The Last Days of the Lacuna Cabal

Dixon, Sean. The Last Days of the Lacuna Cabal. A very strange little book! Initially written as a play, the author remarks that the actors in the original play left their mark when he transformed the play into a book.



Here is what induced me to begin reading:

(Let's start with the epitaph.)

(Oh no. Categorically no. This should become well established as an adventure story before anybody ever dies and anything ever changes.)

(But its a beautiful quote!)

(You mean epigraph.)

(Yes, let's begin with the epigraph. And don't tell anyone I made that mistake.)

(It's called a malapropism.)

(I know!)

(And by the epigraph, are you suggesting the quote by Ezra Pound.?)

(Yes!)

(Who, I might point out, is a man?)

(So?)

(Not to mention a damned fascist?)

(Don't you like the quote?)

(I like the quote very much. I love the quote.)

(...(?))

"WHAT THOU LOVEST WELL SHALL NOT BE REFT FROM THEE."

(Yes, just like that. That's the perfect epitaph.)

And then...things get really strange. The book is just weird -- full of odd ball characters and a fantastic (as in outrageous, bewildering, chimerical, freakish, implausible) plot.

Stir together a young woman's book club in Montreal, the Epic of Gilgamesh, Iraq, myth, and bildungsroman and what have you got? The Last Days of the Lacuna Cabal.

I liked it. There are flaws that brought me up short at times, but...I liked it. I can't categorize it and find it impossible to explain. This book is not for everyone, but I hope to hear more from this author.

Fiction. 2009. 292 pages.