# Books you'd describe as being "a dark Narnia" **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [December 21, 2010, 11:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/books-youd-describe-as-being-a-dark-narnia/565016 "2010-12-21T23:32:32Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 11\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![The\_wind\_of\_my\_soul](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/ecc23a/32.png) [@The\_wind\_of\_my\_soul](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_wind_of_my_soul)\ **Post date:** [March 31, 2011, 4:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/books-youd-describe-as-being-a-dark-narnia/565016/41 "2011-03-31T16:32:28Z")
Sounds like _Inception_. Not a book, but it’s so close to the premise you described in the OP that I figured it was still worth a mention. ---
**Author:** ![WhyNot](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/c77e96/32.png) [@WhyNot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WhyNot)\ **Post date:** [March 31, 2011, 4:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/books-youd-describe-as-being-a-dark-narnia/565016/42 "2011-03-31T16:33:10Z")
> [@Malthus](#): > > In short, the book is premised not so much on atheism as on a sort of gnosticism. > > It reminds me of the conversation that starts out _The Master and Margarita_, where an (atheist) poet is being lectured by a Soviet bureaucrat about what was wrong with his “official atheist” poems - that they portrayed Jesus as a _bad guy_, which was all very well but quite different fromn portraying him as _non-existent_. I wouldn’t call either the books or the writer “atheist.”. They’re downright _anti_-theist. G-d exists, all right, and he’s a right miserable bastard, and institutions that support him (literally) are corrupt and terrible. About as subtle as a brick to the head, by the end of the series. And, since I missed replying to this the first time around: [QUOTE=elfkin477] But no, unless the second half of the series is much bleaker than the first, the world in HDM was just different with some bad stuff here and there like severing the kids’ daemons and not as all-around horrible as I’m hoping for. [/QUOTE] Oh yes, it gets a \*lot \*bleaker and darker. ---
**Author:** ![Malthus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/85f322/32.png) [@Malthus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Malthus)\ **Post date:** [March 31, 2011, 4:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/books-youd-describe-as-being-a-dark-narnia/565016/43 "2011-03-31T16:41:45Z")
> [@WhyNot](#): > > I wouldn’t call either the books or the writer “atheist.”. They’re downright _anti_-theist. G-d exists, all right, and he’s a right miserable bastard, and institutions that support him (literally) are corrupt and terrible. > > About as subtle as a brick to the head, by the end of the series. > > And, since I missed replying to this the first time around: > > Oh yes, it gets a \*lot \*bleaker and darker. Certainly - that’s my point: it is often claimed to be an atheist book, but it isn’t. In a real “atheist book”, one would hardly expect to find an afterlife (even a horrible one). ---
**Author:** ![Doctor\_Who](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/ed8c4c/32.png) [@Doctor\_Who](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Doctor_Who)\ **Post date:** [March 31, 2011, 4:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/books-youd-describe-as-being-a-dark-narnia/565016/44 "2011-03-31T16:54:33Z")
> [@delphica](#): > > Oh, I remembered another one, _The Book of Lost Things_, by John Connolly. I think it compares well to Narnia, because although it’s a recent book, it really has the feel of a mid-century children’s fantasy novel. The world in that one is quite dark – it’s definitely dark when the protagonist arrives, it’s possible that there have been other times in the history of that world where it wasn’t so dark. Boo hiss! I was going to say this one. I’ve read most of the others (The Magicians, Dark Materials, etc). I would say this comes the closest. It is a dark book - Dopers: if you are a fan of the rest of the novels listed in this thread, don’t miss this one. ---
**Author:** ![Lamia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/8e7dd6/32.png) [@Lamia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lamia)\ **Post date:** [March 31, 2011, 11:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/books-youd-describe-as-being-a-dark-narnia/565016/45 "2011-03-31T23:08:18Z")
> [@jsgoddess](#): > > The Grossman book was the one that popped into my mind. There are other books where someone goes into a dark or at least dangerous otherworld, including _Coraline_ by Gaiman,\* The Keys to the Kingdom\* series by Garth Nix, _The Last Rune_ series by Mark Anthony, and _The War of the Flowers_, by Tad Williams. I haven’t read the _Keys to the Kingdom_ books, but I was going to suggest the \*Abhorsen \*series (also known as the _Old Kingdom_ series) as being of possible interest. The first one, _Sabriel_, is probably the closest to what the OP describes. The heroine is actually from the fantasy realm of the Old Kingdom, but spends most of her youth at a boarding school in the mundane country of Ancelstierre. (This is a fictional place and not quite the real world, but magic exists only near the Old Kingdom border and the Ancelstierrians have early 20th century technology.) The two worlds share a physical border and it’s possible to walk back and forth between them, but it’s suggested that they are in different planes or dimensions. Different stars are visible in the two kingdoms, and the passage of time doesn’t quite sync up. The fantasy world in this series is quite dark, rather more so than I expected from a YA series. The heroine comes from a line of Abhorsens, magicians who act as reverse necromancers and send ghosts and revenants back to death, so she spends a lot of time dealing with the undead. ---
**Author:** ![Skald\_the\_Rhymer](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ecccb3/32.png) [@Skald\_the\_Rhymer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skald_the_Rhymer)\ **Post date:** [April 1, 2011, 12:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/books-youd-describe-as-being-a-dark-narnia/565016/46 "2011-04-01T00:26:42Z")
> [@Enderw24](#): > > I believe the movie version was called “The Narn” and it starred Diana Ross, Nipsey Russell, Ted Ross and Michael Jackson as the four kids. You…appear to be mocking the Wiz. I’m going to need you to take that back. ---
**Author:** ![Tom\_Scud](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/f08c70/32.png) [@Tom\_Scud](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tom_Scud)\ **Post date:** [April 1, 2011, 1:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/books-youd-describe-as-being-a-dark-narnia/565016/47 "2011-04-01T01:33:57Z")
Taking another aspect of the OP (people not adapting well to coming back to the real world), there’s Jo Walton’s short story [“Relentlessly Mundane”](http://www.strangehorizons.com/2000/20001023/relentlessly_mundane.shtml), which is “the kids who came back from Narnia, five years later, and how they adapted to not saving the world any more.” The end feels like kind of a cheat, but what can you do. ---
**Author:** ![Autolycus](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/22d042/32.png) [@Autolycus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Autolycus)\ **Post date:** [April 1, 2011, 2:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/books-youd-describe-as-being-a-dark-narnia/565016/48 "2011-04-01T02:52:49Z")
Well, there are parts of Oz that are wicked dark. ---
**Author:** ![Annie-Xmas](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/ecc23a/32.png) [@Annie-Xmas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Annie-Xmas)\ **Post date:** [April 1, 2011, 1:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/books-youd-describe-as-being-a-dark-narnia/565016/49 "2011-04-01T13:32:44Z")
> [@Autolycus](#): > > Well, there are parts of Oz that are wicked dark. There are parts of _Wicked_ that are oz dark? Seriously, if you haven’t read Maguire’s Oz books, do so. They are so much better, rich, and darker than the musical. ---
**Author:** ![Mr.Excellent](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/f19dbf/32.png) [@Mr.Excellent](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mr.Excellent)\ **Post date:** [April 1, 2011, 2:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/books-youd-describe-as-being-a-dark-narnia/565016/50 "2011-04-01T14:39:46Z")
Clive Barker’s “The Thief of Always” has an alternate world of sorts that is very dark indeed - though it doesn’t seem so at first. Juvenile fiction, but I actually like it better than his adult work - I think Barker works better when he’s forced to work within limits on his more outré interests. ---
**Author:** ![Gukumatz](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/74df32/32.png) [@Gukumatz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gukumatz)\ **Post date:** [April 1, 2011, 3:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/books-youd-describe-as-being-a-dark-narnia/565016/51 "2011-04-01T15:05:18Z")
Pan’s Labyrinth is probably disqualified being a movie, but man, that movie’s harsh. I came out of the theatre _wanting_ to believe in the good interpretation of the ending. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/books-youd-describe-as-being-a-dark-narnia/565016.md?page=2)