THE ESCHER TWIST

Leonard Sheldrake is a crystallographer with a passion for the prints of M. C. Escher. At an exhibition of Eschers, he meets and falls instantly in love with Frieda. When she disappears, Leonard, aided by the Kellys, begins a search as twisted as the Möbius strip Escher used to explore the geometry of space. Michael Pritchard handles Langton's complex prose with ease. Pritchard makes the skewed landscape of Leonard's life seem almost normal. His performance allows us to feel Leonard's confusion as he crosses one plane into its mirror image, wondering why his hair is parted on the wrong side and why his watch is suddenly on the wrong hand. In this novel, as in any Escher, shapes and characters change, interact, and break through the plane between the real and the perhaps. S.J.H. (c) AudioFile 2002, Portland, Maine [Published: AUG/SEP 02]