MISTER PIP, by Lloyd Jones

(originally posted on July 26, 2007)

The first paragraph sucks you in and thereafter the story of the juxtaposition between an island's survival by brute force and the power of imagination is a marvel. Jones creates wonderful characters and delivers big themes with the smallest of missteps. One might not have thought of a Dickens novel as a minefield of danger but the New Zealand-based author shows, in stark terms, just how this comes to pass.