Review
"Rohan Quine is one of the most brilliant and original writers around. His 'The Imagination Thief' blended written and spoken word and visuals to create one of the most haunting and complex explorations of the dark corners of the soul you will ever read. Never one to do something simple when something more complex can build up the layers more beautifully, he is back with a collection of 4 seamlessly interwoven novellas. [...] suffice to say he is the consummate master of sentencecraft. His prose is a warming sea on which to float and luxuriate. But that is only half of the picture. He has a remarkable insight into the human psyche, and he demonstrates it by lacquering layer on layer of subtle observation and nuance. Allow yourself to slip from the slick surface of the water and you will soon find yourself tangled in a very deep and disturbing world, but the dangers that lurk beneath the surface are so enticing, so intoxicating it is impossible to resist their call." "It would be remiss of me not to take this opportunity to bring people's attention to a truly remarkable book. Rohan Quine writes right at the boundary between literary fiction and experimentalism, and his new collection of four novellas, 'The Platinum Raven and other novellas', is a genuine masterpiece. This guy is as good as [Sergio] De La Pava, and deserves to be the next self-published literary author to cross over into mainstream consciousness" (in "SPR"). "Rohan is one of the most original voices in the literary world today - and one of the most brilliant." "four stunning new novellas by one of the most exciting literary writers in the UK."
- Dan Holloway, novelist, poet and "Guardian" blogger
"Rohan Quine is a master of words, his world is also accessible, and it's a place you definitely need to visit. With echoes of Jennifer Egan's 'Goon Squad', Quine captures all that is beautiful, but he doesn't shy away from all that is ugly. What links the four novellas together is that his characters are all searching for that something beyond the everyday, beyond the ordinary, and Quine is a god, having them dole out kindness and justice. In his world, everything that is commonplace would be annihilated. This is the kind of read you have to give yourself up to. [...] When you emerge on the other side with a greater understanding of what it means to be 'that animal called human', then that will be the time to stop and ask, 'What just happened?'" "Rohan Quine is a poet who happens to write novellas/novels. Incredible use of language."
- Jane Davis, novelist
"Novelist Rohan Quine not only has several books out. He also has a career in alternative modeling and film to look back on. Naturally, he has gone on to make a series of silent short films to go with an audio track of the author reading from his work. It's flooded with city lights, drugs and darkness. One foot in the New York Nineties, and one foot in today's London, it's both hypnotic and gut-churning."
- Polly Trope, novelist, writing in "indieBerlin"
"A cautionary tale of the potential corrupting power both of vanity and of the internet plays out in modern London's high-tech dockland offices and luxury apartments, with brief forays to lavish West End hotels and country houses. [...] As the story becomes ever darker, gentle touches of humour provide a little light relief. I particularly enjoyed the characterisation of the women, especially the wonderfully petulant Angel Deon [...]. While at first this parable's main purpose may seem to rage against the principles of a high tech, monopolistic, capitalist world that enable individuals to lead unspeakably privileged lives above the law, it is at the same time a cautionary tale against narcissism and the abandonment of love and compassion for others. This broader theme gives the story its true heart and depth. Quine is renowned for his rich, inventive and original prose, and he is skilled at blending contemporary and ancient icons and themes. [...] an interesting approach to dialogue, blending idiom and phraseology from different eras, from Victorian times through 20th century popular film culture to the modern day. [...] There are some classic moments of horror that are very filmic, including one on a par with the Psycho shower scene. Without giving too much away, I can imagine this book might put readers off accessing their own attics for a while."
- Debbie Young, novelist and Amazon UK 1,000 Reviewer, writing in "Vine Leaves Literary Journal", about "The Host in the Attic"
"This is an extraordinary writer. I am going to gorge myself on these novellas as soon as I possibly can."
- JJ Marsh, novelist
"cerebral works full of brilliant imagery and invention.This series of novellas are all well crafted and designed to draw the reader in to the shifting realities of their settings. The title novella 'The Platinum Raven' in fact has two young women in two narratives [...] very vividly described. There are elements of magical realism and alternate reality throughout. At times the two Ravens appear to communicate but the levels of reality are enigmatic and intriguing. 'The Host in the Attic' is a beautifully reinterpreted version of 'The Picture of Dorian Gray' set in a high-tech dystopian world and a sinister computer global company - Mainframe Corporation, which appears to permeate every level of society. The hologram corporate image logo is in essence Dorian. All the main characters from Wilde's novel are here in more modern form. It has a tremendous and horrific climax. The horror novella 'Apricot Eyes' is a fast-paced horror tale in a nightmarish New York. 'Hallucination in Hong Kong' is a mysterious tale of past and present, dreams and waking with horror and love themes. The whole collection is a roller-coaster of at times nightmarish perceptions and strange surreal happenings brilliantly imagined. The tales leave a lasting impression and I recommend highly."
- Alexander Gordon-Wood, actor
The following are reviews of Rohan Quine's "Hallucinations" (New York: Demon Angel Books), published in print in the USA only, which included earlier versions of: "Apricot Eyes"; "Hallucination in Hong Kong"; and a few chapters of "The Platinum Raven".
"I have now been reading 'Hallucinations' with great pleasure [...] you are indeed a star."
- Iris Murdoch
"He has no equal, today or tomorrow."
- James Purdy
"Sometimes Quine succeeds with things you wouldn't think language could do, like describing a piece of music with an extended metaphor that reads something like watching the last half-hour of '2001'."
- Ben Cohen, "New York Press"
"'Hallucinations' at the end of this millennium is what Lautréamont's, Huysmans's and Wilde's work represented at the end of the 19th century [...] a sadistically svelte structure on top of explosive, primal content that refuses to behave in a linear fashion. It can only be described as literature that strains between ecstasy and bondage [...] one of the chic-est, most provocative things we have read in years [...] one of those seminal works that goes on to be accorded the status of a classic."
- Wayne Sterling, "New York Web"
"The imagery is 'Apocalypse Now'-era Coppola meets Wes Craven, or 'Edward Scissorhands' meets 'Barbarella' [...] or Anne Rice (as screenwriter) on an acid trip [...] the lilt and cadence of prose poetry laid end-to-end, resulting in a narrative that is frequently stunning [...] sublime verbal renderings of the emotions and sensations of human love."
- Hayward Connor, "Union Jack"
"Most taut and clever in ['Apricot Eyes']; it grips the reader and gives a provocative ride [... 'Hallucinations'] develops 'alternative' characters with style and dimension, as well as challenging traditional forms of storytelling with admirable results."
- Tom Musbach, "Lambda Book Report"
"This is quite an extraordinary work, distinguished both by its originality and by the strength of [its] voice."
- Anne Hawkins, literary agent (John Hawkins & Assocs.)
"There's a reality in each sentence of 'Hallucination in Hong Kong' that neither depends on nor is blurred by all its virtuoso f*ckings of the English language."
- Dr Michael Halls
From the Author
In Hallucination in Hong Kong by Rohan Quine, sliding from joy to nightmare and back, a plane-flight frames a journey into Jaymi's and Angel's polarised identities and perceptions, where past and present merge in an obsessive fantasy of love, death, horror and apocalyptic beauty.
As their plane takes off, Jaymi is warmed by the presence of his friend Angel sitting beside him. They are bound for Hong Kong, to perform a concert of unearthly music from a stage set high on the Peak, while the world will listen. Jaymi starts to doze ... and enters a fog of horror in seeming to remember that this concert lies in their distant past, not their imminent future: it happened nine years ago, and straight after that triumphant occasion there occurred unexpected disaster and the permanent catatonia of Angel. Those terrible events were rendered all the more poignant, moreover, by the idyllic chapter that the two of them had experienced together when they'd first met - a chapter that Jaymi now relives in his mind in rich detail, when Angel first perceived and came to accept the voltage of darkness in Jaymi's imagination.
In reality (it would seem), Jaymi is now travelling on this flight by himself, to put a compassionate end to Angel's life, in view of his continued catatonia. And step by step, this mission is accomplished, in an atmosphere of escalating nightmare and disjunction, incongruously set against the stunning beauty of night-time Hong Kong as seen from the Peak and the Midlevels. That nightmare atmosphere is magnified by the obsessive flicker of Jaymi's mind through complex permutations of his own possible guilt at betraying Angel, and the latter's possible knowledge of this guilt ... because hadn't there actually been a mirror on the ceiling above the bench where Angel lay supine years ago, unnoticed by Jaymi at the time but in fact revealing to Angel certain things about Jaymi's movements that he hadn't known Angel could see?
When an airline steward's hand shakes Jaymi awake, returning him to safety beside the living Angel on the plane once again, it is of course a vast relief. But so hallucinatory was the intensity of his dream, Jaymi cannot but be paranoid to recognise, somewhere behind the warmth of their next words together, that Angel seems somehow to have intuited the contents of the dream, perhaps ... whereupon there seeps into the world a breath of those hellish possible events that lie just beneath the surface of our present and our future, always ready to break through into reality if they become so inclined.
Sliding between nightmare and the heights of lyrical joy, and obliquely reconciling these extremes, Hallucination in Hong Kong conjures up from Jaymi's and Angel's polarised identities and perceptions an obsessive fantasy of dark androgyny, ironic horror and apocalyptic beauty.
From the Inside Flap
Table of Contents of Hallucinationin Hong Kong by Rohan Quine
1 So here is the horror, to sicken the sun
2 Love among the spires and the fountains
3 Oh, my Angel
From the Back Cover
In Hallucination in Hong Kong by Rohan Quine, sliding from joy to nightmare and back, a plane-flight frames a journey into Jaymi's and Angel's polarised identities and perceptions, where past and present merge in an obsessive fantasy of love, death, horror and apocalyptic beauty. At take-off, warmed by the presence of his friend Angel beside him, Jaymi starts to doze, and enters a fog of horror in seeming to remember that their destination lies in the past, not ahead ... forcing him to explore those hellish possible events lying beneath the surface of our present and future, always ready to break through into reality.
About the Author
Rohan Quine is an author of literary fiction with a touch of magical realism and a dusting of horror. He grew up in South London, spent a couple of years in L.A. and then a decade in New York, where he ran around excitably, saying a few well-chosen words in various feature films and TV shows, such as "Zoolander", "Election", "Oz", "The Last Days of Disco", "The Basketball Diaries" and "Law & Order: SVU". He's now living back in East London, as an Imagination Thief. In addition to its paperback format, his novel THE IMAGINATION THIEF is available as an ebook that contains links to film and audio and photographic content in conjunction with the text. It has gathered some great reviews in "The Guardian", "Bookmuse", "indieBerlin" and elsewhere. It's about a web of secrets triggered by the stealing and copying of people's imaginations and memories, the magic that can be conjured by images of people, the split between beauty and happiness, and the allure of power. Four novellas - THE PLATINUM RAVEN, THE HOST IN THE ATTIC, APRICOT EYES and HALLUCINATION IN HONG KONG - are published as separate ebooks, and also as a single paperback THE PLATINUM RAVEN AND OTHER NOVELLAS, attracting great reviews including from Iris Murdoch, James Purdy, "Lambda Book Report" and "New York Press". Hunting as a pack, all four delve deep into the beauty, darkness and mirth of this predicament called life, where we seem to have been dropped without sufficient consultation ahead of time. His new novel THE BEASTS OF ELECTRA DRIVE, well reviewed in "Kirkus", "Bookmuse", "Bending the Bookshelf" and elsewhere, is a prequel to the above five tales, and a good place to start. From Hollywood Hills mansions and Century City towers, to South Central motels and the oceanside refinery, havoc and love are wrought across a mythic L.A., through the creations of games designer Jaymi, in a unique explosion of glamour and beauty, horror and enchantment, celebrating the mechanisms and magic of creativity itself.
