Stone and Sea — Graham Edwards

IN A WORLD BEYOND THE WORLD, DRAGONS AND WONDERS: the second book in a fantasy trilogy of huge charm and dynamism, and great potential. The Turned World has become our own world, almost. The story begins in the 19th century with the eruption of Krakatoa -- and the reader is hurled, brilliantly, BETWEEN worlds. Through a series of fabulous landscapes our heroes arrive at the Wall. This is the world of Stone, called Amara -- and a world as coherent as McCaffrey's Pern yet as relevant to the reader's own view of the universe as John Crowley's Aegypt series. Edwards is a very significant writer in this respect. The Wall shelters entirely new and strange creatures, such as the Tam, insectile beings that evolve rapidly to sentience whenever there is a breach in the Wall, which they repair and then revert. There are stone-age human settlements in extraordinary buildings, plant life between the cracks in the stones of the wall -- and the dragon descendants of characters from the first series. The story is action-packed and the plot extremely strong. Added to this, the central characters develop in totally convincing if startling directions.