John Myers Myers' Silverlock is an odessey like adventure with the action and cavileir aditude of Robert Louis Stevensons' Kidknapped and the metaphysical undertones of George MacDonald's Phantasies. A. Clarence Shandon is thrown overboard in a storm on his way to Chicago. With no particular taste for life he accepts his inevitable death until he is saved against his will by Golias (also called Orpheus, Wisdith or Taliesin) and dragged through the Comonwealth on one long rambling adventure in which he laughs, drinks and despairs with Robin Hood, Beawulf, The Green Knight, Tam Lin, Job, Faustopheles, Hamlet, Davie Crocket and many others on his journey through storytelling to a better understanding of life.
The character of Shandon is hard to like at first but grows on you pretty quickly even before he starts the more major aspects of his transformation. Silverlock is a wonderful book to explore the effects of storytelling with and a perfect book for summer because most of it is episodic and goes at a more languid pace so you can soak it in little bits at a time. I don't know that I've read a book that made me feel so refreshed upon finishing it in a long time.
