Book Review - ‘The Illusions’ by Liz Hyder T

HE Marches has been home to many writers over recent decades. There are obvious reasons – the views are wonderful, the air peaceful and full of birdsong, there is a kind of creative tension in this Welsh borderland, and, on the whole, houses are cheaper than in the mainstream. There is an impressive roll-call of those within the Broad Sheep’s footprint who have made their living by the pen and become known nationally, from John Osborne and Frank Keating to GF Newman and Matthew Engel, among others, now joined by Ludlow writer, Liz Hyder.

Liz, a former drama student and chirpy imp of a woman, was involved in Arts PR before deciding to apply her own writing talents to an extraordinarily original and enthusiastically received Young Adults’ novel, Bearmouth, about children working down the mines in 19th century England, which won The Branford Boase Award. In 2022, she published The Gifts, which brought her more acclaim and established her as a writer of adult fiction. Her latest title is The Illusions (Bonnier Books, June 2023, £14.99.)

There’s been a great deal of alarmed chatter about AI and what it might do to the creative arts, not dissimilar to that faced by W. Caxton when he first put letterpress to paper. There are genuine concerns of course, when publishers at a certain level conclude that it would be sensible to do without individual authors and all their funny, egocentric ways, and simply employ a complicit, obedient computer to bash out 70,000 words on meditation and diet for expectant fathers, or novels of uncomplicated romance between couples, usually heterosexual, from certain imprints, where 62,000 words and a hero whose given name begins with J and two misunderstandings between protagonists are obligatory before they will ultimately be resolved in mutual passion.

However, it’s hard to conceive that this disturbing new technology could possibly have had anything to do with Liz Hyder’s new novel, so original and unexpected is its graphic portrayal of magic, illusion and pioneering movies. In her book, magic is presented as the plausible extension to music-hall and variety shows of late 19th century Bristol.

It is set in that city in 1896, where Cecily Marsden, 16 year-old London waif, is assistant to a raggedy old trickster. He dies in an accident which she believes she has caused and is scared of the magical powers she thinks she possesses. In another part of the city, we find Eadie Carleton, a pioneering film-maker, angry at not being taken seriously by dismissive men. Rising star magician George

Perris enters her life and sees at once the vast potential of moving pictures. He believes it will revolutionise the world of magic and illusion, but first he must win Eadie’s trust.

In a world where rivalry and jealousy are not strangers, George and Eadie work towards fulfilling the legacy of one of magic’s greatest exponents who has suddenly died among them. Or so it seems.

Liz handles with virtuoso writing the readiness of the public to suspend disbelief when they are asked, and the relationship between actuality and perception, while she deftly immerses the reader in that creative, inventive pursuit of misleading the eye and tricking the mind. She has harnessed her deep love and knowledge of historical illusionists and early movie pioneers, to produce a story of independent women and men, talent, magic and power, and sucks the reader into a world where anything is possible, aided by a suggestion of magic realism in the psychokinetic powers of two of her principal characters.

This story of a coming together of strong, talented characters engaged in a fantastical world is told with rational clarity, sins and redemption clearly acknowledged, with a strong pleasing love story unfolding alongside the tense build up to an effective crescendo in a supreme show of magic. I reached the last page with regret and perhaps a tear in my eye.

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