Mrs Caliban

Rating:
Summary: Classic feminist fantasy
Review: I'd heard about this book for years... Apparently it's considered one of the great modern novels in the UK, though it's not very well known here in Ingalls' native country. I loved the concept--a neglected Los Angeles housewife finding true love in the arms of the Creature from the Black Lagoon--and thank God Ingalls was literate enough to carry it off with style, humor and a great underlying sincerity. "Mrs. Caliban" rates with the best of Margaret Atwood, Fay Weldon and Angela Carter; its edgy depiction of interspecies romance also reminded me of the Canadian writer Marian Engel's savage exploration of the modern female heart, "Bear." Now that we Americans can finally get it, long may it stay in print!

Rating:
Summary: Highly Recommend--works on so many different levels
Review: Mrs. Caliban is a lonely housewife, who has lost a child, and whose marriage is falling apart. Then, she is rescued by a sea monster, who loves fruit and makes passionate love to Mrs. Caliban all day--or is she rescued? Or destroyed?

This deceptively simple novel forces you to decide. Ms. Ingalls does not force her answer down your throat, but gives you a story to which you bring your own thoughts and values.

Is it a fairy tale which ultimately goes bad? Is it a metaphor for the dangers of extramarital affairs, and in particular the danger of trying to escape reality through an affair replete with fantasy?

Is it a warning against the addictive, and ultimately destructive, power of drugs?

On a completely different level, it seems to me that Mrs. Calliban tells the story of creating a story. First a few bits of fiction creep into a writer's otherwise mundane existence, just as Mrs. Caliban hears things that appear very real to her, but no one else hears. As the author continues writing, fictional characters appear on stage, full blown--just as Larry appears in Mrs. Caliban's kitchen. As the novel progresses, its fictional characters begin to take over the author's life, and the fictional world becomes more real than the temporal world the rest of us live in--in an almost sensual way. Then, when the book is finally finished, the characters die--there is nothing left to create and the characters you have created are released to the wider world. Note that the only character left standing at the end of Mrs. Caliban is the narrator herself. And no matter what she does, she can never get Larry back.

Mrs. Caliban is an easy, quick read, but stays in the mind after--like every good book, the more you think about it, the more insight you get. Highly recommended for anyone with a free evening to devote to a good read.

Rating:
Summary: Monster Love
Review: This is a powerful short novel filled with playful words and images that are in dialogue with classical ideas of romance and gothic horror. It works on Shakespeare's idea of the interplay between dream and reality, but does so at a very domestically satisfying level. As the title suggests, this novel's focus is on the housewife and not the great green monster that finds his way into her kitchen. Yet, behind this simple romance is a thick plot of betrayal. This is tightly controlled by Ingalls who never gives anything away until it will make its maximum impact. It's a shame that this novel (and author!) seems to have fallen into a category of obscure fiction because it is truly inspiring in its creative inventiveness and deep psychological portrayal of corrupted innocence.