Product Description

The Deep

In a twilight land, two warring powers -- the Reds and the Blacks -- play out an ancient game of murder and betrayal. Then a Visitor from beyond the sky arrives to play a part in this dark and bloody pageant. From the moment he is found by two women who tend to the dead in the wake of battles, it is clear that the great game is to change at last.

Beasts

It is the day after tomorrow, and society has been altered dramatically by experimentation that enables scientists to combine the genetic material of different species, mixing DNA of humans with animals. Loren Casaubon is an ethologist drawn into the political and social vortex that results with Leo -- a creature both man and lion -- at its center.

Engine Summer

A young man named Rush That Speaks is growing up in a far distant world -- one that only dimly remembers our own age, the wondrous age of the Angels, when men could fly. Now it is the "engine summer of the world," and Rush goes in search of the Saints who can teach him to speak truthfully, and be immortal in the stories he tells. The immortality that awaits him, though, is one he could not have imagined.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #268591 in Books
• Published on: 2002-03-04
• Original language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• 560 pages

About the Author

John Crowley lives in the hills above the Connecticut River in northern Massachusetts with his wife and twin daughters. He is the author of ten previous novels as well as the short fiction collection Novelties & Souvenirs.

Customer Reviews

very, very good
engine summer is fantastic, and needs to be read more than once. this is no problem however since it is a world to which i would gladly return again and again.

beasts is interesting, but crowley purposefully leaves the story unfinished; it is never seen through to completion. this aspect of the novel, although done in purpose, was not fully satisfying.

the deep is wonderful. i agree with the last reviewer that it is just as good as engine summer. but it is a retelling of sorts of the war of the roses. for those interested in such aspects of crowley's works one should turn to snake's hands, which is a book of criticism on crowley's writings;it is especially helpful in reading engine summer.

Crowley's early masterpieces
It is about 20 years since I first read "Engine Summer". I don't know what made me buy it, since it's the sort of book which I would not have been likely to pick up even then, when I was in my late teens and read a lot of science fiction. However, I did buy it, and did read it, and I thoroughly enjoyed it, and have had fond memories of it ever since.

These days, two decades later, I almost never read science fiction, and certainly never read fantasy. But when I saw that "Engine Summer" had been reissued with two other early Crowley novels, I decided to buy it and see if it lived up to my memory of it.

It did. "Engine Summer" is still a thoroughly engaging book. It's pastoral, summery feel makes it ideal to read while sitting in the garden, with your feet up, on a warm, sunny day.

Next I read "Beasts", which I hadn't previously encountered, and which was something of a disappointment - it read as though it was written to fulfill a contractual commitment. Perhaps I'm being unfair, but it was nowhere near the standard of "Engine Summer".

Finally, "The Deep", a short novel I remember looking at twenty years ago but not being motivated to read. This time, however, I did read it and it was almost as good as "Engine Summer", although very different. While "Engine Summer" has a breezy, pastoral feel, "The Deep" has a darker, claustrophic atmosphere. Although a short novel, I often had the sensation that its depth (trying to avoid a pun on its title) exceeded its length. There are many passages of great beauty, and I found it a very compelling story. It is an unusual book, but it is not nearly so weird as some reviewers have suggested. It also hs nothing to do with the English Civil War or the War of the Roses, as some people have suggested, although it does have many echoes of Norse mythology and the Nibelung saga. My only criticism is that the names of the characters (many are variation of "Red" and "Black") are confusing.

Both "Engine Summer" and "The Deep" contained worlds I was sorry to leave behind. If Crowley ever wrote sequels to either, I would eagerly buy both. As it is, this collection of three early novels by Crowley contains two absolute gems, "Engine Summer" and "The Deep" which I would recommend highly to anyone interested in good writing and with a taste for the unusual.

Chow
The first three novels in one package.
The first, "The Deep", is a touch different from Crowley's normal work, but he comes into full form in the second book, "Beasts, and truly flowers in the third, "Engine Summer".

The last book is arguably one of Crowley's very best (for which I believe he was predicted to become 'the next Bradbury', a rather unfortunate title for him in my opinion), while the first two are not in the same league. That said, as with all of Crowley's work, The Style and The Meter of the first two are eminently enjoyable. Not to mention the creativity.

All three books are very worthwhile and necessry reads for Crowley fans. Like all of Crowley's novels up until the Aegypt series, all three are wondrous self-contained universes when compared with the majority of 'literature' that gets written.