Teaching the Dog to Read, by Jonathan Carroll

I've said before that my relationship with Fantasy starts and ends with Tolkien. I read The Hobbit and the trilogy when I was young. I was one of the people who thought The Lord of the Rings was the best book ever written.

I tried to read Peter Beagle and T.M. White. I struggled and failed to read Mervyn Peake. I did read the first Shannara book by Terry Brooks. That settled it for me. I was not, am not, and almost certainly will not ever be a Fantasy reader.

With exceptions, of course. That's where Jonathan Carroll comes in. Carroll is a fantasist, but he doesn't deal with mythic kingdoms. No heroic quests in far flung lands. No elves, dwarves, or trolls. Carroll's work takes place in the here and now. You could call it Magical Realism, but like Joe R. Lansdale, Jonathan Carroll is a genre unto himself.

Carroll puts magic in the mundane. He makes the ordinary extraordinary. He's funny, and he is wholly unique. It's one of the many injustices in the world of literature that Jonathan Carroll is not as famous as Neil Gaiman. I think he is the better writer.

I began my reading relationship with Jonathan Carroll when I bought his novel, Sleeping in Flame, in 1992. I was instantly addicted. I've read everything I could by him all through the nineties and the two-thousands.

Carroll has gone down some strange roads in the latter part of his career. I honestly need to go back and re-read his last two full-length novels. Both The Ghost in Love and Bathing the Lion befuddled me.

I passed on the 2015 Subterranean Press novella, Teaching the Dog to Read. It sold out quickly and became a collector's item. I heard that this piece was like the Jonathan Carroll of olde. I finally happened upon an ex-library copy of the book last week, signed and all, and I jumped right into it.

I heard correctly. Teaching the Dog to Read is vintage Carroll. It's magical and romantic and funny, with surprises and delights all through its brief ninety-page length.

A rather plain, nondescript office guy anonymously receives two valuable gifts, a watch and a car. These items are not only worth a lot of money, they are items he personally coveted. Then he meets a captivating lady who is a mystery and a miracle.

I loved Teaching the Dog to Read. Every sentence is a pure delight. What other writer could use an everyday can opener as a talisman for love, and do so with wit and considerable poignancy? Maybe others could try, but I can't think of anyone but Jonathan Carroll who could pull it off so wonderfully.

Teaching the Dog to Read is not so easy to find. Unless I am mistaken, there is no ebook. For the Carroll fan who may not have read it, the book is well worth tracking down. To those uninitiated with the enchanted and sometimes terrifying world of Jonathan Carroll, I suggest starting at the beginning with his stunning debut, The Land of Laughs.

Written by Mark Sieber