REREAD: Gaal the Conqueror
Feb. 23rd, 2025 02:20 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
feather_ghyllOops, it's quite late for my first review of a book read this year, or, in this case, a reread of a book I read as an adolescent.
Gaal the Conqueror: John White, Eagle, Inter Publishing Service 1992
This is subtitled ‘Book 2 of ‘The Archives of Anthropos’ and follows The Sword Bearer chronologically, filling in gaps between that book and The Tower of Geburah, but it was published fourth in this series. There was a teaser for a further sequel, which led me to discover that two had in fact been published, after the family member who’d bought me my copies of books in this series thought I’d aged out of reading them, so I hadn’t known about them before. I’m feeling reluctant about paying too much out to read them now after this book, and the diminishing returns of this series, in all honesty.
I found this book less satisfying than the earlier books, although it covers this Christian fantasy world’s equivalent of the crucifixion and resurrection. The child heroes feel like they’re on a very disconnected quest. They keep forgetting the lessons they learn, needing continual reminders from Gaal (the Jesus Christ figure) to follow instructions that are both specific, but confusing to them. The series has always mixed all kinds of influences, but it seemed even worse this time around: one of the characters is a dragon, they go to a version of Rapunzel’s Tower, then a disconcerting version of Pan turns up, while one of Evil’s forms is a Bull. Add to that the familiar Matmon (dwarves), and locations and antagonists from the previously published books, and it’s not very cohesive.
John McNab and his father Ian have been in Canada long enough to settle, but we rejoin them after a visit with one of Ian’s former comrades has gone awry. Robbie McFarland is a drunk who hits his daughter Eleanor, who is younger than John. She’s run away from home, crossing the frozen Black Sturgeon Lake on a wintery night. Ian and John are following her to check that she’s all right, and have found footsteps that disappear into nothingness. Because of their past experiences in ‘The Sword Bearer’, they wonder if she has crossed into Anthropos. But if Ian returns there, won’t he revert into Mab the ancient Seer, who was close to death? John must go alone, and so he does, following the footsteps and finding he is now wearing different clothes and carrying both the Sword of Geburah and the Mashal Stone.
About a millennium has passed in Anthropos, he’ll learn. He meets a talking dragon named Pontificator and a talking dog who digs up treasure that will be familiar to readers of ‘The Tower of Geburah’. Once that’s done, John is perturbed to learn that the dog and dragon are agreed, Gaal said the dragon must burn the dog. John, of course, doesn’t know who Gaal is, unlike the readers, and finds the notion horrifying, but he can’t dissuade the other two creatures. So he leaves them, only to find that a nearby village is enchanted, and that’s a bad thing.
In the first of many transformations, it turns out that Pontificator had to burn the dog with his dragon fire, because she was Eleanor who the evil sorcerer Shagah had turned into a dog when she first arrived in Anthropos, some two years ago, because as we know, time passes differently there compared with our world. She had been a cowed dog at that until she met Gaal. She informs John that they are meant to carry the treasures to a Tower, by way of the city of Bamah, Shagah and his lot’s stronghold, to defeat Shagah.
Yes, it’s that kind of logic that pervades the book!
My other big problem was to do with Eleanor. John is the all-encompassing hero (with flaws) and the only time we don’t hollow him is one scene with the servants of Gaal to give us broader context. For plot purposes, John has an uncanny ability (well, the Mashal Stone turns the wearer invisible) to overhear conversations between Shagah and his master Lord Lunacy. Sometimes it’s in his dreams! But we are always told what happened to Eleanor when she and John are separated, we never just follow her, which makes her a less vivid character. It’s disappointing given how Lisa and Mary were written in other books. On their journey, both are equally fallible, sometimes the one falls prey to fears and enchantments, and the other has to help them, and sometimes both are victims, but she’s just the convenient potential love interest (John notices she’s beautiful at times and doesn’t know what to do with it.) It's also pretty much stated that her father wasn't just guilty of physical abuse, although this is not dwelt upon.
John getting to know and trust Gaal is another big part of the book. John, in ‘The Sword Bearer’ met the Changer (the equivalent of God the father), but now, Gaal, one of the ‘Regenskind’ (the descendants of the Regents that John helped bring to Anthropos to rule it) is here. John gradually remembers Gaal trees, and after meeting and being impressed by Gaal, slowly comes to obey him and realise that he is the son or the Changer, even if he keeps saying he will die. And he does after a dramatic duel of sorts. John, Eleanor and Pontificator stay with his dead body. But if you know anything about Easter, and have read the books that happen later, you’ll know that is not the end of the story.
Transformations linked to resurrection are a recurring theme in the book, even if I still stand by saying it is not as coherent as it might be. Some of the details are interesting – the guilt traps, and Gaal’s followers’ hideout in the walls of the enemy’s city, but I felt it was all a lot more confused and disconnected than it needed to be.
Gaal the Conqueror: John White, Eagle, Inter Publishing Service 1992
This is subtitled ‘Book 2 of ‘The Archives of Anthropos’ and follows The Sword Bearer chronologically, filling in gaps between that book and The Tower of Geburah, but it was published fourth in this series. There was a teaser for a further sequel, which led me to discover that two had in fact been published, after the family member who’d bought me my copies of books in this series thought I’d aged out of reading them, so I hadn’t known about them before. I’m feeling reluctant about paying too much out to read them now after this book, and the diminishing returns of this series, in all honesty.
I found this book less satisfying than the earlier books, although it covers this Christian fantasy world’s equivalent of the crucifixion and resurrection. The child heroes feel like they’re on a very disconnected quest. They keep forgetting the lessons they learn, needing continual reminders from Gaal (the Jesus Christ figure) to follow instructions that are both specific, but confusing to them. The series has always mixed all kinds of influences, but it seemed even worse this time around: one of the characters is a dragon, they go to a version of Rapunzel’s Tower, then a disconcerting version of Pan turns up, while one of Evil’s forms is a Bull. Add to that the familiar Matmon (dwarves), and locations and antagonists from the previously published books, and it’s not very cohesive.
John McNab and his father Ian have been in Canada long enough to settle, but we rejoin them after a visit with one of Ian’s former comrades has gone awry. Robbie McFarland is a drunk who hits his daughter Eleanor, who is younger than John. She’s run away from home, crossing the frozen Black Sturgeon Lake on a wintery night. Ian and John are following her to check that she’s all right, and have found footsteps that disappear into nothingness. Because of their past experiences in ‘The Sword Bearer’, they wonder if she has crossed into Anthropos. But if Ian returns there, won’t he revert into Mab the ancient Seer, who was close to death? John must go alone, and so he does, following the footsteps and finding he is now wearing different clothes and carrying both the Sword of Geburah and the Mashal Stone.
About a millennium has passed in Anthropos, he’ll learn. He meets a talking dragon named Pontificator and a talking dog who digs up treasure that will be familiar to readers of ‘The Tower of Geburah’. Once that’s done, John is perturbed to learn that the dog and dragon are agreed, Gaal said the dragon must burn the dog. John, of course, doesn’t know who Gaal is, unlike the readers, and finds the notion horrifying, but he can’t dissuade the other two creatures. So he leaves them, only to find that a nearby village is enchanted, and that’s a bad thing.
In the first of many transformations, it turns out that Pontificator had to burn the dog with his dragon fire, because she was Eleanor who the evil sorcerer Shagah had turned into a dog when she first arrived in Anthropos, some two years ago, because as we know, time passes differently there compared with our world. She had been a cowed dog at that until she met Gaal. She informs John that they are meant to carry the treasures to a Tower, by way of the city of Bamah, Shagah and his lot’s stronghold, to defeat Shagah.
Yes, it’s that kind of logic that pervades the book!
My other big problem was to do with Eleanor. John is the all-encompassing hero (with flaws) and the only time we don’t hollow him is one scene with the servants of Gaal to give us broader context. For plot purposes, John has an uncanny ability (well, the Mashal Stone turns the wearer invisible) to overhear conversations between Shagah and his master Lord Lunacy. Sometimes it’s in his dreams! But we are always told what happened to Eleanor when she and John are separated, we never just follow her, which makes her a less vivid character. It’s disappointing given how Lisa and Mary were written in other books. On their journey, both are equally fallible, sometimes the one falls prey to fears and enchantments, and the other has to help them, and sometimes both are victims, but she’s just the convenient potential love interest (John notices she’s beautiful at times and doesn’t know what to do with it.) It's also pretty much stated that her father wasn't just guilty of physical abuse, although this is not dwelt upon.
John getting to know and trust Gaal is another big part of the book. John, in ‘The Sword Bearer’ met the Changer (the equivalent of God the father), but now, Gaal, one of the ‘Regenskind’ (the descendants of the Regents that John helped bring to Anthropos to rule it) is here. John gradually remembers Gaal trees, and after meeting and being impressed by Gaal, slowly comes to obey him and realise that he is the son or the Changer, even if he keeps saying he will die. And he does after a dramatic duel of sorts. John, Eleanor and Pontificator stay with his dead body. But if you know anything about Easter, and have read the books that happen later, you’ll know that is not the end of the story.
Transformations linked to resurrection are a recurring theme in the book, even if I still stand by saying it is not as coherent as it might be. Some of the details are interesting – the guilt traps, and Gaal’s followers’ hideout in the walls of the enemy’s city, but I felt it was all a lot more confused and disconnected than it needed to be.
