BOOK REVIEW - THE SEA DREAMS IT IS THE SKY BY JOHN HORNOR JACOBS

Intoxicating mix of literature, poetry, cosmic horror
and a perilous return to a homeland ruled by a cruel military junta

The wonderfully versatile John Hornor Jacobs makes a welcome return to the horror genre with his beguilingly strange and compelling novella, “The Sea Dreams It Is the Sky” which packs much into its 127 pages. If you’ve never come across Jacobs he’s well-worth investigating; his debut “Southern Gods” was a superlative play on the myth behind blues music with a phantom radio station giving off strange vibes and followed that with his customary change of direction, an entertaining zombie novel “This Dark Earth”. Next up was an excellent fantasy trilogy the “Incorruptibles”, however, my favourite is his YA series which opens with “The Twelve Fingered Boy”. If you’re looking for a great tip for a boy aged 12-14 this is a wonderful recommendation. Jacobs is a highly underrated YA writer and a couple of years ago Ginger Nuts of Horror featured “The Twelve Fingered Boy” in one of our ‘Top 50 YA Horror Guides’ here   He is a very cool writer.
 
Back to “The Sea Dreams It is the Sky”; which is set initially in Malaga, Spain, in 1987 and narrated by Isabel who is an academic who lectures in literature at the local university. However, Isabel is not Spanish and is in exile from a South American country which is controlled by a brutal dictatorship. This is a fictional country called ‘Magera’ which resembles the Pinochet military junta which ruled Chile for many years around the same time. Isabel becomes friends with a South American poet, Rafael Avendano, who hails from the same country as her, she recognises him as “Mageran” instantly just by his mannerisms. Although “The Eye” (which is his nickname) is not a household name, in academic and literary circles he is notorious for what he has written about their country. He is much older than her and is also fascinated by his past; nothing sexual happens between them because Isabel is gay, a fact which plays some part in the story.
 
And what a strange story it was… Much of the first half concerns their developing friendship, interests, longings for their homeland, her lack of interest in her lecturing job and their shared passions. Rafael Avendano is known as “The Eye” because of the eye patch he wears and has not returned to Magera since he called it the “shit stain between the asshole of America and the cunt of Colombia” and is an outspoken critic of the despot ruling the nation. Although Isabel was not initially a fan of Avendano’s writing she is drawn to him and when she looks after his flat, after he abruptly returns to South America, things get stranger and a supernatural element infiltrates the story.
 
When staying in his flat she finds unpublished passages and other hidden writings, or perhaps extracts he expected her to discover? Becoming obsessed with his scribblings, these manuscripts begin to open strange doors and hallucinations. The narration then begins to splinter and we head back in time to Magera and the period when Avendano still had sight in both his eyes. Their connection becomes stronger and before long it’s obvious that Isabel is also going to return to South America to seek him out.
 
I loved the way the novella opened; quietly sipping coffee with Isabel when she first meets “The Eye” and watching Mexican wrestling films together at the local cinema. It was a strange friendship, and although Avendano was undoubtedly a womaniser in his youth Isabel is confident in her own sexuality in a time when it may well have been dangerous or worse. These are the only two characters given much page time in the novella, both of which are exceptionally well drawn. Although set in 1986, it had the vibe of being a decade or longer earlier than that, perhaps this was intentional as the novella broadly bases itself around the activities of other military juntas from earlier periods, such as Argentina in the 1970s.
 
I recall reading about the Argentinean junta which ruled from 1976-83 in which half of the population were rumoured to be spying on the other half and that torture became so common place it became routine. “The Sea Dreams It Is the Sky” has that vibe, although it moves into cosmic horror much of the evilness comes from man; the torture, the disappearances, the role of the CIA and the blandness of evil which could very well be orchestrated by your next-door neighbour.
 
“The Sea Dreams It Is the Sky” is a terrific and lyrical introduction to the fiction of John Hornor Jacobs, however, be warned the cosmic horror element does not dominate the story, nor does it need to, the wider story of Isabel and Avendano is powerful enough. Jacobs has another novella “A Lush and Seething Hell” scheduled for release in 2019, which looks like it might be connected to this. Here’s hoping.
 
Tony Jones

THE SEA DREAMS IT IS THE SKY BY JOHN HORNOR JACOBS