Group Read: Arcadia Part 3, Chapters 23-33

So I've started chapter 22 which is a mind bender and thought I'd get this section going.

Here's a character list just for good measure -

Jay - 11 year old boy, belongs in Anterwold

Henry Lytten - 50-something academic, writing fantasy book which creates Anterwold, likes Rosie, the girl who feeds his cat

Thompson - crony of Henry’s

Persimmon - crony of Henry’s, scribbler

Davies - crony of Henry’s

Rosie Wilson - local girl, 15, feeds Henry’s cat

Professor Jenkins - Henry’s cat, named for horrible teacher in his past

Jack More - low-level security employee of scientific compound in the future

Angela Meerson - researcher and inventor of important tech at the scientific compound

Dr. Robert Hanslip - the ultimate bureaucrat and dictator, head of the scientific compound that employs (ed) Angela

Zoffany Oldmanter - rich and powerful head of a business that gobbles up others as investments, etc. Think Berkshire Hathaway but as run by Stalin.

Lucien Grange - sales rep/shill/fixer for Oldmanter

Alex Chang - very low level employee, worked for Angela doing data analysis and finding wayward people sent back in time.

Gunter - hapless janitor used by Angela to experiment with time travel, went mad in the 1890s and became a monk

Visitor - nameless agent of some government operating in Anterwold

Storyteller aka Scholar Henary - keeper of wisdom, tradition and all that is Objectively So in Anterwold (ha!)

Esilio - mythical figure/god in Anterwold

Callan Perelson - soldier for the Scholars and erstwhile forester/logger

Jaqui - hermit and denouncer of blind following of the Story

Etheran - deceased Scholar, Hanary’s mentor, Stoic in the vein of Cato

Portmore - WW2 to 1960 Head of British Intelligence

Samuel Wind - Also British Intelligence, somewhat of a Henry follower and possible frenemy.

Lady Catherine - Mistress of an independent domain in Willdon, Anterwold, widow of Thenald

Pamarchen - former heir of Thenald, now leader of disaffected malcontents, suspected of murdering Thenald

Gontal - Scholar

Volkov - Russian defector

The Very Reverend Horace Williams - cleric and friend to Henry

Renata & Beltan - married couple from Cister (Anterwold)

Aliena - singer, student of Rambert (Anterwold)

Rambert - Aliena’s teacher (Anterwold)

Sylvia Glass - leader in a Retreat
Emily Strang - Angela’s daughter (never have they met)

Antros - Pamarchon’s friend

Sgt. Maltby - 1960 copper, Special Branch

Here's the cover from my copy - the US hardback -



It doesn't have a clever cut out like the UK version, but it does sort of talk to the interconnectedness of the book. How the different timelines and settings intersect.

I woke up at 1:00 and couldn't get back to sleep. So now I'm on page 523 - CH 59. Hope to finish today. Really enjoying this one, but it definitely requires some mental gymnastics.

It is a bit of a MF for sure.

Ch 26 p 203 Pamarchon traces his lineage from mother to mother. How logical.

Ch 27 p 215 So now Rosie becomes a fortuitous guinea pig. How did Angela realize that she is here and not here?

Ch 29 p 224 - The Shelf of Perplexities!! OMG so awesome. Infinite Jest belongs on that one.

Ch 31 p 245-9 - I love the conversation between A and R. The repartee, the banter. Persiflage indeed!

>4 Bookmarque: Angela is hilarious!

I'm reading Jack's bit in chapter 24, which gives us more background info about the world (GB in the future) quite cleverly. Nice job of integrating what could have been a data dump, and still keeping it a bit murky.

I am loving this book so far! Though the two Rosies are doing my head in somewhat. How is Pears going to resolve that???

Schrödinger's Rosie.