room was bathed in the morning light. The odour lingered, too, so she climbed out of bed and crawled off to her left, following the smell. Soon enough, she discovered what she believed to be the carcass of a rat lying to the side of the footboard. A dead rat. It’s an omen of something awful. When she finally mustered the nerve, she groped here and there for the tail and collected the lifeless creature. Then she stood, felt her way over to the window, and dropped the dead rat into the alley below.
After she had washed her hands, she stumbled back to the window. What to think of something like that? She revisited the dream. Could it be a sign the conniving dream fox inside my womb has already transformed into a monstrous diadem spider? If so, what happens next?
Outside, the streets grew quiet—and the lull made her twist the Huguenot cross. For a time, she paced. Wringing her hands, she debated what kind of pathology might be responsible for envisioning something so disturbing as the metamorphosis fantasy. Every now and then, she sat in bed and rubbed her belly—and in those moments, she brooded. Someday soon, I’ll deliver the diadem spider. Just like a woman gives birth to a little baby. And then the hideous thing will probably tear me to pieces and consume my remains, and why wouldn’t it?
About the Author:
M. Laszlo has lived and worked all over the world, and he has kept exhaustive journals and idea books corresponding to each location and post.
It is said that the maniacal habit began in childhood during summer vacations—when his family began renting out Robert Lowell’s family home in Castine, Maine.
The habit continued into the 1990s when he lived in the Muslim Quarter of Jerusalem and worked as a night clerk in a Palestinian youth hostel. In recent years, he revisited that very journal/idea book and based Anastasia’s Midnight Song on the characters, topics, and themes contained within the writings.
M. Laszlo has lived and worked in New York City, East Jerusalem, and several other cities around the world. While living in the Middle East, he worked for Harvard University’s Semitic Museum. He holds a bachelor’s degree in English from Hiram College in Hiram, Ohio and an M.F.A. in poetry from Sarah Lawrence College in Bronxville, New York.
Website: https://www.mlaszlo.com/
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Amazon: https://www.amazon.com/Anastasias-Midnight-Song-M-Laszlo/dp/1922329762/ref=sr_1_1
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