Book Review: The Abode Of Fancy by Sam Coll

Sam Coll disobeys every supposed rule on how to get your debut novel published. Snappy start? Not really. Linear, coherent storyline? Hardly. And yet, the good folks at Lilliput were brave enough to take a chance on this madcap marvel. It’s a sprawling behemoth of a book. One part follows Trinity freshman Simeon Collins as he falls in and out of love, drinks to excess and writes terrible poetry.

The other is the fantastical story of the Mad Monk, as he converses with animals, resurrects a demon dog from the Drumcliffe graveyard where Yeats’ body rests, and makes whoopee with a banshee in a gypsy caravan in the midlands. Some of Coll’s stiff, formal prose feels forced, and the narrative meanders a little too wildly at times. But this is a wild and wonderful ride, filled with a memorable menagerie of drunks, poets, chess lovers, faeries, frauds and zombie canines. Think Flann O’Brien gas-bagging with Peter Murphy in a dimly-lit snug and you’re in the right parish. This is a deeply idiosyncratic debut – but one that is well worth paying attention to.