There has been an enormous amount of pre-publicity about this book, and inevitably a certain amount of skepticism as a result. What the publishers clearly hope is that this will be in effect a Harry Potter in Japan. What the skeptics suspect is that an already established author is switching tracks in the hope of emulating J.K. Rowling's enormous international success.
But nothing can disguise the fact that this is a wonderful book. It's Tolkien meets Rowling meets something new and different. But above all, it's exquisitely written. Nothing as good as this could come from an author bent on imitating august predecessors.
It's set in what Hearn calls an "imaginary country" with many Japanese customs and traditions, not to mention landscape and seasons. This "imaginary"proviso is no doubt there simply to allow free play to the supernatural elements the author introduces into her story. For all intents and purposes the book is set in feudal Japan.
In a mountain village occupied by a tribe called the Hidden, a young boy escapes the murderous attacks of the Tohan, under their terrifying leader Iida Sadamu. He owes his life to a lord of the Otori tribe who is mysteriously present at the scene and carries him away under his cloak.
The boy is re-named Takeo and becomes the book's central character, its Harry Potter or Frodo if you like. He is inducted into the Otori tribe and adopted as his mentor's son and heir.
The Otori is determined to overthrow the hideous Iida Sadamu, and predictably Takeo becomes the chosen agent for this task. He is aided in his assignment by magical powers he has possessed from birth as a member of the Hidden. He has exceptional hearing, he can briefly become invisible, and he can also divide himself into two independent images.
Meanwhile a beautiful girl, Kaede, is being held hostage by one of the Tohan's allies. After she gains her freedom she encounters Takeo, and a romance that is both physical and mystical ensues. This love story gives the book another dimension, adding the flavor of the medieval romances of Tristan and Isolde, or Lancelot and Guinevere.
As he grows into adolescence, Takeo acquires a mysterious teacher, Kenji, who is more than he seems. A lesser figure than Gandalf, but more important than anyone at Hogwart's Academy, his true significance is not revealed until close to the book's dramatic, heart-rending conclusion.
Lian Hearn is the pseudonym for Gillian Rubinstein, an Australian writer of children's books. The new name comes from taking the last four letters of her first name, and adding the surname of the famous nineteenth century author Lafcadio Hearn. This Hearn went to live in Japan at the end of the 19th century and produced many books on the traditional life he found still flourishing there.
Macmillan are advertising this book as their first cross-over publication, equally suitable for children and adults. This is at best irrelevant. This book is a classic of its kind, and considerations of "target market" are distasteful in that context. There is no way in which the nature of this book has been adjusted to take account of a possible teenage readership.
Critics who argue that Across the Nightingale Floor is merely an imitation of Harry Potter and his predecessors miss the point. It's certainly true that the concept of a magically talented male adolescent who sets off, with the aid of a powerful teacher, on a quest on which the fate of whole populations depends is very familiar. But great myths don't thrive on originality, but instead on tapping into archetypal patterns that recur throughout humanity's imaginative history. Aeneas and Odysseus could as well be cited as Frodo or Potter. The greatest literature, it could be argued, only has a few prime narratives.
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