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Hope Mirrlees
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Lud-in-the-Mist Kindle Edition

by Hope Mirrlees (Author) Format: Kindle Edition
4.4 out of 5 stars 475 ratings
"The single most beautiful, solid, unearthly, and unjustifiably forgotten novel of the twentieth century ... a little golden miracle of a book." —Neal Gaiman


Hope Mirrlees penned Lud-in-the-Mist--a classic fantasy, and her only fantasy novel--in 1926. When the town of Lud severs its ties to a Faerie land, an illegal trade in fairy fruit develops. But eating the fruit has horrible and wondrous effects.


"Helen Hope Mirrlees was born in England in 1887. Mirrlees was a close friend of such literary lights as Walter de la Mare, T.S. Eliot, André Gide, Katharine Mansfield, Lady Ottoline Morrell, Bertrand Russell, Gertrude Stein, Virginia Woolf, and William Butler Yeats. Under her own name, she published three novels: Madeleine— One of Life's Jansenists (1921); The Counterplot (1924); and her 1926 classic fantasy Lud-in-the-Mist, which has acknowledged inspiration to the likes of Neil Gaiman, Mary Gentle, Elizabeth Hand, Johanna Russ, and Tim Powers."--SF Site


"Hope Mirrlees' writing, usually underrated, moves between gently crazy humour, poetic snatches, real menace, and real poignancy."—The Encyclopedia of Fantasy

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  1. Print length
    303 pages
  2. Language
    English
  3. Publisher
    Wildside Press
  4. Accessibility
    Learn more
  5. Publication date
    May 20, 2022
  6. File size
    903 KB
  7. Page Flip
    Enabled
  8. Word Wise
    Enabled
  9. Enhanced typesetting
    Enabled
Next slide of product details

Editorial Reviews

Review

The single most beautiful and unjustifiably forgotten novel of the twentieth century.

-- "Neil Gaiman, #1 New York Times bestselling author"

From the Back Cover

“a little golden miracle of a book” —Neil Gaiman
Lud-in-the-Mist is a flourishing town and the capital of the Free State of Dorimare, located at the confluence of two rivers, the Dapple and the Dawl. Bordering to the west and said to flow from the Dapple is Fairyland. Dorimare law has banished Fairyland inhabitants and forbidden all fairy
things, but someone is smuggling fairy fruit into the state, causing addiction, fits of delusion, and, possibly, murder. Hope Mirrlees’s 1926 novel is an enchanting narrative intertwined with folklore, the magical realm of the fairy folk, mysterious intrigue, and rural superstitions. A delightful discovery for lovers of fantasy.

Product details

  • ASIN ‏ : ‎ B0B1W7PBRC
  • Publisher ‏ : ‎ Wildside Press
  • Accessibility ‏ : ‎ Learn more
  • Publication date ‏ : ‎ May 20, 2022
  • Language ‏ : ‎ English
  • File size ‏ : ‎ 903 KB
  • Screen Reader ‏ : ‎ Supported
  • Enhanced typesetting ‏ : ‎ Enabled
  • X-Ray ‏ : ‎ Not Enabled
  • Word Wise ‏ : ‎ Enabled
  • Print length ‏ : ‎ 303 pages
  • ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-1667639918
  • Page Flip ‏ : ‎ Enabled
  • Customer Reviews:
    4.4 out of 5 stars 475 ratings

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Hope Mirrlees

Hope Mirrlees

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Customer reviews

4.4 out of 5 stars
475 global ratings

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Customers say

Customers praise the book's writing quality, noting its sheer beauty of prose and easy readability, while appreciating its cheerful earthy humor. The book receives positive feedback for its style, with one customer highlighting its superb world-building. The pacing receives mixed reactions, with some customers finding it poorly paced.

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Writing qualityStyleHumorTonePacing
13 customers mention "Writing quality"10 positive3 negative

Customers praise the writing quality of the book, noting its sheer beauty and ease of reading, with one customer describing it as one of the best novels ever written in English.

"...It is written in a surprisingly straightforward, earthy style that nonetheless has plenty of room for some of the most beguiling and delightful..." Read more

"...The book is very well written, nothing is extraneous...." Read more

"...Her writing ranks with the best of literature; very often I found myself re-reading phrases or whole passages in awe of the power and beauty of her..." Read more

"...The font is ridiculously tiny and the lines are obnoxiously close together, to the point where it will not be an enjoyable read for anyone...." Read more

11 customers mention "Style"11 positive0 negative

Customers appreciate the style of the book, describing it as beautiful, with one customer particularly noting the ambiance created and another praising the author's wordcraft.

"...I now firmly agree with Neil Gaiman that this is "the single most beautiful, solid, unearthly, and unjustifiably forgotten novel of the twentieth..." Read more

"...Better than any 21st century fantasy. Truly an original gem." Read more

"This slim novel is strange and beautiful. In gorgeous prose, it tells the story of Lud, a prosperous town, that over the centuries, as all but..." Read more

"...re-reading phrases or whole passages in awe of the power and beauty of her wordcraft...." Read more

5 customers mention "Humor"5 positive0 negative

Customers enjoy the book's cheerful earthy humor, with one customer noting its trenchant political satire.

"...It uses broad comedy side by side with the melancholy and the bittersweet...." Read more

"...Lud-in-the-Mist is much more than a fantasy--it's a also a trenchant political satire and ultimately a deeply moving work of psychology and..." Read more

"...The writing is intelligent, clear, and sparkling with humor...." Read more

"...Not only is it great fantasy on its own, it's also a satire of modern life--the modes we operate under, the ways in which we make sense of the world..." Read more

3 customers mention "Tone"3 positive0 negative

Customers appreciate the book's tone, with one noting its wonderful glow to the reading experience and another describing its fanciful atmosphere.

"...warmth of her attitude towards the characters adds a wonderful glow to the reading experience." Read more

"...with entertaining and likeable characters, an elaborate plot, and a light tone that makes it easy to read and very memorable as well...." Read more

"...Liked the creepy, fanciful atmosphere, but barely cared about any of the characters." Read more

11 customers mention "Pacing"5 positive6 negative

Customers have mixed opinions about the pacing of the book, with some appreciating its world-building, while others note issues with repetitive and dragging sections.

"...Some parts were repetitious or dragging, and I felt like the book was a middle draft rather than a polished version whenever I hit one of those spots..." Read more

"...It is most certainly about balancing the mundane and the miraculous (paraphrasing Gaiman's introduction), which perhaps explains how it came to be..." Read more

"...The font is ridiculously tiny and the lines are obnoxiously close together, to the point where it will not be an enjoyable read for anyone...." Read more

"...Threaded with timeless wisdom; fantastical yet prescient scenarios; and the most lyrical, poetic world-building...." Read more

This printing is poorly formatted blasphemy - buy a different edition
2 out of 5 stars
This printing is poorly formatted blasphemy - buy a different edition
Lud In the Mist is one of the best novels ever written in English. I give copies as gifts and they generally cause delight. I specifically ordered this to take on vacation in order to give someone as a gift and instead I have to send it back and leave empty-handed. See photo: Bizarre formatting includes random lines at top of page. This appears to have simply been scanned and dumped it into a print-on-demand output with no humans performing a sanity-check or fixing any layout issues. The font is ridiculously tiny and the lines are obnoxiously close together, to the point where it will not be an enjoyable read for anyone. This is just packaged eye strain. This is not how anyone should treat this magical, memorable, masterpiece of a book. Really shameful. You should read this book; but buy an edition you can indeed actually read.
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Top reviews from the United States

  • PhoenixFalls
    5.0 out of 5 stars Brilliant.
    Reviewed in the United States on April 20, 2010
    Verified Purchase
    I don't think I'm well-read enough to review this book -- as is the case with many British writers of that period, Mirrlees is far better classically educated than I am, and I'm sure I missed quite a few of her references. However, I now firmly agree with Neil Gaiman that this is "the single most beautiful, solid, unearthly, and unjustifiably forgotten novel of the twentieth century" so I felt I should attempt to review it here in the hopes that I get a few more people to seek it out.

    This is most distinctly not the sort of fantasy novel that would be able to get published today. Tolkien's Shire feels strongly influenced by Mirrlees' Lud, but it's not the Shire that so many fantasy writers and publishers have taken as their model, it's all that pesky questing and evil-battling. There are no epic quests in this novel, and there is definitely nothing as comforting as a black-and-white delineation of good and bad.

    Instead, Lud-in-the-Mist is somehow at the confluence of high fantasy rooted strongly rooted in folktale and a political thriller. It is written in a surprisingly straightforward, earthy style that nonetheless has plenty of room for some of the most beguiling and delightful descriptive passages I've ever read. It uses broad comedy side by side with the melancholy and the bittersweet. It can be read as a parable of class struggle, or as an endorsement of mind-altering drugs (keep in mind that it was published in 1926, so I highly doubt that this was what Mirrlees intended). It is most certainly about balancing the mundane and the miraculous (paraphrasing Gaiman's introduction), which perhaps explains how it came to be all these things at once.

    There are quite a few elements that turned people off (judging from the reviews I've seen online) but every single one of them worked for me: yes, the first third or so was highly episodic; yes, Nathaniel Chanticleer seems a bit of a bumbling fool at first, and isn't exactly likable; yes, it is very British, and quite old, so everyone reads white (though the women come off quite a bit better than in most of the fantasy written by men at the time) and as I mentioned above there are plenty of classical references. If your reading diet is entirely post-Tolkien fantasy, this novel will come as a bit of a shock to the senses. But if you actually enjoyed some of those classics they forced on you in school (things like Gulliver's Travels (Penguin Classics), for instance, whether you read the satire or not) and want some fantasy with both a brain and a heart, this is absolutely the book for you.
    31 people found this helpful
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  • Sarah Sykes
    5.0 out of 5 stars GLORIOUS FAIRIE-TALE
    Reviewed in the United States on January 3, 2025
    Format: KindleVerified Purchase
    A nearly indescribable marvel of storytelling- you have to read it. Threaded with timeless wisdom; fantastical yet prescient scenarios; and the most lyrical, poetic world-building. Better than any 21st century fantasy. Truly an original gem.
    2 people found this helpful
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  • Ryan
    4.0 out of 5 stars The civilized clashes with the other side.
    Reviewed in the United States on August 8, 2015
    Verified Purchase
    Very enjoyable. I would say this is a mystery adventure book first and a fantasy book second. The fantasy is not the mages and orcs and elves type, the only fantasy element is the fairies. The fairies are real but they are also ethereal at the same time. They sort of represent the unexplained, the unincorporated, the wild, and maybe even ghostly. They exist despite all of the civilized peoples attempts to pretend they don't exist. The story is about the fairy world getting mixed up with the orderly, refined, and civilized people of Lud-in-the-Mist. There is a very real and tangible set of events that is uncovered slowly piece by piece. It's uncovered in a sort of detective novel style but only after the whole town is unhinged by the mysterious fairy fruit, and that's why I would say this is a mystery adventure book first, the fairy element makes it fantasy second.

    The book is very well written, nothing is extraneous. When I started reading the book I wasn't sure if it was going anywhere, but the farther into it I got, the more I realized that everything was a piece of the puzzle. Sometimes, when I'm reading a book, I worry that the author is wasting my time with loose ends. Not here. You can trust that the author is a master of her craft.
    2 people found this helpful
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  • Spode
    5.0 out of 5 stars Unique
    Reviewed in the United States on July 4, 2024
    Format: KindleVerified Purchase
    This slim novel is strange and beautiful. In gorgeous prose, it tells the story of Lud, a prosperous town, that over the centuries, as all but severed contact with Fairy, with which there was once much interchange. The town's denizens have become prosaic, predictable, and complacent due to this severing of ties, but perhaps there are those on either side of the divide who want to restore contact between the two realms, the human and the Fey.
    If you like Neil Gaiman or Jonathan Strange And Mr. Norrell, you'll like this. The prose is definitely on the level of fine literature, so the novel will be challenging for inexperienced readers.
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  • Jerry
    3.0 out of 5 stars Three Stars
    Reviewed in the United States on March 18, 2015
    Verified Purchase
    ok
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  • a customer
    5.0 out of 5 stars A must-read
    Reviewed in the United States on May 25, 2014
    Verified Purchase
    I can't understand why Lud-in-the-Mist is not as well-known and oft-read as the works of Tolkien, Lewis, and other early greats of the fantasy genre. (Perhaps because she was a woman, and to add insult to injury, their work suffers by comparison?!?) Lud-in-the-Mist is much more than a fantasy--it's a also a trenchant political satire and ultimately a deeply moving work of psychology and philosophy. It's also very funny--Hope Mirrlees has an absolutely wicked sense of humor. Her writing ranks with the best of literature; very often I found myself re-reading phrases or whole passages in awe of the power and beauty of her wordcraft. I'm already looking forward to reading Lud-in-the-Mist again--probably several times--because as much as I loved it the first time, I know that there is so much more to delve into than one reading permits; plus there will be the sheer pleasure in immersing myself in such gorgeous writing again!
    4 people found this helpful
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  • Julie Korhonen
    5.0 out of 5 stars No regrets getting this published edition
    Reviewed in the United States on March 27, 2022
    Verified Purchase
    Lud-In-The-Mist is a charming, surprising little book. I didn’t know books like this existed. Curiouser House always has such beautiful, thoughtful editions. The inside has a lovely art nouveau border and many surprise additions, especially Mirrlees’s modernist poem Paris at the end! These little butterflies and the decorative pink font on the cover sets the right mood for this beautiful story. This sacred, classic book deserves a presentation like this. No regrets buying this!
    6 people found this helpful
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Top reviews from other countries

  • guido orlandini
    3.0 out of 5 stars Not very interesting
    Reviewed in Italy on January 15, 2025
    Format: KindleVerified Purchase
    Wonder what all the hype is about . Language very pleasant to read, about half through and getting bored.
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  • Sissi
    3.0 out of 5 stars Gaiman sold it to me
    Reviewed in Germany on June 4, 2022
    Verified Purchase
    I bought this book because it was recommended by Neil Gaiman. Not everything Neil recommends is for people who like his work, but this is ok.
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  • Carol Ann Bradley
    5.0 out of 5 stars A captivating fairytale...
    Reviewed in the United Kingdom on February 15, 2025
    Verified Purchase
    The land of Dorimare was bounded on the south by the sea, and to the north and east by mountain range. These ancient hills marked the boundary between two countries; for beyond the Debatable Hills lay Fairyland. Though Lud-in-the-Mist was situated some twenty miles from the sea, with the confluence of two rivers it served as both a seaport and capital of Dorimare.

    The Dawl river was broad flowing and had long brought wealth and importance to the inhabitants of Lud-in-the-Mist. Rows of pretty red-roofed houses scattered its banks. From the Elfin Marches, the Dapple river ran subterraneously under the ancient hills, for its source was in Fairyland...

    In days of old, Lud had been part of a Duchy, which had consisted of both nobles and peasants. Often, hooded strangers on milk-white steeds would visit, with offerings of fairy fruit for the Duke and high-priest. Gradually, a grim middle-class of merchant traders had arisen; seized power and overthrown the old Duke Aubrey. A taboo was placed on all things fairy and ties were severed with Fairyland. The new rulers decreed that fairy things spelt delusion, and laid claim that the eating of fairy fruit was the chief cause of degeneracy in the dukedom line.

    Yet in spite of fairy fruit being banned, it was an open secret that anyone wanting a taste, could readily procure fairy fruit in Lud-in-the-Mist! An illegal trade dealing in the forbidden fruit had developed. No one knew the means and agents by which it was smuggled into the town; how it crossed the border was a mystery. But centuries past, there had been frequent intermarriage betwixt the mortals of Lud and Fairies. From time to time, an unmistakable crop of red hair would show amongst the race of Dorimare; it was most likely a strain of fairy blood!

    Many a youth of good family had taken to the vice of eating fairy fruit and, its effect was dire. Young Ranulph had succumbed and tasted a sherd of forbidden fruit and was never the same again. He sobbed, as he recounted seeing a small man dressed all in green... beckoning him to the Elfin Marches! Will he venture there... no one had ever returned from Fairyland. And why was his father Nathanial tormented by the Note?

    A gorgeous, whimsical fairytale... Vivid description and engaging humour transport the reader to a magical land; and urges them to think again about the pros and cons of Fairyland.
    Rating 5/5
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  • Ransen Owen
    4.0 out of 5 stars I don't normally like "fantasy"...
    Reviewed in the United Kingdom on September 16, 2018
    Verified Purchase
    I don't normally like "fantasy", but this was so well done I enjoyed it a lot. The last 10% of the book suddenyl flagged, but then it picked up.
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  • Bee Durban
    5.0 out of 5 stars A Book of Strange Heroes
    Reviewed in the United Kingdom on January 2, 2025
    Format: KindleVerified Purchase
    What an enchanting, beautifully written book! The language contained within is a spell all of its own. The more I read the more that I could feel the presence of Fairyland here, there, and everywhere. I am quite sure that Hope Mirrlees must be fairy herself. Lud-in-the-Mist is filled with warmth and compassion, strange heroes who step through fear into love, and a call for making our supposed enemies our friends. Healing for the world.
    Report

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